Accents
After 100 days: a letter continues to remind
The Worldwide Filipino Alliance, the biggest online organization of Filipinos all over the world – abroad and in the home country – wrote a letter to the President-Elect enumerating critical issues posing a challenge to his presidency. Dr. Greg Mariano, a member of the UPMASA, the Association in America of graduates of the UP College of Medicine in the State University of the People, and this columnist, a member of the Filipino-American Association of Beaufort County, South Carolina, helped in finalizing the letter that was hand-carried to the Office of the President. Circulated online, the Letter-Petition has drawn worldwide signatures.
With the 100-day milestone just a wink away, time to deliberate, to do some sizing up, to see as to how far President Noynoy Aquino has gone to meet the critical issues posited by the Worldwide Filipino Alliance. One hundred days already out of the six years for this “Child of Destiny” to crack the country’s gargantuan problems.
Read on:
Worldwide Filipino Alliance writes to the President
4 July 2010
His Excellency
PRESIDENT BENIGNO SIMEON AQUINO III
Republic of the Philippines
Dear Mr. President:
Congratulations, Sir!
Our people have spoken!
Your phenomenal victory certainly speaks of the great hope of our people in you, not only those in the Homeland, but all over the world – the 8.7 million of us who are in diaspora, so that we and our families can survive.
Indeed, as TIME magazine intimates, the multitude who cast their votes for you are earnestly hoping that you and your fellow workers whom you will ask to flex muscles with you, could save our country. That you will “empower” the vast masses of our people so that they are freed from hunger and needs that they have been deprived of for a long time now. When they voted for you, Sir, all their dreams, their hopes, their prayers were embedded in that shaded oval beside your name.
They rallied to your call, confident and hopeful that under your leadership, a brighter future for their families and the country is attainable.
Your Excellency, you come to us not only during these exciting times. Millions of us believe we live in perilous times. The manifestations are numerous. They stare at us in the face every waking moment of our lives. They feed on each other resulting in a macabre societal dance bringing Philippine society closer and closer to the edge of a failed state. To cite a few, we perceive the following as critical:
An economic system that is so awry resulting in massive poverty for our people and forcing millions of us to roam the world for our survival.
Mind-boggling corruption and governmental incompetence.
Centuries-old mutual killings among our people arising from differing systems of belief which have claimed an estimated 150,000 lives in contemporary times alone. Needless to say, the intensifying “Clash of Civilizations” due to Al Qaeda and Jemaah Islamiyah can have a profound impact on the totality of Philippine society.
The seemingly continuing intransigence for the past 41 years of the National Democratic Front in their armed struggle which has resulted in some 40,000 of our people dying.
Environmental degradation which is weakening the web that sustains life.
Natural calamities arising from profound changes in the world’s weather systems due to global warming.
Mr. President, you were acclaimed and elevated to that pedestal of fame, fortune, power, and responsibility. You can command all the forces to do your bidding. But realistically, no matter how powerful and sincere you are, scraping the filth, the dirt, and the rotting carrion of societal corruption that the elite of our society have strewn all over the land and in the souls of our people all over the world would demand massive mobilization of our people, so that they will walk with you, bear with you, suffer with you to achieve our dreams of a progressive, peaceful, and respected country.
There are forces and groups in our society that will try to push their own agenda. Worse, they will try to contrive and exert their utmost to derail the programs that your team has crafted for our betterment.
For whatever it may serve Your Excellency, we who cast our lot with you, together with those who may not have believed in your capability to be our leader, but must now respect the popular will, must now work with you in whatever capacity. The least that we can do would be to provide support and inspiration to your efforts.
Millions of us believe that the wave of popularity that catapulted you to high office must now be harnessed to provide constant vigilance and watchfulness for anti-social signs in policy formulation and program implementation under your watch.
Pardon the enthusiasm, Mr. President, which you may construe as bordering in naivete. Some of us are convinced that you need a vigilant and watchful citizenry as an anchor to your exercise of leadership. How this will be effected is still up in the air. But many of us believe that we need to organize and mobilize, starting with those who supported you during the electoral process. This is the mind-bending challenge confronting us.
Elections are usually the usual nauseating process of promising heaven on earth, of weaving unrealistic and fairy tale expectations so that the naïve and the gullible are induced to cast their support to the politicians.
But we believe that you are different, Your Excellency. You are a Child of Destiny.
Consequently, we expect that your promises will be turned into policy initiatives, then organized into doable programs, and provided the adequate funding, and implemented with dispatch, devoid of any trace of scandal or corruption.
Pardon our simple faith in you, Mr. President. Aside from being vigilant to the best of our ability and knowledge, we will, nevertheless, be unselfish in our assistance, unstinting in our cooperation, and unwavering in our dedication to help you in the Herculean and difficult task of recovering whatever dignity we had before as a people, and instilling all over again the hope of our nation for a better Philippines.
Believing in the power of an organized citizenry, and in your leadership,
We are most respectfully yours, Your Excellency:
The WORLDWIDE FILIPINO ALLIANCE, Inc
(The Implementing Arm of the biggest online organization of Filipinos all over the world – abroad and in the home country)
(Sgd) ATTY. CITA BORROMEO-GARCIA
President
Worldwide Filipino Alliance Inc.
Other signatories to the letter were a core group representing different cities and provinces in the Philippines and various States in America.
Email: lagoc@hargray.com
