President Noynoy Aquino had finished his first year in office and the filipino people will assess what he had done for the country. My opinion is coming only from a distant place, based on the news and solicited from friends and relatives. Before the presidential election i organize a group “bloggers unite”and the primary aim was to mobilize all bloggers and filipinos both abroad and in the country to see to it that there would be election , not supporting any candidate . It was only for the purpose that election must be held to change President Arroyo who on those times were rumored to make the election a failure. I was able to mobilize almost 50 members and the objective was reached.
Luckily the people choose President Noynoy who was favored and elected because of the people’s anger for Arroyo and the people’s sentiment from the death of her mother former President Cory Aquino. If you analyzed what i said it is a vote of sentiment, not a choice for any requirement of what a president should be given the countrys poor economy and corrupt administration. There was no plans for Noynoy to run as president , it was his running mate Sen. Mar Roxas .
So he won and the first year had passed. The theme of his campaign was focused more on “Getting rid of corruption”. It is “Kung walang korup, walang mahirap” The tone sounds if you dont have corrupt officials in government then there will be progress or there will be no more poor people. He is also saying that his government would take the right path “ matuwid na daan”, but taking the right path is still vaque and had to be seen on what he had done in “taking the right path.
Since the main focus of his program is “getting rid of corruption” i would just give some focus on this and say that he is heading towards that direction. These are some of what i know that he had accomplished;
1. There were a lot of income tax deliquents who were charged including big time politicians like Cong. Mike Arroyo. The the military comptroller Carlos Garcia’s will now be tried again for plunder.
2. Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez was forced to resign, she is being accused of delaying many corrupt cases of government officials related to the former president.
3. There were also two gentlemen from the Ombudsman who were dismissed because of charge of neglect of duty in sitting down the case of hostage man Rolando Mendoza.
There are many cases of government officials that Pinoy will go after but these will still have to be tried and justice system in the Philippines takes a long time. But he had started with big time government officials and probably the former President will be tried.
In my own point of view “getting rid of corrupt officials in government” is one good step but i am hoping this will give lessons to others in government not to corrupt . My doubt is that the system of corruption in the Philippines is already “part of a rotten system” and its historical since the time of Spaniards. With the present infrastructure of government , there is corruption from the lower level of barangay to the highest. The path that Pres. Noynoy will be treading with only be a symbol and the substance will still had to be seen in the long run , six years of his term i would say would not be enough to change corruption in government.
It will be a historical struggle to rid the government of corruption. This had always been the campaign slogan of any politician. I wish there would be “significant changes” with the Presidents program. Because if nobody will be penalize for corruption then also the poor will remain poor, which just makes the slogan “walang korap, walang mahirap’ useless.
