PLATFORM
A COVENANT FOR THE FUTURE
FPJ, my father, ran for President in 2004 on a platform that emphasized the need to confront the problem of poverty. He declared that poverty was “the biggest scandal in the country.”
To make matters worse, in 2004, our people “no longer believe that our leaders truly care. They no longer have faith in the system that governs them, and, in the process, they have lost faith in themselves. By far, this is the biggest and most serious challenge that faces us all.”
My father campaigned and won in our people’s hearts and minds. He hoped for “bagong umaga para sa ating bayan.” But he was robbed of the chance to serve. He did not live long enough to see the dawn of his dream.
Today the hopelessness that overwhelmed our people’s minds in 2004 has been replaced by guarded optimism. Public trust is largely restored in our leaders and institutions. The effects of good governance are starting to be felt on the ground. But poverty still persists.
My father called for a “social covenant” to rebuild Philippine society and lead our nation towards unity and sustainable development. His goal was addressing the poverty problem. He was confident that with our people’s support, it was possible to have a country where every Filipino can aspire for and live the good life.
I share my father’s dreams. Ang inumpisahan ng tatay ko, tatapusin ko.
Thus I commit myself to a platform that builds on my father’s social covenant:
• Poverty Alleviation
We should promote an environment of inclusive growth, focus anti-poverty programs on the family, and mobilize the support of all sectors. This will happen when there is good governance, when government has the capacity to generate resources, when our leaders have the will to use these resources for the most vulnerable sectors, when our people feel safe in their homes and the communities, and when even our culture reflects our people’s desire to break away from poverty.
• Opportunities for our Children
We should provide opportunities for our children so that they will grow up to become productive citizens and active participants in our country’s development. We should give special attention to children who are victims of poverty. They deserve a better future.
• Electoral Reforms
Never again should we allow any group, no matter how powerful they are, to deny our people of our right to choose our leaders. We should put in place the necessary electoral reforms, provide sufficient funding for implementation, and rekindle our people’s trust in the electoral system.
Poverty Alleviation
1. Sustainable Inclusive Growth. In 2003, 3.3 million Filipino families (or 19.8 million people) were considered poor. In 2009, the number rose to nearly 3.9 million families (or 23 million people).
1.1 During the period between these two years, the economy was growing at an average of 4.2 percent in real terms. Yet poverty remained. Economic growth is not enough to help the poor.
1.2 For economic expansion to make an impact on the poor especially the vulnerable sectors—indigenous people, detainees, people with disabilities, elderly, women, internally displaced people, and overseas Filipino workers. I believe that growth should be “inclusive,” i.e. sustained, substantial, broad-based, and participative. This growth will happen in an environment of macroeconomic stability, with investment-friendly policies, and supported by infrastructure development and timely capability-building interventions.
2. Focus on Family. Poverty is a problem that can break the family and bring great harm to our children. I consider the family as the focal point of our poverty alleviation efforts. The importance of the family is also enshrined in the Philippine Constitution (Art. II Section 12 of the Philippine Constitution: the State “recognizes the sanctity of family life and shall protect and strengthen the family as a basic autonomous social institution.”)
2.1 We should provide incentives to institutions that promote family-oriented programs.
2.2 We should strengthen and affirm the Filipino family as a basic social institution of Philippine society.
3. Mobilizing Goodwill. I believe that poverty alleviation is a shared goal. No poverty alleviation effort will become successful if it does not harness the goodwill of our people and convert good intentions into effective actions.
3.1 We should mobilize the local government units, the business sector, international support agencies, and civil society organizations so that the anti-poverty initiatives will be sustainable.
3.2 We should empower our people to take part in anti-poverty programs rather than just become passive recipients of help. We should not encourage a culture of dependence among our poor.
4. Good Governance. I believe that good governance is the key to make government an effective tool for poverty alleviation. I support the administration’s efforts to make “tuwid na daan” as the benchmark in our Philippine political and economic life.
4.1 We should encourage private sector initiatives to build anti-corruption integrity circles in government and in private companies.
4.2 We should further promote transparency and accountability in government through the enactment of laws that provide access to information about government transactions.
4.3 We should provide capability-building programs for local government units and encourage inter-LGU sharing of good practices. I support the national government’s program that gives a “seal of good housekeeping” to local government units that are able to institutionalize the values of transparency, accountability, participation, and performance.
4.4 We should promote the use of information technology to provide government services and engage our people in dialogue. We should use the internet as an expanded arena for policy making. Our people’s rights should be properly protected in online discussions.
5. Resource Generation and Use. We should improve government’s capacity to generate resources and to use these resources for the most vulnerable sectors.
5.1 Government should expand its revenue base but it should also provide safety nets to vulnerable sectors that will bear the greatest burden of adjustment.
5.2 I support the existing government programs that develop the capacity of the poor to improve their lives, such as the “Pantawid Para sa Pamilyang Pilipino,” expansion of health insurance, skills training, education, and social housing. These programs should be properly targeted and its beneficiaries regularly reviewed.
5.3 Government should provide sufficient funds for infrastructure facilities that advance food security and encourage competitive trade, such as farm-to-market roads, post-harvest facilities, and air and sea ports.
5.4 We should increase the share of local government units in the revenues to be generated from natural resources in their areas. The additional revenues should be used to provide economic and social services and capability-building interventions to families affected by such activities.
5.5 Asset reform is an important aspect of poverty alleviation. I support the agrarian reform program as a means to empower small farmers. We should continue providing adequate institutional support, capability-building assistance, and funding for agrarian reform communities.
6. Peaceful Communities. We need peaceful communities in order to promote inclusive growth and undertake anti-poverty initiatives. Only when our people feel safe and our communities are peaceful can we focus our attention on the things that matter: that of creating a better future for our children.
6.1 Government should execute our laws effectively in order to deter crimes. Erring officers of the law should be removed and punished so that people’s confidence in our justice system will be upheld. Police visibility should be increased and sustained.
6.2 We should encourage community organizations to participate in programs to build peaceful and orderly communities. Government should provide capability-building interventions and protection when needed.
6.3 We should work for lasting peace by building communities of peace based on trust, social justice, and development. I believe that any effort towards the negotiated settlement of conflict should be anchored on the bigger goal of realizing our people’s dream of a good life.
7. Anti-Poverty Culture. We should develop and promote a culture that liberates our people from hopelessness, generates intolerance of corruption, revives our passion for the common good, and enhances awareness of our nation’s heritage. In line with this, we should provide more incentives to independent producers who capture Filipino values in their films and strengthen government agencies that protect the Philippine film industry.
Opportunities for Our Children
8. Institutional Support for Children. According to the basic sectors survey of the National Statistical Coordination Board, there were 12.4 million poor children in 2009. Children ranked third (after fisher folk and farmers) in the incidence of poverty among the basic sectors. I am deeply concerned about the impact of poverty on children because poverty can destroy their future and bind them to a life of misery.
8.1 We should provide stronger institutional interventions for street children and abandoned children.
8.2 We should establish more day-care centers in barangays and private companies.
8.3 We should have a more comprehensive and standardized feeding program for children of poor families.
8.4 We should create additional governmental programs that protect and ensure the future of children with special needs and disabilities.
8.5 We should advance the interest of those people who take care of the welfare of our children. I believe that we should have additional comprehensive support programs for our domestic helpers, health workers, and other professionals who are working hard to look after the interest of our children.
8.6 We should be with our teachers in shaping the future of our children. I would like to ensure that their welfare is also protected especially when it comes to their salary, benefits, professional development and job security.
9. Legal Framework for Children. We should review the legal framework that deals with children.
9.1 We should strengthen the anti-child-labor law. Parents should take care of their children and not allow their children to become exploited for the sake of economic gain.
9.2 We should review the mandatory age for criminal liability of children. I believe that children should be given all the opportunities for rehabilitation when they get in conflict with the law. They should never be treated as common criminals.
9.3 We should reform the educational system in the Philippines especially those that involve the education of our children. I would like to create programs that will ensure that every student is entitled to a decent classroom, high quality education and an environment conducive to learning.
10. A Good Future for Children. We should be responsive to the challenges that await our youth today.
10.1 We should be mindful of the need of the youth today to have quality and affordable secondary and tertiary education.
10.2 We should address the problem of youth unemployment by promoting job matching programs and encouraging academic institutions to be responsive to the requirements of industry.
10.3 We should institutionalize programs that would facilitate a more efficient and youth-friendly job employment system, especially for first-time job applicants. I strongly support the idea of having state-sponsored job employment initiatives like Job Placements and Career Planning Seminars in schools and local communities (for out-of-school youth).
10.4 We should provide more incentives to youth achievers who are excelling in school, communities and public service. The state should be supportive of those young achievers by giving them more benefits in governmental programs and services.
Electoral Reforms
11. Electoral System. Election is an important part of our fledgling democratic system. We saw the damage done to our country when the people’s will was thwarted in 2004 by powerful groups. We should not let this happen again. Hence we have to aggressively pursue reforms on the electoral system that will further strengthen our democracy.
11.1 We should revisit and strengthen our existing electoral system especially those mechanisms that ensure systematic, inclusive and open registration of voters; transparent candidate nomination; orderly, free and regular election; a clean automated counting system; and truthful determination of winners.
11.2 We should provide additional government intervention and support for Comelec. The government should make an effort to restructure some of its main functions especially its judicial and administrative roles. The Comelec should be supported in its effort to strengthen its internal offices and processes like its IT-capability, research and development, handling of peace and order, and dialogue with the civil society and other interest groups.
11.3 We should institutionalize the participation of civil society groups. Election watchdogs, advocacy groups, and the academic community should be given a space in the electoral system—on monitoring, mainstreaming of issues, research and development—to sustain the maturation of Philippine electoral practice.
11.4 We should institutionalize voters’ education in the Philippines. The Comelec, in participation with civil society groups, the academe and the media, should work together in familiarizing the people about the relevance, practice and outcomes of elections; election; political parties and party platforms; candidates and their positions.
11.5 We should strengthen the Philippine multi-party system by institutionalizing state-sponsored mechanisms for party organization, party funding, party candidate nomination, party loyalty, and party discipline.
11.6 We should revisit and amend some provisions of the party-list system especially on the four pillars of the party-list law and the conceptualization of ‘marginalized’ and ‘proportional representation’.
11.5 We should create government-sponsored programs and mechanisms that will facilitate the growth and eventual participation of sectoral groups and organizations in mainstream Philippine politics. I believe that the state should encourage the emergence and participation of sectoral parties not just in the party-list system but also in other levels of government.
11.7 We should reinforce the newly implemented automated system of election in the Philippines. In addition to the efforts to introduce more security features in the PCOS machines, I intend to institutionalize mechanisms that will ensure speedy casting of ballots; trustworthy monitoring of the automated counting of ballots; fast and transparent transmission of electoral data; and, effective validation of electoral data.
12. Toward a More Democratic Election Result. Elections should be reflective of the interests of all people. The current tendency of our election to favor only a few people in the society exacerbates the longstanding societal, political and economic problems in our country. Therefore, discussions on electoral reform should also include the possibility of having an electoral outcome that really reflects the interests of the pluralized Filipino society.
12.1 We should start to discuss the possibility of moving toward a more proportional election result in the current electoral system in the Philippines. This discussion should particularly aim to undermine elite dominance both in mainstream and party-list electoral politics.
12.2 We should continue the discussion of restructuring the current form of government—from presidential to parliamentary. I believe that there is so much to learn in exploring more lessons from the parliamentary experience especially in guaranteeing a more proportional election result during elections.
I developed this platform from the legacy of my father, my consultations with various sectors, and my beliefs and aspirations. I offer this as my personal agenda as I run for Senator in 2013.
FPJ, my father, ran for President in 2004 on a platform that emphasized the need to confront the problem of poverty. He declared that poverty was “the biggest scandal in the country.”
To make matters worse, in 2004, our people “no longer believe that our leaders truly care. They no longer have faith in the system that governs them, and, in the process, they have lost faith in themselves. By far, this is the biggest and most serious challenge that faces us all.”
My father campaigned and won in our people’s hearts and minds. He hoped for “bagong umaga para sa ating bayan.” But he was robbed of the chance to serve. He did not live long enough to see the dawn of his dream.
Today the hopelessness that overwhelmed our people’s minds in 2004 has been replaced by guarded optimism. Public trust is largely restored in our leaders and institutions. The effects of good governance are starting to be felt on the ground. But poverty still persists.
My father called for a “social covenant” to rebuild Philippine society and lead our nation towards unity and sustainable development. His goal was addressing the poverty problem. He was confident that with our people’s support, it was possible to have a country where every Filipino can aspire for and live the good life.
I share my father’s dreams. Ang inumpisahan ng tatay ko, tatapusin ko.
Thus I commit myself to a platform that builds on my father’s social covenant:
• Poverty Alleviation
We should promote an environment of inclusive growth, focus anti-poverty programs on the family, and mobilize the support of all sectors. This will happen when there is good governance, when government has the capacity to generate resources, when our leaders have the will to use these resources for the most vulnerable sectors, when our people feel safe in their homes and the communities, and when even our culture reflects our people’s desire to break away from poverty.
• Opportunities for our Children
We should provide opportunities for our children so that they will grow up to become productive citizens and active participants in our country’s development. We should give special attention to children who are victims of poverty. They deserve a better future.
• Electoral Reforms
Never again should we allow any group, no matter how powerful they are, to deny our people of our right to choose our leaders. We should put in place the necessary electoral reforms, provide sufficient funding for implementation, and rekindle our people’s trust in the electoral system.
Poverty Alleviation
1. Sustainable Inclusive Growth. In 2003, 3.3 million Filipino families (or 19.8 million people) were considered poor. In 2009, the number rose to nearly 3.9 million families (or 23 million people).
1.1 During the period between these two years, the economy was growing at an average of 4.2 percent in real terms. Yet poverty remained. Economic growth is not enough to help the poor.
1.2 For economic expansion to make an impact on the poor especially the vulnerable sectors—indigenous people, detainees, people with disabilities, elderly, women, internally displaced people, and overseas Filipino workers. I believe that growth should be “inclusive,” i.e. sustained, substantial, broad-based, and participative. This growth will happen in an environment of macroeconomic stability, with investment-friendly policies, and supported by infrastructure development and timely capability-building interventions.
2. Focus on Family. Poverty is a problem that can break the family and bring great harm to our children. I consider the family as the focal point of our poverty alleviation efforts. The importance of the family is also enshrined in the Philippine Constitution (Art. II Section 12 of the Philippine Constitution: the State “recognizes the sanctity of family life and shall protect and strengthen the family as a basic autonomous social institution.”)
2.1 We should provide incentives to institutions that promote family-oriented programs.
2.2 We should strengthen and affirm the Filipino family as a basic social institution of Philippine society.
3. Mobilizing Goodwill. I believe that poverty alleviation is a shared goal. No poverty alleviation effort will become successful if it does not harness the goodwill of our people and convert good intentions into effective actions.
3.1 We should mobilize the local government units, the business sector, international support agencies, and civil society organizations so that the anti-poverty initiatives will be sustainable.
3.2 We should empower our people to take part in anti-poverty programs rather than just become passive recipients of help. We should not encourage a culture of dependence among our poor.
4. Good Governance. I believe that good governance is the key to make government an effective tool for poverty alleviation. I support the administration’s efforts to make “tuwid na daan” as the benchmark in our Philippine political and economic life.
4.1 We should encourage private sector initiatives to build anti-corruption integrity circles in government and in private companies.
4.2 We should further promote transparency and accountability in government through the enactment of laws that provide access to information about government transactions.
4.3 We should provide capability-building programs for local government units and encourage inter-LGU sharing of good practices. I support the national government’s program that gives a “seal of good housekeeping” to local government units that are able to institutionalize the values of transparency, accountability, participation, and performance.
4.4 We should promote the use of information technology to provide government services and engage our people in dialogue. We should use the internet as an expanded arena for policy making. Our people’s rights should be properly protected in online discussions.
5. Resource Generation and Use. We should improve government’s capacity to generate resources and to use these resources for the most vulnerable sectors.
5.1 Government should expand its revenue base but it should also provide safety nets to vulnerable sectors that will bear the greatest burden of adjustment.
5.2 I support the existing government programs that develop the capacity of the poor to improve their lives, such as the “Pantawid Para sa Pamilyang Pilipino,” expansion of health insurance, skills training, education, and social housing. These programs should be properly targeted and its beneficiaries regularly reviewed.
5.3 Government should provide sufficient funds for infrastructure facilities that advance food security and encourage competitive trade, such as farm-to-market roads, post-harvest facilities, and air and sea ports.
5.4 We should increase the share of local government units in the revenues to be generated from natural resources in their areas. The additional revenues should be used to provide economic and social services and capability-building interventions to families affected by such activities.
5.5 Asset reform is an important aspect of poverty alleviation. I support the agrarian reform program as a means to empower small farmers. We should continue providing adequate institutional support, capability-building assistance, and funding for agrarian reform communities.
6. Peaceful Communities. We need peaceful communities in order to promote inclusive growth and undertake anti-poverty initiatives. Only when our people feel safe and our communities are peaceful can we focus our attention on the things that matter: that of creating a better future for our children.
6.1 Government should execute our laws effectively in order to deter crimes. Erring officers of the law should be removed and punished so that people’s confidence in our justice system will be upheld. Police visibility should be increased and sustained.
6.2 We should encourage community organizations to participate in programs to build peaceful and orderly communities. Government should provide capability-building interventions and protection when needed.
6.3 We should work for lasting peace by building communities of peace based on trust, social justice, and development. I believe that any effort towards the negotiated settlement of conflict should be anchored on the bigger goal of realizing our people’s dream of a good life.
7. Anti-Poverty Culture. We should develop and promote a culture that liberates our people from hopelessness, generates intolerance of corruption, revives our passion for the common good, and enhances awareness of our nation’s heritage. In line with this, we should provide more incentives to independent producers who capture Filipino values in their films and strengthen government agencies that protect the Philippine film industry.
Opportunities for Our Children
8. Institutional Support for Children. According to the basic sectors survey of the National Statistical Coordination Board, there were 12.4 million poor children in 2009. Children ranked third (after fisher folk and farmers) in the incidence of poverty among the basic sectors. I am deeply concerned about the impact of poverty on children because poverty can destroy their future and bind them to a life of misery.
8.1 We should provide stronger institutional interventions for street children and abandoned children.
8.2 We should establish more day-care centers in barangays and private companies.
8.3 We should have a more comprehensive and standardized feeding program for children of poor families.
8.4 We should create additional governmental programs that protect and ensure the future of children with special needs and disabilities.
8.5 We should advance the interest of those people who take care of the welfare of our children. I believe that we should have additional comprehensive support programs for our domestic helpers, health workers, and other professionals who are working hard to look after the interest of our children.
8.6 We should be with our teachers in shaping the future of our children. I would like to ensure that their welfare is also protected especially when it comes to their salary, benefits, professional development and job security.
9. Legal Framework for Children. We should review the legal framework that deals with children.
9.1 We should strengthen the anti-child-labor law. Parents should take care of their children and not allow their children to become exploited for the sake of economic gain.
9.2 We should review the mandatory age for criminal liability of children. I believe that children should be given all the opportunities for rehabilitation when they get in conflict with the law. They should never be treated as common criminals.
9.3 We should reform the educational system in the Philippines especially those that involve the education of our children. I would like to create programs that will ensure that every student is entitled to a decent classroom, high quality education and an environment conducive to learning.
10. A Good Future for Children. We should be responsive to the challenges that await our youth today.
10.1 We should be mindful of the need of the youth today to have quality and affordable secondary and tertiary education.
10.2 We should address the problem of youth unemployment by promoting job matching programs and encouraging academic institutions to be responsive to the requirements of industry.
10.3 We should institutionalize programs that would facilitate a more efficient and youth-friendly job employment system, especially for first-time job applicants. I strongly support the idea of having state-sponsored job employment initiatives like Job Placements and Career Planning Seminars in schools and local communities (for out-of-school youth).
10.4 We should provide more incentives to youth achievers who are excelling in school, communities and public service. The state should be supportive of those young achievers by giving them more benefits in governmental programs and services.
Electoral Reforms
11. Electoral System. Election is an important part of our fledgling democratic system. We saw the damage done to our country when the people’s will was thwarted in 2004 by powerful groups. We should not let this happen again. Hence we have to aggressively pursue reforms on the electoral system that will further strengthen our democracy.
11.1 We should revisit and strengthen our existing electoral system especially those mechanisms that ensure systematic, inclusive and open registration of voters; transparent candidate nomination; orderly, free and regular election; a clean automated counting system; and truthful determination of winners.
11.2 We should provide additional government intervention and support for Comelec. The government should make an effort to restructure some of its main functions especially its judicial and administrative roles. The Comelec should be supported in its effort to strengthen its internal offices and processes like its IT-capability, research and development, handling of peace and order, and dialogue with the civil society and other interest groups.
11.3 We should institutionalize the participation of civil society groups. Election watchdogs, advocacy groups, and the academic community should be given a space in the electoral system—on monitoring, mainstreaming of issues, research and development—to sustain the maturation of Philippine electoral practice.
11.4 We should institutionalize voters’ education in the Philippines. The Comelec, in participation with civil society groups, the academe and the media, should work together in familiarizing the people about the relevance, practice and outcomes of elections; election; political parties and party platforms; candidates and their positions.
11.5 We should strengthen the Philippine multi-party system by institutionalizing state-sponsored mechanisms for party organization, party funding, party candidate nomination, party loyalty, and party discipline.
11.6 We should revisit and amend some provisions of the party-list system especially on the four pillars of the party-list law and the conceptualization of ‘marginalized’ and ‘proportional representation’.
11.5 We should create government-sponsored programs and mechanisms that will facilitate the growth and eventual participation of sectoral groups and organizations in mainstream Philippine politics. I believe that the state should encourage the emergence and participation of sectoral parties not just in the party-list system but also in other levels of government.
11.7 We should reinforce the newly implemented automated system of election in the Philippines. In addition to the efforts to introduce more security features in the PCOS machines, I intend to institutionalize mechanisms that will ensure speedy casting of ballots; trustworthy monitoring of the automated counting of ballots; fast and transparent transmission of electoral data; and, effective validation of electoral data.
12. Toward a More Democratic Election Result. Elections should be reflective of the interests of all people. The current tendency of our election to favor only a few people in the society exacerbates the longstanding societal, political and economic problems in our country. Therefore, discussions on electoral reform should also include the possibility of having an electoral outcome that really reflects the interests of the pluralized Filipino society.
12.1 We should start to discuss the possibility of moving toward a more proportional election result in the current electoral system in the Philippines. This discussion should particularly aim to undermine elite dominance both in mainstream and party-list electoral politics.
12.2 We should continue the discussion of restructuring the current form of government—from presidential to parliamentary. I believe that there is so much to learn in exploring more lessons from the parliamentary experience especially in guaranteeing a more proportional election result during elections.
I developed this platform from the legacy of my father, my consultations with various sectors, and my beliefs and aspirations. I offer this as my personal agenda as I run for Senator in 2013.