SEVERAL years back, I attended a CB seminar on bank management and the resource person, who likewise conducted periodic audits of banking institutions, was so impressed of the diversity he saw in Iloilo City that he proffered a forecast: that our city would enjoy an eight-year infrastructure and economic boom. At that time, it seemed to be a generous appraisal but apparently, he was wrong…in a nice way.
What is going on in the city and province of Iloilo is phenomenal and astounding. There is an avalanche of domestic and international entrepreneurs who have established and re-located their businesses here and impressive buildings and structures sprouting wherever you look. And come…the income that will fill our government’s purse.
Hand-in-hand with the new investors follow their officers and personnel, technicians and workers who have to buy/lease homes and places to stay in. There will be many new faces promenading thru Megaworld, SM City and other Diversion road bistros…looks like luxurious Makati City and the central market. And we are dazzled by a gaggle of Tagalog, Cebuano, Karay-a, and Mandarin, and meet as many Tausogs and Badjaos as well.
Such is the price of progress.
And if what we hear is not fake news, there will be more unbelievable things to come – a bridge too far, an overpass too long. We sometimes ponder if all of these are too good for us.
There are some subtle downslides. The sudden influx of mega-infrastructure projects have greatly raised the wages of the lowly worker whom we usually take for granted…or hardly notice at all.
In the distant past, it was not difficult to look for four, six, 10 workers to do emergency or temporary manual work in the farm, fishpond, your house; fix the roof, lift furniture, whatever/wherever…and many unemployed kanito boys will eagerly line up contented with P100, P150, or P200 daily wage for their labor.
Now? You can’t find a single laborer in the farm, slums and squatter areas or elsewhere to work for you. You will find them at Megaworld, Diversion Road earning P400 to P500 per day, and after 5 p.m. they are drinking and karaoke-ing at MO2, Juan’s Comedy Bar, and other Smallville diversions. Shades of LGBTG. So, why the heck should they work for you when they are having the fun of their lives and being paid a higher rate?
This progress thing has lead to increased domestic problems and violence. The husband does not go home anymore and neglects his wife and children. He is paid well by the contractor, buys nice ukay-ukay togs and is getting to be a good singer…honky-tonking at Smallville. With this new lifestyle, who wants to go home to Loboc, Lapuz or Agsirab, Lambunao?
The domino effect makes this also a difficult time to find any domestic help. Their rates, too, have been influenced by the increase in the laborers’ wages. In the forgotten past, P500 to P1,000 a month pay was already great for a maid-in-the-Philippines.
Now? They won’t work because they are paid by the government 4Ps…Para sa Pobreng Poor Palalamunin…pang-tong-its, pang-toma, pangutang, pang iba pa. No wonder we can’t easily find a maid or domestic help nowadays.
And they now have greater awareness of their labor rights and how badly their services are needed by those of us who are rich. They are now the ones asking questions: How much is the salary? What is my work? Miay day-off? Colored TV with CableStar? May air-con? Washing machine?
And as no one is now working in the farms…the prices of vegetables have gone up. A single string bean costs P1.25; okra for P10; ¼ kalabasa, P20; a ball of egg, P6.25; 2 balls of eggs, you might as well just scratch yours.
These are just some of the inevitable concerns facing industrialization. If this continues and we become like…America and highly urbanized Europeans countries…we will have no more maids to play with, when your wife is shopping at SM City… we will have to do things ourselves. And I’m too old for that.
I hope we just progress slowly. (muzones_law_office@yahoo.com/PN)
