BY SAMMY JULIAN
AHEAD of President Benigno Aquino III’s State of the Nation Address (SONA), the administration had been under fire for poor efforts in addressing urgent concerns of Filipinos, especially on high food prices and lingering poverty.
In a recent Pulse Asia survey, the administration received a -15 net approval rating for controlling inflation (26 percent approval, 41 percent disapproval) and -1 net approval for reducing poverty (32 percent approval and 33 percent disapproval).
A report recently made by the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) also revealed the administration’s “poor performance” in the areas of good governance and the rule of law, enrollment rate of PhilHealth coverage, fighting private armed groups and other threat groups, and protection and rehabilitation of environment and natural resources.
The Statistical Indicators on Philippine Development 2013 (StatDev 2013) issued by the PSA, on the other hand, cited the administration’s “good performance” on the macroeconomy.
“The economy is performing beyond the target set by the government by registering an annual growth rate of 7.2 percent in 2013. However, in the first quarter of 2014, the growth was posted at 5.7 percent,” PSA said.
PSA, however, noted that the exports-to-GDP ratio posted a low probability of achieving the target in 2016.
“In particular, the productivity in merchandise exports is still far from its USD 91.0 billion target,” it said.
The administration also scored well in the areas of competitive industry and services sector, accelerating infrastructure development, facilitating a dynamic and resilient financial system, social development, and peace and security.
The StatDev is a statistical indicator system to monitor achievements of economic and social development goals in the Philippine Development Plan 2011-2016.
After getting these poor marks, other many bright spots in the administration’s performance in the past year, particularly in facilitating robust economic growth, should be noted.
We should take pride that the economy is on track in meeting its growth targets, having achieved impressive gross domestic product (GDP) growth for the past two years.
Amid the low grade received by the President in the areas of inflation, poverty reduction and good governance, there are indeed many bright spots, too, in terms of the macroeconomy, competitiveness of industry and service sectors, infrastructure and social development.
We just refuse to see the positive side of what the government has achieved. Of course, it is more exciting to highlight the negative.
We believe that for us to reach our goals, that should not be the case always.
