Monday Matters is dedicated to all things that matter.
I know my blog is just about simply me - my adventures, my potpourri, and my Fascino. It is just a personal blog aiming to make myself be made known, to showcase my hometown Ozamis City, and to feature some business establishments and brands which I am faithfully patronizing. Overall, my blog tackles about beautiful things, having a light mood and attitude. But for today, I dare it to be differently heavy. I dare to write on politics in which I am not too inclined about.
I admit, I'm not really into politics and this is my first time to express my thoughts on a really significant issue. As a person who doesn't care about serious and too brainy stuffs, politics never stir my interest up. Though people around me are already debating about politics, I just keep quiet and don't listen at all. For me, politics is just there, causing havoc to the nations, and inflicting perplexity to the people! And I don't want to stress myself with that! Not until I became part of an organization, the Junior Chamber International (JCI) Philippines.
Then I started caring about the community and the world. Since I was once rubbing elbows with the millionaire businessmen and powerful politicians, little by little I came to understand politics. Much more when I became the president of our local organization, the JCI-Ozamis Red Rose. By then, I learned using and experienced being used and hated all for the sake of politics. So I came to ponder, politics is not evil at all. But it is the act of politicking which makes it evil to the eyes of the people who doesn't understand the way it works. Moreso, it is not the politicians to be blamed for whatever mishap that had happened but it is the way on how they handle the integrity of their office. For politics has its own culture and one has to take effort in trying to dig deeper in understanding its real way of life.
So as President Benigno Simeon C. Aquino III delivered his State of the Nation Address (SONA) today, I took effort in watching and listening to him intently. There are only three main points I would like to share my thoughts with, out from his SONA and here they are:
The Title of the SONA
The title of the SONA was "Pagtahak sa Tuwid na Daan: Ang Ika-Apat na SONA". As you might recall, PNoy's platform while vying for presidency last 2010 national election was to make the path of the Philippine government straight. Why did he did so? It is because Filipinos were already fed up with all the corruption issues happening in the country. We were longing for a change and there came somebody who promised a change. At that time, majority of the Filipinos claimed his promise so he was elected to hold the highest position in the land. In three years time, yes there were already changes! Apart from abolishing wangwangs in his first month of term, he also replaced the secretaries of executive departments for he believed that replacing the heads of offices with trustworthy people would start that big change of making the crooked path straight. And how did the journey to the straight path go? The Aquino administration enumerated its achievements of changes and one of these changes is the continuous increase in the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth.
The Increase in GDP Growth
For the previous administrations before the Aquino, the economic status of the Philippines had been sloping downhill. This just means that our peso value is getting less compared with the currencies of other countries and this further means that our country is getting poorer and poorer each year. But after one year of the Aquino administration, the GDP increased and is continually increasing until now. This just shows a good sign on the effectiveness of safeguarding the so-called kaban ng bayan from greedy government officials nationwide. President Aquino is just so wise in releasing funds to the local and national government units thus securing the wealth of the people's money. But how come there are still a large number of poor Filipino families? If the country had already recovered from its crisis, why are there still poor people? Well in any thing, change cannot happen overtime. It has to undergo a process and this increase in GDP growth is only a preliminary to that process. Eliminating hunger and strife cannot take for only three years to happen. At least now, we are going to that direction and the masses must also do its share in making their lives better. Fortunately, Filipinos started to understand in not just hoping for the government to feed them but to do his or her part as an individual on how to put food on the table. So in three years time, there is also an increase in the employment rate of the country. And better employment comes from better education thus the Aquino administration also furthered Philippine education.
The Improved Delivery of Education Services
Albeit the people's negative reactions on the K to 12 Basic Education Program of the Department of Education, the Aquino administration had been working hard in implementing this radical change for the country. This has been done for the Philippines to be at par with the first-world countries in terms of the educational system. With this, our degrees and licenses would be credited to such countries thus enabling us to compete globally. Many Filipinos think that we are not yet prepared for this kind of change but at least, we are already taking a step. A number of secondary public schools had already been opened which had paved way for plenty of teachers employment. In this regard, any youth can also go to school and avail such low-cost education for these schools had been made accessible even at the far-flung barangays in the country. Moreover, kindergarten schools are also given much attention to prepare every Filipino child for a brighter future.
Truly, making changes do take a lot of processes and a great deal of time. But as PNoy stressed, "Now, we are experiencing change...change that was brought about by the millions of Filipinos who have, in their own ways, big and small, pitched in and transformed the country", we had altogether contributed to that CHANGE! So no matter who you are, what we do affects the totality of the status of our country. So altogether, let us cooperate in the journey to the straight path by doing makialam and not magkikibit-balikat because this is our nation. And what we are doing today for our nation affects our future children. In unity, let us move forward and onward to a better Philippines!
So there goes my thoughts and opinion for PNoy's SONA. Some of you might take it still lowly but I am proud to say that I had reached this age and maturity to have had written that! In so far, this has been a seriously deep and sensitive blog post - the longest I had written ever! So your comments and suggestions would be very much appreciated. Drop in your feedback to maryrosalieo@yahoo.com! :)
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