By Joel B. Belinan
Sigh, Sigh, Sigh.
Such would have been my reaction if my thoughts are focused on my failures in life after all these years and reaching middle age. By the way, I would like to express my thanks and gratitude for all the greetings I got last Tuesday, February 14, when I marked another year of my existence in this world even if those were mostly said on my favorite social media platform. Yes, I am slowly approaching the qualification of becoming a dual citizen. There were hundreds of them (greeting) and many were of other nationalities whom I share an interest in the philosophy I live by, the Ananda Marga (Path of Bliss), and, yes, acquaintances on the net. Even If only for a day that such attention was given to my existence whether good or bad.
That however is not where my mind is dwelling at this moment but rather on how our struggle in life seems not to be showing any sign of getting better. I thought that after all these years I have seen the worst that this country’s economy could go through. And I am referring to the 8.7 very high inflation rate announced by authorities on the end of January. Inflation rate accordingly is the rate of increases in the prices of commodities or in local parlance “diay panagpangato ti magat gatang”. Of course, such is basically based on the very capitalistic economic system we have. But for me and most of you, it means the high prices of my basic needs that I buy almost every day.
No matter how much government officials especially the president try to make all those cosmetic statements to try and hide their inefficiency to curb this ongoing economic crisis, the reality remains. President Marcos’ announcement of the country’s very stable macro-economic fundamentals are just statements meant to lure foreign investors but will not help lower the prices of the very basic food items I need to buy and put on the table. Even those supposed tens of billions of investments from Japan where he just came from are not at all what we need. What we need is how to increase the purchasing capacity of the overwhelming majority of people in this country. Based on the Progressive Utilization Theory (PROUT) propounded by modern Day Philosopher Prabhat Rainjan Sarakar, “Purchasing capacity is the number of goods that the local currency can purchase at any point in time”.
The problem with the national government is its penchant for making statements that are laden with capitalistic terminologies that are not meant to show the real situation but, rather, just intended to confuse the people. Maybe these officials thought by doing so, their incompetence would go away, and that the very problem will pass away on its own. And again maybe that is the very reason why this country remains to be the sick man of South East Asia. Many will disagree with this but for me, we are still the sick man of this region.
During my younger years as a reporter for this paper, I was the most consistent one writing about the development of our economy based on the data coming from economic agencies of the government. It was during those years I came to know about how various measuring yardsticks were employed to show the progress of our economy. As a country these will always just go with the flow and will never have their own path, but all those yardsticks were just being accepted.
Comparing ours with the very small kingdom of Bhutan, instead of it succumbing to the world’s definition of progress, it introduced the so-called “Happiness Index” which is now very popular the World over. Am I dreaming too much to expect such kind of thinking from our national leaders? Alas, maybe, but who knows?**
