Current measures to address the crisis created by COVID-19 are as yet temporary, palliative, and incongruous. Medical scientists are conducting experiments to find an effective cure or antidote against the coronavirus. Some appear promising but have yet to be validated and will take a little more time before they become available. The World Health Organization and all those who have embraced the medical profession are racing against time to forestall a pandemic which threatens to erase human civilization.
It is not the alarming spread of COVID-19 which should be of immediate and serious concern to the government and the citizenry. It is the economic depression or meltdown which will cause anarchy and chaos once the millions of jobless, idle and desperate people get hungry, mad and violent.
Like an approaching super typhoon, this terrifying calamity is gaining speed and will be devastating at landfall. This calamity is known as economic recession or depression.
Since the crisis is not abating and the stop-gap measures are not sufficiently working, the pandemic will claim more and more victims. Unless more stringent and disciplinary measures are imposed and observed, the transmission of the virus will be widespread and difficult to control or contain. The daily death toll in New York City is sending chilly alarms to other countries.
President Rodrigo Roa Duterte should exercise the emergency powers given him by Congress. He must be on top of the situation. The people would want him to take the bull by the horn, so to speak.
No one can boost the morale of the people and lift their spirits more than the nation’s highest official and chief executive. President Duterte should address the nation on national television every day or as often as is necessary.
The President could call on the 50 richest families in the country to contribute P1 billion each to the government’s relief funds. This will hardly make a dent on their wealth. Corporate farming, cooperative fishing and the production of essential goods and medicine can be financed and managed by the owners of business conglomerates to ensure that food and essential commodities will be adequately available for as long as the crisis persists.
Most of the members of the Inter-Agency Task Force and the Cabinet are competent and are ably doing their jobs. But they could be too burdened with the nitty gritty aspects of their responsibilities that they may lack full grasp and insights into the complexities of the principal concerns that the government must address.
This is where the best and the brightest minds in the private sector, the brains behind the most successful business establishments, are needed.
The President should call on them. With their experience and ingenuity, they could be the catalysts in confronting successfully the crisis.
There should be full and detailed media coverage of the crisis. Like the medical and law enforcement frontrunners, media practitioners should be allowed to perform their jobs at their establishments and should be given access to all sources of information. The government’s media information agencies do not have the manpower and facilities to disseminate what is going on all over the country and around the world.
The government should subsidize the operations of the media establishments and the salaries of the private media practitioners since they are not receiving income from advertisements and sales. The business establishments who have been the biggest advertisers could also be convinced by the government to contribute to the subsidy budget.
President Duterte should now appeal for national unity in the face of the most dreadful crisis confronting the country. COVID-19 infects anyone, regardless of color, gender, calling, age, social status and creed.
The President should impose discipline and compliance with the laws and correspondingly mete out sanctions on those who transgress them.
With less than a little over two more years left in his term and still enjoying a high performance and acceptance rating, President Rodrigo Duterte has been given the rare opportunity to be a great and beloved leader. By confronting the crisis with ingenuity and courage, the President could prove worthy of the honor and equal to the challenge.
As in previous visits of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, God will save mankind whom he created in his own image.
Pious genuflections and prayers will help.