A question of priorities

There are currently several Congressional initiatives to draft laws but none of these appear to have anything to do with inflation which is now our biggest headache.

One lawmaker wants to amend the law so that the age to be considered a senior citizen will be brought down from 60 to 56.

This is at a time when a new law was just signed increasing the retirement age of selected military officers on the grounds that retiring at 56 is too early.

This might be alright if the Filipino life expectancy will remain stagnant at 67.

But it has been increasing over the years and is now about 72 and will continue to go up. It would also be interesting to know whether the current crop of 56-year-olds would really want to be considered senior citizens at 56 considering that 60 is now the new 40 as some people are saying.

56 years is a bit too early to be considered old.

There is also another bill intended to grant paid leave to military reservists who are called for temporary active duty.

The military operates differently compared to civilian agencies.

The military has its own personnel management system which, in many ways, is considered a lot more generous than its civilian counterparts. So, although the intention is good, this is perhaps totally unnecessary.

Another bill being considered is the amendment of RA 11709 fixing the term of the Armed Forces Chief of Staff and other AFP senior positions to three years which in hindsight is not really surprising.

The original intention of the law was to fix the term of the AFP Chief of Staff only to avoid the revolving door policy of having Chiefs of Staff serving for just a few months. The way the law came out, however, was that it included scores of other positions which cannot help but affect the careers of many officers.

This proposed amendment, therefore, is intended to correct a bad situation before the problem gets out of hand.

There are others but the most important initiative is the much discussed sovereign wealth fund aka the Maharlika Investment Fund which we now debating.

There are some sectors that include government supporters cautioning against going thru with this or, at the very least, postpone or study it further.

It appears, however, that the proponents are bent on going thru with it with House Bill 6398 already filed in the House of Representatives.

It probably would have been better if we had simply called it a rainy day fund because that is what it really is.

It is money that the country can grow to access in times of need like wars or pandemics. Instead of raiding our current precarious financial resources, the funds needed can be started by appropriating P20B of our yearly national budget which can be increased every year.

Within a few years, we can accumulate a sizable sum which the government can invest if it wants to without endangering the other financial resources of the country.

Under certain conditions there are certainly merits of having some kind of a rainy day fund.

But I would think that the public would prefer that the government focus its attention to the very serious problem at hand which is inflation before anything else.

It all boils down to priorities.

Inflation is making life miserable for Filipinos especially those on fixed incomes. Even President PBBM himself alluded to this problem.

If we look at what is going on, the increase in food prices is no longer governed by the law of supply and demand.

The Department of Agriculture keeps on saying there are sufficient food supplies but prices of basic commodities keep on going up.

Pork, onions, and sugar are just a few examples.

The Departments of Agriculture and Trade and Industry cannot seem to enforce their own regulations.

This clearly shows that there are certain sectors taking advantage of the situation to make a killing and they should be dealt with aggressively.

Perhaps the government should consider forming a special police force to go after these people because the problem has become a law enforcement problem.

There is a need for good intelligence to root out those responsible including those in government who may be in cahoots with the price manipulators.

The government must simply do a lot more instead of coming out with instructions on how to make do with P500 for Noche Buena for a family of five which by the way cannot be done.

This year’s Christmas celebration must be bleaker for many of us Filipinos because of the much higher food prices.

It is not an exaggeration to say that Filipinos work hard the whole year to prepare for the Christmas holidays because it is our most important holiday season.

Let us first worry about taming inflation which, as things stand, will last a lot longer than government predictions.

Then we can go back to other issues such as sovereign funds and all.