“Coming together is the beginning. Keeping together is progress. Working together is success.” HENRY FORD.
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There. Henry Ford has spelled it for us.
Working together – cooperation and coordination – is the formula to achieve success and then sustainable progress.
While the President makes the effort to sell the country’s economic potentials before the international business community, officials in his government appear to be going their own way even as global inflation and the soaring prices of local commodities continue to harass and hustle every Pinoy household.
We do not see the Department of Trade and Industry actively cooperating with the Department of Agriculture in resolving the skyrocketing price of onion and the dismantling of cartels that control the supply chain in the market.
The dictionary defines “cartel” as an association of manufacturers or suppliers with the purpose of maintaining prices at a high level and restricting competition.”
A cartel is formed when a group or groups band together to control the supply of a product for their best (vested) interests.
It is crystal clear to every Pinoy that the horrifying adverse economic effects of the cartels have damaged our socio-economic environment such that even higher authorities and line agencies could not contain, suppress, disband and, more so, jail them.
The cartels have become powerful and influential. They have been in operation since the late fifties when shrewd business operators took advantage of the loose government policies as the Philippines was coming out of the ruins of the Second World War.
There are thousands of farmers cooperatives existing in the country and various other cooperatives but they don’t seem to factor in in the on-going food supply chain.
How is it that a country blessed with great natural resources and patrimony finds itself in poverty and its people in a state of penury?
Filipinos are politically polarized and this polarization is the answer as to why we cannot get our acts together.
Our political leaders appear to be great in making speeches but lack the executive action to implement what is good and profitable for the people.
The DTI and the DA are two of the most important line departments that, if only their respective officials act with dispatch, can together find long-lasting solutions to the problems besetting us in these contemporary times.
The decades old malpractice is that when the President is not looking, some mischievous officials attempt to sneak in some quick money schemes. When they don’t get caught the first time, they make another try, using their same old corrupt system that will then become a template for future corrupt transactions.
This is the vicious cycle PBBM must get rid of if he wants to leave a legacy of good governance.
Knee jerk reactions are what the people see from government officials when emergencies and calamities descend upon their offices. They stammer and reel from what they see as staggering headaches because they have no visions for the future.
Cooperation – getting their acts together – is the key to a nation’s progress and prosperity. There is no argument against this.
No matter how big and herculean the problem is – as a Chinese adage says – “many hands make light work.”
Which means that any presidential appointee who cannot perform his assigned task must be replaced – or fired.
Watch and listen attentively to Senate hearings live on FB or Youtube.
You can easily identify who among the resource persons representing a particular government agency is unqualified or reactionary. They stammer, search for answers or point to a scapegoat.
Wow, do Filipinos deserve these officials who are paid handsomely from taxpayers’ money?
Get your acts together, folks. Don’t wait for the President to boot you out. Oops! (Email feedback to fredlumba@yahoo.com.) GOD BLESS THE PHILIPPINES!
