Presidential Noynoy Aquino: his advocacies, philosophies, and perspectives

January 24th, 2010 by Abe N. Margallo

The polished performance of Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III before the nation’s business leaders on January 21, 2010 will make Ferdinand Marcos turn in his grave.

For many Filipinos (the businessmen, business managers and financial executives in attendance including) it could be their first time to get to know this gift from Noynoy (with his outstanding command of the essential and relevant facts and all) who theretofore has preferred “to not to seek the limelight” despite being at the core of an iconic political family all his life and a seasoned politician himself.

Yet the suave eloquence of Noynoy will remind many of the last generation or two – as well as the old fogies of the Marcosian era still living today – of his own father’s gift of gab, minus of course the trademark theatrics the martyred Ninoy was famous of. But unlike his father who was inexorably senatorial, whether performing before the august Senate of the Philippines exposing just another of Marcos’ shenanigans or defending himself before the military tribunal, Noynoy is graciously presidential even at this stage. Well, this is form.

But what’s the substance of Noynoy?

Or, as Noynoy himself puts it: What are “the advocacies that I champion, the perspective and philosophies I bring to the equation and some of my proposed solutions to give an insight into my inner persona.”

First, Noynoy confidently simplifies the nation’s problem by stating it as something that is not hard to figure out since we share the same statistics and probably the same conclusions and that “the solutions have been there all along.”

Change is therefore “extremely possible” – if only the leader we choose has the “clear political will to execute (it).”

That will to change, Noynoy contends, will be absent in a leader “whose own financial and political ethics are questionable” and who is in fact “benefiting from the status quo.” Such a leader “who has used public office for private gain, will always be the most committed enemy of change.”

In short, Noynoy argues: “To lead transformation, you cannot be part of the problem.” Neither can you be the agent of change “if you have lied, cheated, and stolen to gain power.”

The very first step to leading to national transformation is therefore the choosing of a leader who is a part of the solution.

Needless to state, the government is continually operating on deficit and without the required revenues, it is incapable to serve the basic needs of the state and its people such as proper education and other social overhead capital, e.g., for science and technology, and the economy unable to progress from its present status to a “development” state. The consequent lack of productive activity results in the inability of the economy to generate employment opportunities necessary to create a society of indigenous (instead of diasporic) middle class.

Getting down to the brass tacks, Noynoy then identifies an initial and wholly doable two-pronged approach to enhance the national budget without imposing new taxes or increasing tax rates but otherwise allowing “universal low tax rates.” One is by plugging the “revenue leaks” at the BIR and Customs and by punishing tax evaders and smugglers (Sans the kind of tough talk Obama unleashed to confront the prohibitive emoluments and bonuses given by investments banks to their executives a year after the US government had bailed out the financial system, Noynoy only politely assured his audience that “those smugglers and evaders are not faceless and unknown entities”). The other is “to encourage entrepreneurs and enterprises to invest and create jobs in any industry” and allow the market rather than the government “in spotting where the growth opportunities are.”

The nation’s businessmen, managers and financial executives are also reminded by the leading presidential aspirant that cronysism, state capture by the private sector and perverse symbiosis between the state and powerful rent-seeking economic class are anathema to progress. This is because while the practice “may work, locally, for now, it has not enabled these players to become competitive in the world market, where the rules of the game do not take special relationships into consideration.”

Noynoy makes perfectly clear that the government under his watch will not compete with business or “use its regulatory power to extort, intimidate and harass” (Take note however that he stops short of saying the government will not get involved).

Thus, for instance, in addition to his somewhat decentralized or Taiwanese approach to development, Noynoy is of the view that “our infrastructure agencies and LGUs (must) transform into cooperative ventures with the private sector by bringing forth an agreed public infrastructure program, based on a cohesive plan that optimizes the value of the entire network.” On the other hand, another of Noynoy’s approach suggests a South Korean model as he looks forward to this public-private partnership “as a means to pump-prime the economy” subject to “objective criteria for different types of projects and . . . a scorecard that will assess various projects against benchmarks transparent to the public.”

There are indeed certain policy alternatives that other governments have tried to pursue economic development such as: promotion of small and medium firms, targeting the development of a certain manufacturing industries, attraction of foreign investments or protection of certain domestic industries against imports.

But for Noynoy, one of the pragmatic priorities of his administration is to have a complete review of our agricultural programs. He believes that a lot can done for our farmers, given its present budget, if we plug the leaks and focus on the efficient use of resources; stop those resources by being eaten up in administrative costs; and instead support such efforts as “supply chain management that minimizes losses, creates jobs, consults with stakeholders, and capitalizes on our competitive advantage.”

(On a cognate note, I have advocated here in FV that a successful strategy for sustained agricultural surpluses possibly in conjunction with the development of the extractive sector could pick up a good portion of the bill for the transition to modernity. For example, foreign exchange from agricultural products and supplies would help defray the costs of imported capital goods necessary for industrialization.)

Noynoy may have been formally schooled in the market system and he dares to take a rather progressive stand on how to solve the growing number of underclass in our society because of unplanned pregnancies. However, instead of blind conformance with the conservative ideology of trickle down economy and the doctrinal teaching of his faith, Noynoy anchors his core philosophy on these fundamental humane and Christian values:

Our faith teaches us that we are our brother’s keeper. Our logic should tell us that in taking care of others, their growth equals our own.

Do you still wonder why our color is yellow?