SoNA: A country Filipinos deserve

SoNA: A country Filipinos deserve | Daily Tribune

One such plan is the launch into space next year of our own rocket in partnership with a South Korean aerospace company. To this end, Cagayan is being primed to host the first spaceport as it is geographically and economically the ideal gateway into space.

From the SoNA outline, the President may have intended as his target audience out of the whole viewing universe those in grassroots, Classes D and E, to the extent it might put them under deep hypnosis. For FM Jr. appeared to speak profusely of a wide range of what the government does for the country, for OFWs, for MUPs, for the region and for the world.

FM Jr. should have done away with revisiting what he announced in his SoNA of last year. This time his speechwriter must have, in devil-may-care fashion, put in reverse order the main culprits in the epic floodgate scandal — mentioning first the contractors, followed by high public officials, and last and but not least, the legislators — in that bizarre pecking order.

The old theme formed part of his opening speech to persuade all listeners that he has done everything to get to the bottom of things even under pain of consolidating multiple charges against his own cousin, the former House Speaker.

In stark contrast, the first bunch of legislators to find themselves behind bars were not those who prominently figured in the first, second, third and last round of the Blue Ribbon Committee hearings that took full cognizance of the unprecedented corruption in flood control projects.

Former Chair of the House Committee on Appropriations Zaldy Co is still at large. The case against Martin Romualdez is held at bay until the Ombudsman winds up its investigation wherever the evidence leads — something better said than done.

Meanwhile, do the President’s announced updates ring a bell, viz., 1) P20 billion recovered; 2) monetary accounts and properties of the accused frozen; 3) P800 million reverted back to the Treasury; 4) a promise that all monies yet to be recovered will go back to government coffers? All these depend on the work of the Ombudsman and the National Prosecution Service.

This fifth SoNA did not strike anyone as reflective of a great legacy of an incumbent President, hardly. Any number of failings could still be brought to question. One, it might be fair to ask whatever happened to the so-called Maharlika Wealth Fund, whether there has been a good return on investments and who did largely benefit from the windfall of monetary benefits or proceeds.

Two, it was not clear how the system loss charge in electricity bills of millions of consumers could be written off, more so removing the value-added tax at the expense of the government. Isn’t this merely a pipe dream to give people false hope?

Roughly, by way of fiscal earmarking, the manner by which the President dutifully expounded on the rest of the programs in health, education, agriculture, technical-vocational, local government, OFWs, energy supply, jobs, housing, doles to the marginalized, tax relief and exemptions, Malampaya, nuclear energy, universal health care and so forth could have well put every listener in some state of suspended animation or mass hypnosis.

All words over numbers — kaput.