Championing mendicancy
"IT IS irresponsible to allocate a budget for a program that is not yet fully prepared. The details may look very nice... but the implementation is certainly not that simple.”
Thus the Honorable Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, representative of the 2nd District of Pampanga, took the House floor calling “ambitious and untimely” the doubling of the budget of a poverty-alleviation program which her administration started.
Integrated in the budget of the Department of Social Welfare and Development, the budget for the conditional cash transfer (CCT) program for 2011 was raised to P21.9 billion, nearly doubling last year’s P12 billion.
The DSWD said this was principally due to the expansion of the program to cover a total of 2.3 million households from one million this year.
As provided in the CCT, each family – pre-selected among the poorest of the poor – will receive P1,400 per month for 10 months provided that the children will finish schooling. Parents are also required to regularly bring their children to health centers for immunization and preventive health care, as well as improvement in their children's nutrition and regular prenatal visits for pregnant women.
It is those conditionalities – supposed to be sine qua non for the cash – that, the CCT proponents claim, thoroughly differentiates the program from mere dole. A sort of a “social contract” binds the beneficiary to the donor, in effect.
So how adequate is government in ensuring that the beneficiaries would meet the conditionalities of their contract? The task at hand is enormous, to say the least, the former President said. “We have to prepare the allied services in health and education whose demand would increase because of the conditions of the (CCT). Now we have a program that's very good, that should be expanded but the question is by how much."
Having initiated the program, Madame GMA of course had to concede that it is “very good” and “should be expanded.” The question is only in the cost.
Other sectors however are not as optimistic of the CCT as the president-turned-solon.
As a matter of fact, even at its inception, the program – under a nomenclature other than the generic CCT – had drawn criticisms from practically all but the intended recipients.
Here’s a piece we wrote here not-too-long ago.
Culture of indolence
WITH THE government program that gives up to P1,400 monthly stipend to a family living below the poverty line, a new take on the old Chinese “fish talk” comes into being.
Government does not feed that family for only a day, it makes it cling to government for its meal for a lifetime.
This is a perpetuation of patronage politics, that has bedeviled Philippine governance from its feudal past to its so-called democratic present.
That is promoting, nay, further enhancing our culture of mendicancy.
That is propagating indolence, inertia and indigence.
Ahon Pamilyang Pinoy, the name of the dole-out program will effect the very opposite of its intent – instead of uplifting the life of the poor, it will submerge them into greater indignity, overdependence and despondence. Lubog Pamilyang Pinoy will make a most appropriate name.
To the point, and so rightly, is Caritas Manila in saying that the dole will only make the poor dependent on government.
“It is anti-poor, gives the poor no dignity, and only breeds dependency.” So said Fr. Anton Pascual, executive director of Caritas Manila.
The P5 billion allocation of the national government to fund monthly stipend for each of the country’s poorest of the poor can better serve the poor by funding livelihood and income-generating projects where they can be gainfully employed.
“The government should instead employ the poor as street sweepers, canal sanitizers and garbage collectors to teach them the value of work,” Pascual suggested.
The government can partner with non-governmental organizations, small cooperatives, and social institutions in the programming of projects – from the old self-employment assistance and small-loan packages, to more innovative income-generating activities – for the poor.
That is going by the pro-actively positive “teach him how to fish, and feed him for a lifetime” part of the old Chinese saying. It goes well too with the Christian value that labor ennobles the man.
Trabaho, hindi limos ang sagot sa kahirapan. Trabaho, hindi limos ang aangat sa karangalan ng pinaka-hikahos man sa mga mamamayan.
AS IT was then, so it is now. Government too impoverish in thought as to think of a truly alleviating, much less empowering, anti-poverty program.
Shame
Thus the Honorable Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, representative of the 2nd District of Pampanga, took the House floor calling “ambitious and untimely” the doubling of the budget of a poverty-alleviation program which her administration started.
Integrated in the budget of the Department of Social Welfare and Development, the budget for the conditional cash transfer (CCT) program for 2011 was raised to P21.9 billion, nearly doubling last year’s P12 billion.
The DSWD said this was principally due to the expansion of the program to cover a total of 2.3 million households from one million this year.
As provided in the CCT, each family – pre-selected among the poorest of the poor – will receive P1,400 per month for 10 months provided that the children will finish schooling. Parents are also required to regularly bring their children to health centers for immunization and preventive health care, as well as improvement in their children's nutrition and regular prenatal visits for pregnant women.
It is those conditionalities – supposed to be sine qua non for the cash – that, the CCT proponents claim, thoroughly differentiates the program from mere dole. A sort of a “social contract” binds the beneficiary to the donor, in effect.
So how adequate is government in ensuring that the beneficiaries would meet the conditionalities of their contract? The task at hand is enormous, to say the least, the former President said. “We have to prepare the allied services in health and education whose demand would increase because of the conditions of the (CCT). Now we have a program that's very good, that should be expanded but the question is by how much."
Having initiated the program, Madame GMA of course had to concede that it is “very good” and “should be expanded.” The question is only in the cost.
Other sectors however are not as optimistic of the CCT as the president-turned-solon.
As a matter of fact, even at its inception, the program – under a nomenclature other than the generic CCT – had drawn criticisms from practically all but the intended recipients.
Here’s a piece we wrote here not-too-long ago.
Culture of indolence
WITH THE government program that gives up to P1,400 monthly stipend to a family living below the poverty line, a new take on the old Chinese “fish talk” comes into being.
Government does not feed that family for only a day, it makes it cling to government for its meal for a lifetime.
This is a perpetuation of patronage politics, that has bedeviled Philippine governance from its feudal past to its so-called democratic present.
That is promoting, nay, further enhancing our culture of mendicancy.
That is propagating indolence, inertia and indigence.
Ahon Pamilyang Pinoy, the name of the dole-out program will effect the very opposite of its intent – instead of uplifting the life of the poor, it will submerge them into greater indignity, overdependence and despondence. Lubog Pamilyang Pinoy will make a most appropriate name.
To the point, and so rightly, is Caritas Manila in saying that the dole will only make the poor dependent on government.
“It is anti-poor, gives the poor no dignity, and only breeds dependency.” So said Fr. Anton Pascual, executive director of Caritas Manila.
The P5 billion allocation of the national government to fund monthly stipend for each of the country’s poorest of the poor can better serve the poor by funding livelihood and income-generating projects where they can be gainfully employed.
“The government should instead employ the poor as street sweepers, canal sanitizers and garbage collectors to teach them the value of work,” Pascual suggested.
The government can partner with non-governmental organizations, small cooperatives, and social institutions in the programming of projects – from the old self-employment assistance and small-loan packages, to more innovative income-generating activities – for the poor.
That is going by the pro-actively positive “teach him how to fish, and feed him for a lifetime” part of the old Chinese saying. It goes well too with the Christian value that labor ennobles the man.
Trabaho, hindi limos ang sagot sa kahirapan. Trabaho, hindi limos ang aangat sa karangalan ng pinaka-hikahos man sa mga mamamayan.
AS IT was then, so it is now. Government too impoverish in thought as to think of a truly alleviating, much less empowering, anti-poverty program.
Shame
posted by A.Caesar Z. Lacson at 6:58 AM
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