I am ready to vote. I received a card with my full name, precinct number, clusteredprecincts number, polling place, my home address, birthday, gender and my number in the list of voters. It was placed in the mailbox and the sender is anonymous.The data will assist me on election day. But I will still look for the Comelec special precinct for senior citizens and persons with disability which is supposed to be on the ground floor. I think Ihave no energy to climb the upper floors of the school building.

 If need be, the senior citizens and PWDs should be allowed to vote via the model for Overseas Filipinos and absentee voters, I guess Commissioner George Garcia, a media friend, can author a bill for the purpose.

The BSP conducts a quarterly survey on consumer expectation survey but I did not find the consumer expectation and confidence survey for the 2^nd half of the year. Neither do I found private survey for the purpose. What I read is the scary statement of the President that the next leaders should be able to handle the soaring oil prices.

Normally, we consumers welcome changes in the leadership.There are policy proposals that are doable in the short, medium and long term. We should propel consumer confidence thru quick and bold decisions. Less debate and argumentation. We know what are the MUSTS and WANTS for the new leaders.

I was aghast to read the financial profit statement of my Alma Mater employer of a huge jump in net profit that doubled for the current year. I did not read the increases in volume of liters sold by products but only the revenues generated. With soaring oil prices that is left untouched by the regulators, I believe all the oil traders, importers and oil companies will announce high profits.

I used the word untouched for a purpose. Whoever will be the new Energy Secretary should act decisively and stopped the pro business pricing formula being implemented on a weekly basis . Simply secure all the profit and loss statements for the first six months of all the oil retailers. In our neighborhood, a new Service station by a name brand is going up despite the fact that in the same short street there are clusters of retail outlets. The financial project study should show that the new station will be a profitable retail station.

Consumer confidence should welcome that prices of basic necessities and prime commodities should be reduced.None of the food processors and manufacturers including the distributors and retailers lost money over the past 6 years.

I did random sampling of increases in SRP of selected basic goods and their increases were implemented in 2016, 2018, 2019, 2021 and 2022.

For illustration, the SRP of a 155-gmcanned sardine in 2016 was P13.45 but now cost P16.60, instant noodle 55 gm SRP was P7.10 but now is P8.25 and corned beef 175 gm SRP was P33.25 but now at P39.75.

The new Trade and Agriculture Secretaries should promptly act on prices and refrain from acting as the spokespersons of the business.They should not be argumentative when consumers complain on prices. The matter of supply and production takes its natural course.

Consumer confidence will soar up when the new leaders promptly decide on wage increases to cope with the diminishing value of the daily wage earners income. The traders are quick in passing on added costs to the prices but how quick can consumer salary cope with prices. I read many proposals submitted on the table for a wage hike. There should be prompt decision on wage increases.

There are reasons for the consumer confidence that prices of water and electricity are the least cost and reasonable to them. The new concession agreements of the water concessionaires and the classification of their business as public utilities should inure to consumer gaining new confidence on their utility bills are fair and equitable. The new leadership should pounce on these changes.

The competitive selection process for new generating plants should ensure that technology that are abundant and easy should translate to lower prices of electricity for kWh.  The State should remove archaic and one-sided incentives that benefits only traders and business at the expense of the consumers.

We consumers look forward to the sincerity of the new leaders of the country that above all and everything else,the consumer welfare is their primary responsibility under the public trust doctrine that the State thru the leaders are only trustees and that people or the consumers are the owners of the country’s resources.

LET US GO OUT AND VOTE.

Atty. Vic Dimagiba

President, Laban Konsyumer Inc.

Email at [email protected]