PAGBABAGO

Those of us who continue to monitor the country’s performance in global surveys on competitiveness, education, media freedom, environment which are deemed critical in assessing the health of the country, will be dismayed by outcomes showing that the Philippines had slipped several notches during the past five years or so. We may attribute this to the pandemic and the comparatively strict lockdowns in the country that had limited its growth. But, even before Covid-19, surveys on media freedom, education and literacy as well as economic growth had already shown serious deficits that had limited our performance. What surprises some of us is our general response to such surveys. They are reported by the media, and we comment on them with a sad note of acceptance. In most of these cases, the inadequacy of existing policies as well as prospective response on the part of policy makers and executives. But what makes us wonder is that over these years, and almost in every administration, perceptions of our performance on the global stage is not taken seriously. It does not result in sustainable system change. We merely react to these surveys with a grain of salt, and life goes on. And we find our ranking slipping several notches almost every year or so. If this were in South Korea, or Vietnam, or even some of our other ASEAN countries, this could have resulted in citizens coming out, demanding from government why this had happened, and asking how they can get involved in helping find a solution to the problem. Now, I remember the story about a Korean who told his Filipino business partner who wondered why our country had not developed as fast as his friend. “You do not love your country as much as we do.” This may be a simplistic response, but there is much truth in it. If our country is under siege or attack, our response is to get our family together and try to get out of the country. We are not able to think of more long-term alternatives. We can’t blame our Filipino friend altogether. He had lived long enough to know that trying to advocate change requires a great deal of sacrifice in time, money, and health. It is like “chasing the wind,” or Sisyphus pushing the rock up only to find it slipping down again. According to the International Institute for Management Development (IMD), the country’s slide by seven notches to the 52nd spot this year from its 48th rank in 2022 makes it the second least competitive economy among 14 economies in Asia-Pacific. What are the weaknesses that had caused this decline? One is education. The gaps in our learning system had already been widely noted after the PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment) results came out. It showed dismal performance of our students in reading, math and science. We showed deficits in government efficiency – in health, tax policy, finance, environment, and basic infrastructure. The global survey on media freedom likewise showed a steep decline of nine spots to 147 out of 180 countries in the World Press Freedom Index. Even according to Transparency International, we showed a drop in 14 notches from the Corruption Perceptions Index 2019. We realize that all these indicators – competitiveness, transparency, freedom are all related. And that they must all work together to create a sustainable future. Thus, our post-Independence day reflection calls for more than just waiting for more global and national surveys to confirm the sorry state of our republic. If Rizal, Bonifacio, Mabini and other heroes were around, what would they have said? And what would they have done? ([[email protected]](mailto:[email protected]))