How do we bring back our collective sense of optimism?

This was the question asked me by our readers and our colleagues in the local government sector recently. The question was triggered by our column a couple of weeks ago, where we shared our view regarding the survey done by research organizations, including the Social Weather Station (SWS). The result of the surveys apparently showed that fewer Filipinos welcomed the year with a positive outlook, and that there was an increase in the number of our countrymen who began 2026 “with fear.”

To recall, according to the SWS, some 89 percent of adult Filipinos looked forward to the New Year with hope instead of fear. This was the lowest level since 2009, the SWS said. It also reflected a one-point decline from 90 percent in 2024 and a seven-point decrease from 96 percent in 2023. This is supposedly the lowest level of optimism in 16 years since the 89 percent recorded in 2009.

In search of an answer to the question, we looked back to what happened in 2023 when nearly all Filipinos said they were hopeful that 2024 would be a better year. The record 96 percent marked in 2023 was obtained only twice before – in 2017 and 2019, according to the SWS.

The SWS survey of 2023 apparently did not probe the answers of the respondents. It did not state the reason for the remarkable “optimism” displayed by those who were asked in the poll. As we said in our column that year, we surmised that the SWS had presumed two things: first, that “optimism” is generally a “feeling” or an “emotion” which need not be explained; second, that “optimism” is “natural” to us, Filipinos – the survey just wanted to find out how much more optimistic we are in the new year compared to the previous one.

We noted that the record 2023 level of “optimism” among Filipinos was reached at a time when there were major uncertainties in the region and in the world. At that time – as it still is today – scary incidents involving our giant neighbor were taking place in disputed portions of the West Philippine Sea. The war between Russia and Ukraine was raging, posing a continuing risk to our energy supply. Israel was still fighting the longest war it has ever entered into, and the end to the conflict in the Gaza Strip is not in sight.

So, why were our countrymen exceptionally positive at that time? The answer could be a key to the bid to trigger a resurgence of optimism today.

Looking back, certain developments in the country gave us reasons to be filled with hope that life in 2024 will be even better than it was in 2023.

For one, we recall that, in 2023, the national government was aggressively pursuing key infrastructure development programs. Two of them stood out: the North-South Commuter Rail (NSCR) project of the Department of Transportation (DOTr), and the National Fiber backbone project of the Department of Information and Communication Technology (DICT).

In 2023, both projects garnered headlines and sparked enthusiastic responses from the business sector and the general public. Interestingly, nothing much was heard about those two crucial projects from late 2024 to the present.

We recall that before the end of 2023, the Department of Transportation (DOTr) announced that it was “all systems go” for the North-South Commuter Rail (NSCR) project. Then-transportation Secretary Jaime Bautista made it clear that the government intended to finish the project on time, despite the humongous challenges it faced at that time.

The NSCR is the 147-kilometer railway system that will supposedly connect Calamba City in the south and the New Clark City in the north. It promised to be able to transport international air travelers from Alabang, south of Metro Manila, to the Clark International Airport at 160 kilometers per hour or in less than two hours through its Airport Express component. That may have triggered considerable optimism, as it promised regular commuters a fast and comfortable journey from Calamba to commercial centers in Central Luzon, without having to endure the traffic along EDSA.

After the exit of Secretary Bautista from the DOTr, we hardly heard any news about the NSCR project. The succeeding DOTr leadership apparently opted to focus on land transportation woes and driver behavior.

A few days ago, we saw small news items about the NSCR. The news item referred to progress apparently made by the DOTr in the acquisition of rights-of-way needed by the project. This must have been a damper to the public who were expecting better news, more like the much-awaited super-fast trains had arrived, or that the project would be finished ahead of time. The announcement apparently created the impression that not much progress had been made in the past two years and that the hoped-for modern, world-class transportation facility is languishing in unexplained delays.

Perhaps, that is the key: the government must now shift our focus from the controversies spawned by the much-vilified flood-control projects and back to the ones that create hope.

There are projects like the NSCR and the NFB that promise our countrymen a more comfortable life. They need to know where these projects are now and what the current department leadership is doing to make sure they are finished soon. The public has had its fill of what is going wrong in the infrastructure front.

They need to know what is going right. Then, a sense of optimism just might make a comeback.

(The author is a Doctor of Medicine, an entrepreneur and the mayor of Antipolo City, former Rizal governor, and DENR assistant secretary, LLDA general manager. Email: [email protected])