President Noynoy’s Inauguration: Hope and Promises

Inauguration of an incoming president is one of the good times to gauge the next six years of the country. The inaugural speech will serve as a baseline that we could use to judge the performance of the president. President Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino’s inauguration is no different. Just like the presidents that preceded him, President Aquino uttered many promises in his speech. However, he also tried to instill hope and asked the Filipino people to join him in his crusade of changing the country.

In his speech, President Noynoy Aquino stated these things:

1. Raise government revenue by raising tax collection.

I think President Aquino plans to achieve this by strengthening the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) and the Bureau of Customs (BOC). These two revenue generating agency always fall short of their target. BIR never achieve its target and there are many private companies that evade paying tax. The BOC is so corrupt and is quite famous for having the most corrupt government employees in the country. Making the BIR efficient and cleaning BOC is a good way of increasing the public fund. Before creating new tax, President Noynoy should fix BIR and BOC first.

2. Develop trading centers to help the Agricultural Sector.

President Noynoy said that he wants to help the farmers by creating trading centers where farmers could directly sell their produce without going through the middlemen. His goal here is to reduce price of agricultural products by removing the middlemen in the equation. Middlemen are guilty of placing to buying goods from farmers at very low price and selling those goods at the market at very high price. I agree with him here. The middlemen should be removed for the sake of the poor.

3. Cut red tape and level the playing field for businesses.

One of the investors’ complaints is the lengthy process in setting up a business in the Philippines. President Noynoy promises that he will remove bureaucratic red tape so as to speed up the process. Reducing red tape is also a good way of removing corruption in the government because red tape breeds government officials that asks bribes for speeding up the processing time in the government. However, many presidents promised reducing red tape and failed. President Noynoy will fail too if he will plan to reduce red tape by following the previous presidents’ example. The key in achieving this is by having guts of steel in streamlining the government.

4. Raise the number of jobs.

This is another one of the old promises uttered by many presidents. This could only happen if President Noynoy succeeds in raising tax revenue and in reducing red tape. Being successful on those endeavors will make the country more attractive in the eyes of foreign investors, ergo, more jobs in the country.

5. Raise the number of soldiers and police.

President Noynoy said that the number of soldiers and police are disproportionate to the population. This is the reason why he intends to raise the number of soldiers and policemen. This plan of Noynoy is ominous to rebel groups around the country because it will strengthen the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) and the Philippine National Police (PNP). I approve of this plan of President Noynoy, but he must understand that raising the number of soldiers and police in the field is not the only solution to the problems of AFP and PNP. These institutions are still hounded by issues of corruption. President Noynoy must clean AFP and PNP. He should also initiate the modernization of the AFP. Now is the time to consider having new equipments, especially the Navy and the Air Force, so that we are not ridiculed by other nations.

6. There is no reconciliation without justice

This is President Noynoy’s clear message to former President Arroyo and her cohorts. No one will get off the hook after stealing money from the public coffers. I agree with him. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and gang must face justice for their crimes. But this statement of should not only be applied to GMA, it should also be applied to all corrupt government officials from the Marcos administration to Arroyo Administration. Also, the people who killed the Hacienda Luisita farmers, the perpetrators of Mendiola Massacre, and the Maguindanao murderers should also pay for their crimes. “Justice for all,” that is what I am saying here.

7. No “wang-wang” or the removal of privileged class?

Noynoy said that he want to remove the people who uses wang-wang (police siren) off the streets. Wang-wang had been the symbol of privilege in the country. If you have wang-wang on your car then you have the power to pass through heavy traffic at the expense of the Filipino people. People suffering from congested traffic despise this noisy wang-wang. It is the symbol of the privileged class and President Noynoy implies that he want to remove the privileged class. He is somewhat saying that we are all equal. This is the hardest thing of all the promises in his speech. He will have a hard time in fighting against the elite class because he and his family is part of the elite class. If he is serious then he will betray his class.

Noynoy Aquino’s speech is full of big words that require large amount of effort and guts of steel to achieve. It can’t be denied President Noynoy stirred some in his speech. He makes the people believe that there is still some hope for this country and he could deliver it. The Filipino people is hoping upon hope that he will not destroy the trust that he received people because if he does then this country will fall and its people will be alienated further to their government.

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This is an opinion piece for President Noynoy’s inaugural speech. How about you dear reader? What are your thoughts about Noynoy’s speech? Please leave your thoughts in the comment box.