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Sunday, January 15, 2017
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DEPARTMENT of Finance spokesperson Paola Alvarez says the Social Security System (SSS) pension hike and land use moratorium are mere “populist proposals willy-nilly just to earn political pogi points for the Duterte administration.” She says that revenues, in particular, will take a hit as taxpayers may be forced to fund the increase in SSS pensions without corresponding adjustment in members’ contributions.
Calling these initiatives mere short-term populist initiatives is an unacceptable slight aimed squarely at millions of income poor pensioners, farmers and urban poor. It might be incorrect to say that revenue will take a hit by approving the pension hike, because as soon as the President gives his approval, it become state policy to provide funds to the pension fund. It is no different from the budget given to the other pro-poor programs of the administration.
The government should look somewhere else to raise the revenue it needs for infrastructure spending in the next six years. If additional revenues are the concern, a most basic initiative would be to raise the level of efficiency in tax collection, both in the Bureau of Internal Revenue and Bureau of Customs, and not to flatly reject clearly pro-poor programs of different agencies.
SSS pensioners are personally slighted by the statement that the pension hike and land use moratorium merely panders to short-term populist initiatives. The President was swept to power on the strength of his support for the pension hike, and his clear concern for the day-to-day problems of our people. This was not something made up just to grab the headlines of the evening news.
These initatives put the ordinary Filipino at the center of government programs. How can you argue against ensuring support for our seniors till the end of their days? How can you argue against protecting peasant lands from being converted into malls and subdivisions?
By opposing social justice measures directly benefiting the daily lives of our people, we betray our promise to take care of them, especially their day-to-day concerns.
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