Friday, January 23, 2009

Senators propose summit to stem job losses in the Philippines

Words for Moolah will be amused upon hearing that an old publicity gimmick that creates a lot of noise and a crowd but achieves nothing has resurfaced.

Holding summits to solve pressing problems.

Currently, some newspapers and TV news programs are screaming about "job losses!" after information leaked that Intel was shutting down its facility in Cavite and Accenture reported that some 500 jobs would be cut.

Another big problem in the offing is that of Pre-Need companies (college assurance plans and pension plans) are said to be going under.

To solve the problem of a sharp rise in unemployment, Senator Francis Pangilinan is proposing a "job creation summit".

Senator Alan "Peter" Cayetano, seeing the dire circumstances faced by the Pre-Need industry, wants "an emergency summit" to specifically address their problems.

Meester Eff will probably shout 'DRAMA QUEENS!" and he'd be right, as usual.

Summits are tantamount to shouting 'Looky! Looky! Me solving problem with summit!'.

The question is, have any of the summits in the past achieve what they were supposed to achieve?

During former President Fidel Ramos' time, there were summits of all sorts. There was a summit for agriculture, the judicial system, and even a peace summit. After holding the summits, agricultural productivity stayed the same... the judicial system continued to be slow and corrupt... and the peace summit didn't stop government and rebel forces from engaging in hostilities.

Of the most recent date, former House Speaker Jose De Venecia held a political summit of some sort and politics in the country remains fractured.

In the case of holding a job creation summit, the only jobs it will create are those directly related to holding the summit itself.

Senator Alan Peter Cayetano, in his usual annoying fashion whines that Congress and the Executive hasn't done anything regarding the reported closure of many preneed companies.

"We should not take this lightly. It's shocking for me that both Congress and the executive will not act right away," Cayetano said.

"Every single minute of uncertainty isn't good for the industry, isn't good for the consumers and is not good for the government, so there should be an emergency summit by the executive and the legislature, or Congress, and solutions that will be felt by those who are already paid for this should come forth from this summit," he said.

My neighbor remarked that the Senator seems great at two things: Pointing out problems for other people to fix and grabbing publicity for it.

Perhaps he should just lead the Pre-Need summit himself.

Did you know that after holding so many hearings regarding the NBN ZTE deal and the Fertilizer Fund Scam, he has failed as Senate Blue Ribbon Committee Chairman to produce a committee report which would have pressured the Ombudsman to investigate cases against Malacanang? All sound and fury signifying nothing.

Anothing thing which a taxi driver once told me about Senator Cayetano was that his tongue is good for two things: spraying saliva all over the place like a sprinkler and licking the butt cracks of First Gentleman Mike Arroyo (whom he once asked for campaign funds) and Senator Manuel Villar (who gave him a high priced election lawyer that helped him in his case with the Comelec and a senatorial candidate who had the same name as his).

So, there, that's what I think about summits.

1 comment:

Political Jaywalker said...

Summit? No need for sabit este summit all they have to do is look in their own backyard like when DepEd remove the tuition fee increase ceiling that dealt a death blow to the college educational plan.

On another note, come join the Filipinos Unite link love for bloggers unity, add your name, blog and url to the list.... check it out at POGB.

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