Editorial: Not at the poor's expense

THE applause has long ended and the glum faces of the politicos who felt fire in their pants when President Benigno C. Aquino III enumerated a few of the anomalous moves and transactions the past government did are now hogging the headlines defending themselves.

But all these grandstanding and handwashing should not make us lose our focus on what the wastefulness and corruption has placed our country in: near bankruptcy, except that governments cannot declare such.

Updates on President Benigno Aquino III's presidency

As the Bureau of the Treasury reported just this week, the "January to June fiscal deficit of the National Government reached P196.7 billion, P 51.6 billion higher than the programmed ceiling of P145.2 billion."

June deficit is P34.6-billion.

To paint an even dreary picture, national government debt was said to have dropped by P22-billion as of April 2010, that is equivalent to 0.5 percent from the March 2010 level and is thus now at P4.4-trillion.

The drop, however, is nothing to cheer about. "The decline in NG's (national government's) foreign debt of P33 billion or 1.7 percent from the level as of March 2010 was due to the P28 billion appreciation of the peso against the US dollar and P8 billion depreciation of the third currencies against the US dollar," the BOTR reported last July 12.

As we should know, a huge deficit and a ballooning debt will mean drastic measures to raise revenues, and the most conventional way for government to raise revenues is through taxes.

No way can the Aquino administration plod through its six-year term without raising taxes. We just hope that this will not be at the expense of the poor and tightly taxed, like the middle-income wage-earners.

Let the burden of the crisis be on those who can pay.

Anyway, in the past nine years under the Arroyo administration, the rich and powerful has just become richer and more powerful, while the ordinary wage earner has not even had a decent wage increase. Imagine, almost ten years of no substantial wage increase. That is already half a generation. Let all those who have fattened their wallets and feathered their nests during those past nine years pay for such privilege, as they have most likely been not made to pay.

Anyway, this is the right time to generate revenues from import tariffs and corporations, while the Aquino Administration is still enjoying high trust rating and while everyone is still buoyed up with hopes for the better.

"Narinig po ninyo kung paano nilustay ang kaban ng bayan. Ang malinaw po sa ngayon: ang anumang pagbabago ay magmumula sa pagsiguro natin na magwawakas na ang pagiging maluho at pagwawaldas."

President Aquino did reserve a substantial portion of his state of the nation address for tax evaders, and we will continue to hope that whatever deficit the country is suffering from will be squeezed out from those multi-billionaire tax evaders and not the ordinary mother who is already taxed the moment she buys food from the market.

"Bawat linggo po ay may bago tayong kasong isinasampa kontra sa mga smuggler at sa mga hindi nagbabayad ng tamang buwis," he said. Let's demand that from him.

Otherwise, it will be our meager earnings that will once again be placed on the chopping block to fund a bureaucracy that has made billionaires of its minions and cash-strapped millions among the masses.