Wednesday, August 13, 2008 Valdehuesa: NGOs and the GBP By Manuel Valdehuesa Street Talk
DOZENS of civic clubs and other non-government organizations (NGOs) with supposedly well-educated members are spread out in our city; every one of them located in a barangay.
But all of them put together have not made the barangays more democratic or better developed or more orderly.
They organize, manage, or undertake development projects using funds they raise from corporate citizens, politicos with large pork barrels, or from their own pockets. But they don't apply the same vigor, attention to detail, or efficiency to the governance of their immediate community. If only they would, the city would have better developed, progressive, or pleasant barangays.
Barangueños would be enticed to participate and learn the craft of self-governance or autonomy. They would learn to employ the community's capital to improve quality of life and productivity. And they would learn to govern collectively in accordance with the Autonomy Law. The barangays could then rise to their potential as a government, as a corporation, and as an economy.
Up to now, people don't know or appreciate that their barangay is a full-fledged government with requisite powers - to levy local taxes and fees, to police its jurisdiction, or to exercise its power of eminent domain (actually expropriate private property for public use!).
Even less appreciated is its nature as a public corporation, that it has capital derived from various sources including its internal revenue allotment.
Because of this ignorance, the capital of the barangays are squandered by officials who know no better than kids with a weekly allowance - spending it to gratify personal, not developmental or communal imperatives. Their capital does not attract counterpart funds from elsewhere or equity from its inhabitants, either corporate citizens or wealthy individuals.
Consequently, because the available capital isn't invested or spent with the view to growing it, the fund is dissipated, down to zero at the close of each budget year.
And because the barangay never goes bankrupt (no government goes bankrupt as long as there are taxpayers!), people view government as a Horn of Plenty flowing with goodies to give away year after year no matter how ignorant, incompetent, or corrupt its handlers.
Meanwhile, nothing is ever done to address the problems of unemployed, under-employed, or unproductive inhabitants in the neighborhoods.
If people can figure out their Gross Barangay Product, or GBP, they can plan local growth targets rationally, methodically. Leaving this important aspect of governance entirely to non-performing officials - who play at governance and live off the community's resources - will not expand the local resource base. Quite the contrary, it will dissipate the common wealth.
What are the institutes of government or the faculty of social studies in schools, colleges and universities teaching their students and graduates? Quite a few of these communities could very well produce, say, 10 million pesos worth of goods and services by developing their resources in terms of production, processing, tourism, services, and so on. Multiply the magnitude by the number of barangays in the country and the national economy would realize several hundred billions more than it does -- perhaps as much as half a trillion in new goods and services. Imagine what that increased GBP can do for the GNP -- to finance the country's infrastructure, indebtedness or investment needs?
Surely there's a lot that civil society groups can do to crank up the local economy of these barangays, especially the suburban ones. In the process, they would also expand the democratic space in our still feudalistic society and bring better order and stability to the grassroots.
Without progress and stability at the grassroots, there can be no real progress or stability in the nation. Check this out with the professors at Liceo U, Capitol U, Xavier U, or COC!
(A former vice chair of the Local Government Academy, Manny heads the Gising Barangay Movement and writes Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays. Email: valdeman_esq@yahoo.com.)
