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Thursday, November 17, 2005
Editorials: Malacañang’s claim
MALACAÑANG has been rather too eager to acquire the bragging rights to a few positive developments in the country’s economy the past few days.
Press Secretary Ignacio Bunye, for example, has attributed the recent rollback in the prices of petroleum products to the Arroyo administration’s implementation starting last Nov. 1 of the Reformed Value-Added Tax (RVAT).
Bunye’s arguments lean heavily on the claim that RVAT helped strengthen the peso, which in turn helped lower the cost of the country’s oil importations.
Of course, there are several factors why the value of the peso has appreciated just as there are several factors why there has been a lowering of oil prices the past few days.
But it is important for the Arroyo administration to grab at the opportunity to claim these developments as its own doing not only to paint the much-maligned RVAT in a more positive light but also to fend off continuing offensives by the political opposition.
Besides, there is the push, as articulated by Finance Secretary Margarito Teves, to go ahead with the raising by two percent more in January of the value added tax as laid down by the RVAT law.
The public should therefore be wary of Malacañang’s claims just as it should be wary of doomsday scenarios painted in the wake of RVAT’s implementation.
It has only been half a month since RVAT was implemented, thus it is still too early to say what its impact on the country’s economy really is.
Metro Cebu body
A Population Commission 7 report has stated what has been argued before: basic services can be delivered efficiently if there is a permanent body that will oversee the various needs of Metro Cebu and its residents.
But that is just a rephrasing of the rationale behind the bill filed by Rep. Raul del Mar in 1992 for the creation of the Metro Cebu Development Authority (MCDA).
Theory is better if it is brought to reality. The problem, with the MCDA proposal, however, is that its realization needs receptive local government officials---something that may not be readily available now.
As it is, Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña is still locked in a bitter squabble with officials of neighboring Talisay City on the ownership of a portion of the South Reclamation Project.
That alone will make the setting up of an MCDA but a dream, for now.
(November 17, 2005 issue)
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