Tuesday, January 17, 2006
Velasco: Gov't rationalization is long overdue
By Diana B. Velasco
Grain of salt
TECHNICALLY speaking, Executive Order 366 directs the "strategic review of the operations and organizations of the executive branch and providing options and incentives for government employees who may be affected by the rationalization of the functions and agencies of the executive branch."
To some people in public service, it implies the doom of their sense of security of tenure and spells the death of their careers. To the rest of the population, it signifies concrete actions by government in finally doing something about a bureaucracy that is often perceived as corrupt, inefficient and downright frustrating. To some, it is a bitter pill to swallow; painting a bleak future defined by not being able to provide for the needs of one's family. To others, it is like having one's cake and eating it too being justly compensated for the years in public service and having a wealth of options on the next path to take.
There are at least two sides and a million opinions on every issue. And so, here is my two pesos' worth of thoughts on EO 366, otherwise known as the Philippine Government rationalization program.
Let me begin with the statement that I am a government employee and that EO 366 as an organization will definitely and drastically affect the agency I work for. Preliminary findings on the review of my bureau indicate that there will be major restructuring on our end; in short, we might possibly lose our administrative division and become reduced to being a mere component of our department. We will have less people and fewer resources due to budget realignments. Having no financial independence from the department means that we will mainly be a regulatory body, having limited opportunities to conduct research work for special projects' our present activities that are closest to my heart.
I admit to having innumerable misgivings about EO 366, being unsure about its effect on me and the agency that I have spent the last seven years of my life working for and loving immensely. I did not want anybody to lose his or her job, and I was aghast that the rationalization program was going to be implemented when I was in government. Talk about wrong timing.
But looking at the issue from a higher perspective, we have to admit that in public service, there are way too many people doing way too little actual public service. Some organizations have similar or even duplicate tasks and functions. For instance, the Local Government Code of 1991 devolved a number of functions done by government agencies and new positions were created within the structure of the LGUs. But because the agencies were not restructured even if new people were placed on board, what resulted was that there were at least two organizations--one LGU-based and the other, agency-based--doing the same thing.
So many agencies or special bodies have also been created in the past decades, with many of these being the result of knee-jerk reactions to certain popular issues during the time they were created. When the issues were somewhat institutionally resolved or no longer popular, we were still left with organizations that continue to exist and demand for their share of the budget.
Even by just looking at these two realities, we have to realize that there is a need to rationalize government service, and that this rationalization is long overdue. But never in our political history has there been any widespread and concrete effort by government to review and objectively assess the contribution of every organization and position to the efficiency of the executive branch, until now.
And I say, it's about time. (To be continued)
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