‘THE clock is ticking from day one of your first 100 days...’
— Daniel L. Vasella
VASELLA isn’t a politician but the CEO of a private firm. He warned managers of his multinational company they “must make a difference or get their exit plan ready.”
A chief executive officer must meet profit goals or he loses his job. That can’t be said of some public officials who survive a rotten rule and cling to power by buying or stealing the election.
Stakeholders and constituents judge public and private leaders.
Whether bad management results in a sacking or poor governance brings defeat at the polling place, public opinion matters.
The public last Aug. 5 looked at Cebu City Mayor Michael Rama’s report at the “First 100 Days” forum initiated by the Ramon Aboitiz Foundation Inc. (Rafi) at the Aboitiz Development Studies Center.
The story in one paper had a 24-word paragraph on the mayor’s promises, while another paper’s story used less than 10 words in a sentence about his “road map for governance and development.”
Bias
The stories dwelt more on the critique. And not because journalists were biased against the mayor and chose the negative. Maybe there was nothing significant or exciting in his report, no stuff to make the reader sit up or almost fall off his chair.
The mayor talked about housekeeping tasks. Fine with that but Michael, reactors told him, has to face gut issues on malnourished children, street beggars, water, livelihood, housing, urban blight, in-bound migration, crime, and ecology.
The mayor skipped those critical issues in his plans. And the clock is ticking.
(paseares@yahoo.com)