FROM the perspective of a Mindanaowon, the more than two-hour state of the nation address of President Aquino is nothing but empty rhetoric. Just about the consolation is his brief reference to the BangsaMoro Basic Law which is not only constitutionally infirmed but it is doomed to fail.
I am not saying this, the legal luminaries in the senate and a number of lawyers I have interviewed are saying that the remaining days of this administration are not enough for the debates and if at all it will passes congress will surely be castrated in the Supreme Court.
The Sona is supposed to rev up enthusiasm, pride and hope. Instead it created defeatism, shame and hopelessness. Metro Manilans are the only happy citizens in this country with the President mouthing billions of pesos in infrastructures.
Visayas and Mindanao are not in the radar screen of this administration in its last days in office. Well, I would grant that President Aquino did have Mindanao in his mind. As many Mindanao journalists observed the government had allocated armaments to battle insurgents and separatist groups in the region.
Which is rather unfortunate. The mindset has always been for every people’s uprising respond with all that you have in your military arsenals. Remember the Zamboanga siege? The ragtag elements of the Moro National Liberation Front had wanted to plant its emblem in the city hall grounds to remind the government panels negotiating peace with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front that the MNLF should be consulted on the crafting of the Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro.
How did the government respond to the crisis? Stop the posturing and drop bomb on them. The loss of life and damage to properties were unquantifiable. The irreducible estimate on properties reached P36-billion. DILG Secretary Mar Roxas, the man who took over the helm of the crisis committee promised to restore normalcy and rebuild the damage wrought by the government. To date, just like the victims of Typhoon Yolanda in Leyte, the victims in Zamboanga are still living in tents, hopeless and helpless.
I can feel the searing pain of the victims of these catastrophes, man-made and natural, as they listen to the Sona of President Aquino. He was rambling of billions of pesos that would benefit Metro Manila and Luzon while they, which deserve a little bit more of charity from this government, are salivating and salivating have given up on the prospects of their deliverance.
It saddens me the more because there are minor functionaries in the national government who are supposed to articulate the problems and the needs of Mindanao but instead blamed local governments for their failure to submit feasibility studies to be considered for funding by the national government. The blame game which the national leadership had steward had woefully permeated agencies like the Mindanao Development Authority.
The Sona should have been dubbed Somla: the State of the Metro Manila and Luzon Address. At least, while it is exclusive of these areas it speaks of the ugly truth that Visayas and Mindanao have to wait for the next administration for their share of the nation’s wealth and government services.
These diabolism and injustice that should compel Mindanao and Visayas to vote for national leaders, the President included, who have manifested their concern for the plight of the people in these regions which were/are conveniently forgotten by the present dispensation.
For this reason, it has become imperative that, since he is the popular choice of Mindanaowons and Visayans, Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte seriously reconsider his option to retire from politics. It is now his moral obligation to put an end to the isolation of Mindanao and Visayas.
We cannot afford to lose this chance otherwise the inevitability of being consigned to the status of docile vassals of Metro Manila will be with us till kingdom come.