When a family is in dire need of money to finance the needs and already scraped the bottom, it will resort to selling properties,isn't it? Well same thing for government. Despite the trillions- close to P15 trillion- it keeps borrowing more funds both from domestic and foreign sources. Government need for money is a bottomless pit.
The finances are always in precarious balance. Figures from the Philippine Statistics Authority indicate almost half of the 115 population are considered poor. Nothing more for the ever crying poor folks because there’s not much money now in the treasury. The Social Amelioration Program or ayudas is now being set aside even there is still the shrill cries from the impoverished of the country’s slums. Sorry President Marcos Jr. the ball is in your hands. Hopefully your strategy on how to raise more funds will succeed and not fail.
I proposed this sometime back when pandemic was raging and government was desperate for funds to purchase the much needed vaccines. Now may I sincerely repeat the propose solution on how to make trillions and trillions of pesos. Too good to be true? It is true! And if you don’t agree on the proposal, just bite your lips, gnash your teeth, sport a smile and then forget it. Recently, as a matter of fact, there was recently a passed law setting aside five percent of the total areas of former United States military installations and converted into economic zones by virtue of a law passed in 1993 and can be disposed as sales. Good for a start. Question. Why only 5%?
More billions of pesos are needed. No need to cross oceans and with stretched palms begging for more aids for foreign donations if we will sell some 100,000 hectares of land at a premium price. Yes Virginia let’s sell what we owned. It’s just like when a family is pushed to the wall and need money badly he will resort to sell something of value. Pay all our borrowings. Invest in infrastructure like seaports, airports and agricultural facilities.
All what we have to do is put a deed on the land titles owned by our government now which were formerly base lands used by the American military forces. Clark Freeport, the former Subic naval base, Poro Point and other smaller former military camps. These locations may even spur growth and make our country list among the first world.
I served as a member of the board of the Bases Conversion Development Authority (BCDA) for some years till I resigned in the late 2013. I saw how a former military camp was transformed into a cross-functional central business district. And this is the former Fort Bonifacio, now called the Bonifacio Global City (BGC). The BGC is only more than 300 hectare property and this is now the location of tall and modern buildings. The Market Market Shopping Mall and the Sy owned Aura are drawing the shoppers while those who are biased food lovers troop from lunch hour to dinner time at the Serendra. Hundreds of thousand of yuppie workers fill the hundreds of tall office buildings and while their break time are spent at the Bonifacio High Street.
All these things happened when the government placed a deed on the title and sold the land. If you were lucky enough to buy a property there earlier, you can sell it from anywhere from half million to one million per square meter today because builders are allowed vertical constructions, as against the adjacent Forbes Park and Dasmarinas Village where a square meter of land you'll be buying at P300 thousand per square meter only because tall buildings are not allowed to be built in these two gated subdvisions. This idea of mine is take it or leave it. Adopt it or drop it. Study it or forget it.
