By Judaline F. Partlow
DUMAGUETE CITY, July 27 (PNA) – Locales from different sectors of the community have expressed varied opinions on the sixth and final State-Of-The-Nation Address (SONA) of President Benigno Simeon Aquino III that he delivered Monday afternoon at the Batasang Pambansa during the opening of the 16th Congress.
While giving him a rating of between five and 8 on a scale of from one to ten, the reactors said they still want to see the President follow through with certain concerns and other issues as he enters his final stretch of his term ending in mid-2016.
“Though there are things I was expecting to be included (in his SONA) but not mentioned, I felt the sincerity of his words”, said Dr. Salustiano Jimenez, Department of Education (Dep Ed) division of schools superintendent of Negros Oriental.
Dr. Jimenez said he wanted to hear President Aquino mention about the salary increase of teachers and government employees and an update of the Mamasapano, Maguindanao murders.
“Clearly, he was not able to explain thoroughly the issue of the DAP (pork barrel fund)” but according to Jimenez, he believes the President was just “playing safe” and not dwelling on the more controversial issues of the land.
Giving him a rating of 6.5, Dr. Jimenez said, “his being grateful to all those who worked with him made me proud of being a Filipino and a public servant. The Philippines is what it is today because it is what we made it.”
Jimenez also said he was happy to hear that the country’s education program, specifically the K to 12, was going in the right direction with the President’s announcement of building more classrooms and hiring thousands more of teachers in the coming months.
A client of the Perpetual Help Community Cooperative, Inc. (PHCCI) noted the good points of the SONA where the President presented the achievements of his administration that covered many sectors.
It showed that the President was working, said the client who asked not to be named.
For her part, PHCCI’s marketing and advertising chief Maricar Vensuelo commended President Aquino for his administration’s gains in the labor sector.
Job generation was real considering the number of businesses opening in the country and offering job opportunities to the employment sector, she said, as she rated the President’s SONA at eight.
In his SONA, the President had announced that the unemployment rate had dropped in the latest count in 2014 after the national government had addressed the job mismatch problem.
The Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program showed positive results in family development since education was encouraged while parents were also asked to become members of cooperatives, like the PHCCI, where they could save and invest their money, Vensuelo said.
Her husband, Sulpicio Vensuelo, Jr., meanwhile, had this to say about the President: “I hope his momentum for running after scam (suspects) and corrupt officials will continue until his last days in office.”
Dioscoro Aranas, a carpenter by profession, pointed out that the Aquino administration has marked a lot of gains in the past five years although many people fail to recognize these and instead continue to criticize his “daang matuwid” (straight path) approach to governance.
“There are no perfect presidents but PNoy has done a lot for the country like agriculture development projects, improvement of the PAG-ASA (weather bureau) and running after scam suspects like Napoles” which he described as “proof” of his sincerity to fight corruption in government, he added.
Adrian Sedillo, the executive officer of the Provincial Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (PDRRMC) of Negros Oriental, meanwhile, commended the Aquino administration for its innovative changes in the country’s weather bureau, the Philippine Astronomical, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (PAG-ASA) which can now give close to accurate weather reports.
In the past, people relied on other weather agencies, many of them based abroad, for information on the weather, specifically on typhoons, as PAG-ASA’s equipment were not dependable, Sedillo said.
PAG-ASA’s major changes adopting the latest technology, providing better services, enhanced communications systems and wider information dissemination through different modes such as social media have made disaster management and response a lot easier, he added.
Sedillo, however, said he would like to see the national government under the Aquino leadership to invest more on programs on disaster and mitigation and preparedness, explaining that local government units could only do so much.
Angeline Gonzalez of the provincial office of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) described the President’s SONA as “refreshing”, “down to earth”, “makamasa (favoring the masses)” while the “daang matuwid” as a long road that hopefully the next President would continue.
What she appreciated most of President Aquino’s state address was his thanking his Cabinet and even the “lowest” of those who have played different roles in his life, which “shows that so many, from all walks of life, really care and appreciate what he has jump started.”
Gonzalez gave President Aquino a rating of eight.
For a mother of three, who lives in the mountains of a formerly insurgency-affected barangay, Janilyn Ramos (not her real name), said she hoped that the President was sincere in his desire to weed out the corrupt in his administration.
She expressed disappointment that she and her husband were not included in the government’s Conditional Cash Transfer, also known as the Pamilyang Pantawid Program.
According to her, they took the survey but they were rejected, given the reason the roof of their house was made of galvanized iron.
The 31-year old mother said she understood clearly that the program was intended for the poorest of the poor, but what made her sad was that there were CCT beneficiaries in their barangay who were allegedly enrolled in that program but who were not “poor”.
Some were even allegedly barangay officials, she added.
Nevertheless, she said she was hopeful that President Aquino would improve the educational system of the country, now that the K to 12 program was in place.
Public teachers who are assigned in the mountains are still not reporting on time, she claims, adding some of them report at lunch time Monday and return home mid-afternoon Friday, thus limiting the school hours of children being served.
She asked not to be identified for fear of reprisal as two of her children were already at school. (PNA)