The brutal demolition operations against
so-called informal settlers in Metro Manila and elsewhere in the Philippines
bring to fore many festering social, economic and political issues in the
country.
And as
Manila hosts a grand meeting of the Asian Development Bank, the demolitions and
the reported erection of walls to hide the slum areas from the view of visiting
dignitaries betray and indict the government for its failure to make a dent in
expanding the middle class and lifting the poor from a state of destitution.
While
some would allege that the “squatter” problem is a mere hodge-podge of
“isolated incidents” between aggrieved property owners and scores of
law-violating poor folk, the reality is altogether different.
We have
in Metro Manila and many other places across the country “squatter colonies”
where poor folk occupy private and public lands for the simple reason that they
have nowhere else to go to. Some colonies are found under bridges and by river
banks. These urban poor are so many that traditional politicians view them as
voting blocs, big enough to sway election results.
The
urban poor situation is also said to be the flipside of the unresolved problem
in the provinces where, like the case of Hacienda Luisita, landlords continue
to control large landholdings and evade the policy of agrarian reform. Many
farmers and farmworkers flee the provinces in search of a better life in the
city, only to be shocked by a different kind of a situation in metropolitan
areas.
This is
not to say that property owners whose lands are occupied by squatters should
stop fighting for what is rightfully theirs. It is a plea for responsible and
intelligent middle class Filipinos to stop their anti-poor vendetta and train
their sights on the government for using violence and brutality against what is
clearly a national social, economic and political problem that is poverty. (It
is partly understandable why the middle class feels aggrieved so much by the
squatter problem: They are maybe just a pink slip or a few tens of thousands of
pesos in savings away from falling down from middle class luxury to being
“isang kahig, isang tuka”.)
The
government has the duty to make sure that everyone, especially the poor, would
have a fair chance to obtain a better life. This is where policies of agrarian
reform in the provinces, urban land reform in the cities, a government-run
socialized mass housing program, a mass entrepreneurship program and the strict
implementation of minimum wage laws, among others, should come in.
However,
it seems the hacendero President Aquino is so allergic to such policies. The
killing of a Silverio compound resident in the last violent and brutal
demolition job is a wake up call to everyone that the moratorium belatedly
declared by Aquino’s interior and local government secretary should only be the
first logical step in finding poverty-reduction solutions where the poor are
not considered “enemies” to be violently and brutally crushed but as partners
for development.
Tonyo
Cruz
asiancorrespondent.com
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