July 22 , 2011 A NEEDS ASSESSMENT STUDY OF THE COUNTRY UNDER THE AQUINO ADMINISTRATION Movement for Good Governance1

It is relatively easy to elect a President. The difficulty lies in supporting him so that he succeeds in governance. Supporting him entails affirming his performance in areas that he has done very well. But it also involves reminding him what policies and practices are not coherent with his platform and promises. What would an objective or fair approach in evaluating performance of the administration? The assessment must be based on a metric or what the President himself set out to do. In other words, the standards against which the President will be judged are those set by himself, and no one else. In President Aquinos case, these standards can be found in his campaign platform, which can be broken down into either 102 or 150 action programs/promises, depending on the websites one visits.2 The Presidents campaign platform was reiterated in his inaugural address, where he promised to keep his promises: No more turning back on pledges made during the campaign, whether today or in the coming challenges that will confront us over the next six years. It metamorphosed into the program of government formally known as his Social Contract with the Filipino People3 which in turn, serves as the basis of the recently released 2011-2016 Philippine Development Plan (PDP), with Inclusive Growth as the mantra. The Movement for Good Governance uses a scorecard system to assess the needs of the country based on the extent to which the administration has implemented the platform of the President.

1 The Movement for Good Governance (MGG) started in 2008 as a coalition of individuals and organizations who believe that the Philippines deserve better governance. MGG supported advocacies and programs on voter and empowerment, leadership development, and election reforms. It launched a TV program entitled Timbangan in partnership with Channel 5 that benchmarked presidential candidates using a scorecard system. MGGs Chair is Prof. Solita C. Monsod. 2 These include the ProPinoy Project (Campaign Promises Checklist), AntiPinoy (Noynoy-Truth-O-meter), abs-cbnNews.com (Aquino Promises Tracker), and politicaarena.com The PNOY campaign website is no longer found in the web. 3 A 16-point program that can be accessed from The Official Gazette

Score 0 2.5 5 7.5 10

Assessment The President has broken his promise. There has been very slow or little progress on his promise. Something has been accomplished but is lower than expected. The administration is on track and is expected to achieve the target as scheduled. The target has been achieved as scheduled.

The rating system is qualified by indicators. The assessment also makes reference to the qualities of a transformational leader: effective, empowering, and ethical, which MGG used in benchmarking the candidates in the 2010 elections. In specific issues, such as corruption and education, different weights are given. Lighter weights were assigned to those that required simple actions such as requiring public officials to fill up their Statement of Assets and Liabilities (SALN) and making them public. In cases where promises were equally important and difficult, they were given equal weights.

1. Ang Tuwid na Daan

1.1 The President promised to appoint public officials based on their integrity, qualifications and performance record and will hold them accountable to the highest ethical standards of public office. Unfortunately, being a shooting or drinking buddy and/or classmate of the President seems to have been added as a requirement to some posts after his election which makes for a very mixed record. On the plus side are the appointments of cabinet secretaries like de Lima, Robredo, Abad, de Jesus, Singson, and Domingo, and two of the most recent appointments to the Court of Appeals, Gabriel T. Ingles and Pamela Ann A. Maxino.4 On the minus side are those appointees on whose integrity, and worse, even competence, doubts have been cast. The most glaring example of the latter is the appointment of Vice President Jojo Binay as Chairman of HUDCC. In his action plan on housing, the President vowed: We will appoint a person with a track record and demonstrated capacity in delivering social housing as HUDCC Chairperson. Binay has no such record; and his reputation for corruption in Makati is widespread, not to mention the anomalies unearthed by State Auditor (now COA Commissioner) Heidi Mendoza in the building of the Makati City Hall and the Makati Hospital.

These names are mentioned because they apparently had no backers, and were surprised that they were appointed such surprise being a strong indictment on how nominees are selected.

The second part of the action plan, where the President will hold them accountable to the highest ethical standards of public office did not seem to apply to DILG Undersecretary Puno (a shooting buddy), Virginia Torres, another shooting buddy. 1.2. The President promised to require all Department Secretaries, Heads of Agencies, and senior officials from Director to Undersecretaries to have their Statement of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth (SALN) available and accessible to the public as required by law. Since this is already a legal requirement, why does the President pledge to obey the law? And yet, the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism has recently documented the difficulties it had in accessing these SALNs, reporting a 57% approval rate (20 out of 35 requests for SALN having been approved), with several taking place well beyond the 10 working days deadline in law and with the Office of the President and the Office of the Ombudsman sticking out as the most barren fields for harvesting information. 1.3. The President committed to ensure transparency and citizens participation in crafting and implementing laws, rules and regulations and in monitoring the programs, projects and transactions of government. However, except with the constructive engagement of the Department of Budget and Management, the means through which citizens can participate in crafting laws, rules and regulations, other than the usual hearings, have not yet been developed. But there is definitely greater transparency, particularly with respect to project costs and implementation both at the national and local levels, led by the DILG and the DBM, that have required these to be posted in the relevant websites. The 2011 General Appropriation Act requires full disclosure from the Local Government Units. 1.4. The President pledged to uphold the peoples right to information on matters of public concern and support the enactment of the Freedom of Information Bill (FOI) in Congress. But the President broke this promise when Malacanang did not submit the FOI as a priority bill to Congress, justifying its flip flop by alternately saying that transparency doesnt even require an FOI bill (Candidate Aquino had said that having a force of law was necessary for transparency in government to really take place), and claiming that an FOI law would imperil the privacy of government officials and perhaps even put national security at risk. 1.5. To enable citizens to help stop corruption, the President stood on a platform of organizing, packaging and distributing information about the governments budget to the media regularly and posting them in the internet so the public may know, understand and monitor how their money is spent. This is one of the bright points of the administration, with again DBM and DILG in the lead. The former has drafted, with civil society organizations, principles of constructive engagement, and early this year formally called citizen groups to participate in the 2012 budget preparations an unprecedented process. As 3

mentioned above, full disclosure is required of local government units. In fact an NGO filed a case against a governor for failing to comply with the requirements. The DILGs website posts the funds received by the agency, how the funds have been spent, and contracts entered into. The Secretary has required full disclosure of its budget and operations from all local governments, and has supported community-based monitoring of the performance of local governments. It has instituted a performance-incentive fund that rewards LGUs that meet the standards of transparency and accountability. 1.6. The President committed to strengthen peoples participation with simple and clear procedures for citizens to monitor all government projects and report their feedback through accessible means. Feedback mechanisms, in particular hot lines are almost de rigeur in most agencies, and have been in existence since before. The problem is that the public has not been apprised of the effects of their cooperation -- there is as yet no feedback on the feedback no reports from the government agencies showing the benefits arising from such participation. 1.7. One of the priorities of the President in the campaign against corruption is strengthening the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Office of the Ombudsman. The President assured the public the full implementation of the recently passed Prosecution Service Act to strengthen the national prosecution service, attract qualified lawyers, and institutionalize a more effective witness protection program while improving training and equipment. The government has put its money where its mouth is with respect to implementing this campaign promise almost doubling the resources set aside for witness protection, and creating more than a thousand positions in the prosecutorial service. But the status of the hiring process is as yet unclear. Moreover, what the right hand gives, the left hand takes away. For whatever reason, Secretary of Justice Leila de Limas authority seems to have been undermined several times in the past year, with her recommendations weakened or reversed, particularly where friends or political allies of the administration are involved, e.g. Hongkong hostage incident and the case against the LTO head Torres. 1.8. The president affirmed that the administration will ensure the independence of the Office of the Ombudsman by appointing a competent and credible Ombudsman who will be true to the mandate of the office and will pursue unresolved cases of corruption and human rights abuses committed by public officers. Top marks must be given the administration for its successful effort to get rid of Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez, and the search for her successor is underway. Black marks must be given because even as applicants and nominees to the position are still being vetted, the President reportedly has already made a choice, in effect rendering inutile the JBC search efforts. This is a pity, not necessarily because Justice Morales is not a good candidate, but there may be other candidates who may fit the bill for an Ombudsman being honest and competent are minimum requirements for an Ombudsman. At least equally

important are independence, particularly from political and business influences, and administrative/managerial competence. 1.9. The Aquino administration announced that it will put into place a zerobased budgeting system to enhance transparency and improve efficiency. This has been accomplished, at least for the 2011 budget. Whether it will be followed for the succeeding budgets is another matter altogether. But it looks like DBM Secretary Butch Abad is determined to pursue this reform. 1.10. One of the policy pronouncements of the President is that budget allocations for the different agencies of government will be shaped by their performance and their compliance with the reports of the Commission on Audit (COA). The second part of this action the compliance with COA reports, cannot as yet be monitored, because there is a lag time of about a year before the COA reports are released. Table 1. Scorecard on Corruption Platform 1. Performance-based appointments 2. Public Availability of SALN 3. Citizens participation in policy formulation 4. Freedom of Information Bill 5. Public information on governments budget 6. Citizens monitoring and feedback system 7. Strengthening DOJ 8. Independent Ombudsman 9. Zero-based budgeting 10. Agency Budget based on Performance and COA audits Total Average Weight Score Weighted Score 1.5 5 7.5 0.5 5 2.5 0.5 8 4 1.5 0 0 0.5 8 4 1.0 5 5 1.5 2.5 3.75 1.5 6 9 1.0 10 10 0.5 5 2.5 10 48.25 4.8

The war of the President against corruption gets a score of 4.8, where some of the promises have been delivered but the accomplishments are less than expected.

2. The Finance of Government

There is very little on the platform of the President that explains how the finance of government will be managed. The social contract of the President with the Filipino people does not provide details on how funds will be raised to provide the poor with opportunities to rise above poverty. The President stated that We will refrain from imposing new taxes or increasing tax rates Additional

revenues will be forthcoming if we become more serious in curbing and punishing tax evasion and smuggling.5 By keeping his promise of no new taxes, the President can get a score of 10. But this policy should not be taken in isolation. It should be related within the context of the Presidents vision of an organized and widely-shared rapid expansion of the economy6, universal health care, improved health infrastructure, universal pre-schooling, adequate housing for every Filipino, and large-scale public works program.7 . Certainly, a robust revenue system is needed to finance the requirements of an equitable development. A clear and comprehensive platform on revenue mobilization is essential in facilitating macro-economic stability that will rein in the deficit and bring the down the debtto-GDP ratio.8 2.1. Is the Program Efficient? The strategy of government of plugging revenue leakages by filing charges against tax evaders does not produce the revenues that government needs in the short-term. The tax effort in 2010 barely inched upwards to 12.1 percent9 and government missed its target of 13.0 percent. While it can be said that BIR collection in 2010 grew by 8.7 percent, this growth is below the growth of the economy, 7.63 percent GDP growth, and a 3.8 percent inflation rate. This implies that the increase in tax collection was brought about by the normal increase in income and prices. Or that the increase in tax collection was equal to the growth of the economy and increase in prices. As a result, BIR collections in 2010 were off by 38.1 billion Revenues from Customs in 2010 were also off-target by P21.4 billion. The DOF explains that the shortfall is caused by lower imports and that the BOC target was estimated using higher tariff rates. But the smuggling problem continues to stymy collection efforts of government and undermines the competitiveness of domestically-produced products. Government claims that it reduced the budgetary deficit in 2010 from a program of P325.0 billion to P314.0 billion. But the deficit reduction was done through expenditure control. The actual spending of government in 2010 was P97.1 billion lower than what was planned. A bit of good news about the under spending is that P32.7 billion represented lower interest payments of government. Expenditure control was again primarily responsible for the fiscal surplus that government reported in the early part of 2011. Actual spending fell by P36.1

Speech of the President before the Makati Business Club and reported by ABS-CBNNews.com, January 21, 2010. 6 Benigno S.Aquino, A Social Contract with the Filipino People. 7 Platform and Plan of Action of the Aquino Government, <ph.politicalareana.com/> 8 Ibid. 9 The study uses the rebased GDP figures.

billion below what was programmed for the first quarter. 10 Public construction fell by 37.3 percent, government spending for salaries and regular operations fell by 17.2 percent. The result of a constricted public spending was an economic growth of 4.9 percent that was lower than expected, i.e., at the lower end of the governments target range of 4.8-5.8 percent. 11 Weak revenue efforts impacted on the debt problem. The debt of the national government in 2010 was P4.72 trillion, up by 7.3 percent compared to 2009. Debt service continues to claim a hefty sum of the budget, 36.0 percent in 2010 compared to 35.3 percent in 2009. About 57.1 percent of the revenues of government are spent to pay-off interest and maturing debts. The budgetary deficit has put pressure on government to continuously borrow. But on the bright side, the ratio of the national government debt to GDP slid from 54.9 percent in 2009 to 52.4 percent in 2010. The weakening of the dollar has contributed to this favorable development, as well as the positive social capital that the administration carries. On the positive side, the President and the Department of Budget instituted its promise of a zero-based budgeting (ZBB) to enhance transparency and efficiency. Programs that had inefficient operations like the Food for School Programs and, subsidies to the National Food Authority, were phased out to direct more resources to the Department of Education and the Cash Conditional Transfer. Since significant reductions were made on spending for agriculture, health, and infrastructure, it is critical to make the basis for resource-allocation transparent and performance-based. The administration continues to highlight public-private partnerships (PPPs). Although PPPs can harness resources and expertise of the private sector in financing capital projects, they cannot bring in revenues that can finance the operations of government. Moreover, PPPs require a significant lead time in policy and project development. Without a strategic and comprehensive approach, PPPs may lead to greater control of the nations wealth by the elite. 2.2. Is it empowering? Empowerment means that the administration engages stakeholders in decision-making and inspires unity, trust, and optimism. The latter implies that the administration shares the concerns and values of the ordinary Filipino and has a compelling vision which inspires hope, and makes us proud to be Filipinos. The consultation of the Department of Budget and Management with civil society in budget planning is an act of empowerment. It is hoped that these consultations can be deeper and broader so that even peoples organizations from the countryside can be involved.
10 Department of Budget and Management, National Government Disbursement Performance., March 2011 11 Roel Landingin, Corruption in the Philippines and the Cost of Fighting it, Financial Times, May 30, 2011.

Not much can be said, however about the effort of the Department of Finance in promoting greater engagement of the public in the formulation of policies and reforms. The web of the DOF provides a window for reporting tax evaders and corrupt officials, but there is no provision where the public can be informed of the DOFs position on proposed legislations. Unlike the DILG which posts its budget and spending on the web, the budget of the DOF as well as its spending are not publicly available. There is no information on the budget and spending programs of major Finance agencies such as the BIR and BOC. The statistics provided by BIR on its collection by type of tax are of 2007 vintage and do not empower the public to monitor its performance in collection. On the macro-side, the inability of the LEDAC to meet regularly does not provide assurance that the agenda of the executive and legislative branches of government is going to be coherent. It is to be remembered that the regular meeting of the LEDAC is listed as one of the Presidents promises. The President has also promised to provide venues for peoples participation in monitoring implementation of governments projects. Currently, there are very limited venues for such and the mechanisms for public involvement are not defined. Does the administration inspire hope? Without concrete measures and demonstrable proof that adequate revenues can be raised and the tax burden can be more equitably distributed, faith cannot be established. There has yet to be visible results in fiscal management that can make taxpayers proud that they paid their taxes correctly. The promise of the President to cut down the bureaucratic processes in transacting with government, e.g. registering business names in only 15 minutes, has yet to be fulfilled. The President has also promised a regime of low tax rates. What are the programs that can lead to a reduction in the VAT and income tax rates? 2.3. Is it ethical? Ethical means that those enforcing the policies on public finance are of proven integrity and with honest track record. Integrity issues were raised on some DOF appointments at the DOF. More recent appointments for mid-level positions contradict the administrations memorandum circulars (MC 1 and MC2) which tried to remove incumbent and career officials from their posts if they did not have CESO qualifications. The CESO requirement seems to be a non-requirement for new directors that have been hired. The fear is that politics may be is leering its head much deeper than the appointment of undersecretaries. The Corruption Perception Index in 2010 shows that much has yet to be done in pursuing the philosophy of tuwid na daan. The country ranks 134th among 178

countries in the Corruption Perception Index in 2010, with no improvement in its 2009 score of 2.4. 12 Table 2. Scorecard on Public Finance Performance Raising the targeted revenues Expenditure control Bringing down the debt to GDP ratio Zero-based budgeting Empowerment of stakeholders Ethical governance Total Average Score 5 5 5 10 5 5 35 5.8

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

Using the scorecard system, MGG gives the administration a score of 5.8 acknowledging that something has been accomplished, particularly in expenditure management, but the results are lower than expected. Its saving grace is an adept management of expenditures which trimmed the deficit in 2010, the attempt to make budget formulation more participative, as well as the effort to introduce more efficiency in public spending by reining in expenditures of government enterprises.

3. Governance Program
There are four (4) main areas of governance reform that the Aquino Administration promised to pursue. The four areas as follows: 1. Institute a performance incentive system match every peso invested in 4th and 5th class LGUs in basic education, maternal and child care, and potable water and latrine; 2. Regularly publish all fund releases to LGUs; 3. Take all actions on irregularities in the COA reports; and 4. Ensure that the ARMM election in 2011 is clean, orderly, and peaceful. The above-mentioned promises are in keeping with President Aquinos 2010 campaign slogan, namely, that it wants to clearly wage a campaign against corruption and that a key to such campaign are the twin principles of transparency and accountability particularly in the use of resources that are entrusted to public offices and functions. Whilst these are clearly governance

RP fares poorly in Corruption Index, Transparency International, >www.abscbnews.com/nation/10/27/10. The scale ranges from 0, which is perceived to be highly corrupt, up to 10 with low levels of corruption.

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areas, governance reform is not limited to these four areas. If it should hit a mark, the administrations governance reform should include and begin with:

3.1. A coherent system of appointment of people in the cabinet and the rest of
the over 5,000 positions in public office. This refers to an appointment that is primarily based on merit and qualifications, rather than an appointment that is characterized by an elitist circle of friendship and buddy system. Whilst friendship and merit system are not mutually exclusive, there seems to be a hit and miss approach in the selection of men and women who join the president and serve government. There are appointments made primarily on a payback system, and this refers to a number of appointments of people who had supported the Aquino campaign in 2010 but who may not necessarily have the competency or the fitness for the post on the basis of their familiarity with public institutions and the functioning of the bureaucracy. For example, there are appointed Undersecretaries and Assistant Secretaries who are not even familiar with the fundamentals of planning and budgeting, and it is taking some time before operationalization and roll out of programs against poverty take off. Advocacy and public service are worlds apart. The latter requires knowledge and skills on the operation of the public sector system. In the 2011 budget hearing, some young appointees were obviously groping for the procedures and processes of budget hearing and defense of their respective department or unit budgets. There are also appointments assigning personalities who are known to have contributed to and prominently figured out during the campaign of 2010 in favor of the president. Did the process of appointment go through a rigid search where equal opportunities were given to equally qualified candidates? Or, was it a process of entitlement? However, let us give credit to the Presidents appointment of people who are known to be serious in instituting reforms in governance and those who have the expertise in their fields and who could bring some luster to the posts as well as restore trust in public office and leadership. Note here for example, Secretary Butch Abad of the Department of Budget and Management who is seriously pursuing transparency and accountability as well as performance in the budget as well as in the utilization of the PDAF. Secretary Soliman of the Department of Social Welfare and Development has been working very hard to make the Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) work by looking into the pitfalls of the program and attempting to institutionalize corrective measures, including cleaning up the list of parent-leaders and beneficiaries of the program. Secretary Ping de Jesus of the Department of Transportation and Communication is probably the appointee whose integrity in public service is unquestionable. It is however unfortunate that he had to resign from the post. His resignation raises some questions on whether the administration defends officials of its choice regardless of allegations and findings of ineptness.

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3.2. Ensuring the rule of law. In this regard, the President has shown by example on day 1 that the leader makes a strong signal about the rule of law. The no wang wang policy hit every public official who had always felt they are above the rules and the law. The President wanted to show that the culture of dualism or double standard of the rules, one for the leaders and another for the followers and regular guys- does not have a space under his administration. The first signal has been clearly set by the President. Investors have become more confident in an environment where no intercession from relatives of the President is necessary to win a contract or establish a business. The trustworthiness of government is enhanced when there are no reports of fund diversions or major irregularities in procurement. Now, the four domains of governance which the President uses: 1) Institute a performance incentive system. He promised to match every peso invested in every 4th and 5th class LGU in basic education, maternal and child care, potable water and latrine. The LGUs are clearly at the frontline of basic services: on basic education, access to clean water and sanitation, and maternal and child care among others. It is therefore important that there are good and committed elected local officials who would deliver the services and put the money where the mouth is. Thus far, the DILG leadership makes the signal that it is seriously pursuing transparency and accountability in local governance. One measure of this effort is the rounds of meetings and consultations and in some cases, the signing of Memorandum of Agreements (MOA) to make transparency and accountability a joint effort between government and civil society. Thanks to the DILG leadership and the ardent commitment of civil society groups to boost transparency and accountability as guiding principles of local government operation. When it comes to clean water and sanitation however, an executive dialogue convened by the NEDA and UP-NCPAG in March 2011 shows that the institutional arrangements amongst various agencies of government responsible for making decisions and policies on water management is terribly complex, incoherent and weak. This means that there are many agencies which have various mandates on water management and water service provision; however, there is weak coordination amongst these agencies. As a result, there are incoherent policies that weaken the direction of water service management, provision, and regulation. The role of the legislative in defining such policy direction is crucial. As we know, water and sanitation are tied to maternal and child care. If the administration is bent on contributing further to the attainment of the MDG on maternal and child care, there should be clear incentives to good performance by local government units in this regard. The concerned national agencies including 11

the National Anti-Poverty Commission should invest in and mark their incentives on good performance in the delivery of these basic services for the poor. There are no clear indications that the national government is clearly defining the road signs to achieve access to clean water and sanitation especially for the poor. Policies on water and sanitation are not in place to provide various agencies and units the right incentives in the delivery of basic services. There are laudable signs that the Department of Budget and Management is dead-set on the pursuit of a budget utilization based on sound performance even at the local level. This is a positive point for the Aquino administration. The national budget leadership seems steadfast in its goal to make a change with regard to the usage of the PDAF. 2) Regularly publish all fund releases to Government agencies and LGUs. The DILG has again made the signal. It wants greater transparency of local budget. It wants the citizens through organized groups of civil society, to lead in watching the usage and management of local budget. The DILG and the civil society are joining hands to take this mission forward. But let us see where all these would lead us. An interesting challenge in this regard is the LGUs in the ARMM. Much also depends on the capability of the LGUs to make their funds and budget management transparent and accessible to all. The DBM and the DILG websites are fine examples of the administrations desire to make budget and fund usage available to all. However, much is yet desired of other agencies and especially the local government units and the detailed reports on fund releases to LGUs. 3) Take all actions on irregularities in the COA reports. One challenge to the administration is transparency of information. When the President was a legislator, he himself was supportive of the right to information advocacy. Now he seems to chicken out from this commitment and old advocacy. The campaign on the right to information and right to know public documents is in an uphill battle not only with the legislature but also with the Executive. The observations and reports of COA are picked up very slowly. We do not seem to hear further success in the investigation and sanctions related to the AFP fund scandal. On the other hand, the Department of Justice (DOJ) through its Secretary, during a meeting with international and national development partners in May 2011, vowed to pursue cases and to hound the violators without favor or mercy, and people seem to take the DOJ Secretarys word seriously. In fact, the DOJ ranks first amongst all government agencies in terms of credibility and performance. Lets see how things go on the administrations efforts to mete out justice for those concerned. 12

4) Ensure that the ARMM election in 2011 is clean, orderly, and peaceful. If there is one legacy the Aquino administration would make, it should be that it avoids dipping its fingers on the ARMM particularly on the election of leaders in the region. The usual complaint of ARMM (and Mindanao) constituents is that Malacanang has been defining and dictating the tempo and essence of the elections and governance in the ARMM. This was true across many administrations in the past. If the President is a leader for change, it should let Mindanao and ARMM choose its leaders. Let ARMM proceed with the election, and make the election as independent and peaceful and orderly as possible, at least through an effective performance by Comelec and civil society. The postponement of the ARMM elections has caused some to believe that Malacanang will again pick the ARMM leaders on the basis that a good man sits in Malacanang and his choice might be a better one compared to allowing the trapo clans and politicians reign in the ARMM territories. That may be a valid argument, however, there are those who believe that the essence of an election is that it is an exercise where people are made to chart their destiny and make choices for whatever pitfalls and imperfections there may be in an election. The conduct of an election is charted in the law, not in men. The optimistic view is that the appointment of competent OICs is a step forward in developing transparent and efficient processes that will pave the way for clean and honest elections in ARMM. Table 3. Scorecard on the Governance Program Platform Coherent system of appointment Ensuring the rule of law Institutionalization of a performance incentive System Publication of all fund releases to government agencies and LGUs Take all actions on irregularities in the COA report 6. Ensure that ARMM election is clean, orderly and peaceful. Total Score Average score Score 5 5 6 4 2.5 NA 22.5 4.5

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

A score of 4.5 implies the administration falling short of its promises on governance.

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4. Basic Education 4.1. Framework for Analysis. The Presidents Basic Education Reform Agenda was contained in ten points released during the campaign period and adopted in total by the DepED Secretary. That agenda was structural in nature; that is, it focused on making changes to the basic education system and not just to deliver on more of the same (e.g. build more classrooms, hire more teachers, provide more textbooks). More of the same would have addressed shortages. But if input begets output, and if more of the same input would beget more of the same poor quality output, then government resources would have been wasted. The key: More input but delivered in a structurally different manner to generate different, quality output (i.e. enrolment leading to graduation, significant decreases in dropouts, graduates attaining ideal competencies and scoring well in achievement tests, and so on.) Because the basic education reform agenda is structural in character, it is not possible to attain all the objectives in a short one-year period. Basic education reform is a multi-year agenda and must follow a building blocks approach that is necessarily sequenced and logical. What is important at this stage of the presidency (i.e. the one-year mark) are the following: a. That there are plans that translate the long-term goals of the reform agenda into a program of action (e.g. provide the direction and trajectory for growth); b. The plans are reasonably specific as to provide targets to be attained by the end of the presidency; and, c. That the Department of Education and the government, in general, have allocated the necessary resources to show that the reform agenda is indeed a priority of this Government. Starting in year two, the assessment would have to include (d) the actual delivery on the structural reforms (which is premature at this stage of the presidency). 4.2. Ten-Point Basic Reform Agenda. To review, the ten-point basic reform agenda include the following (with the assigned weights in this assessment):13

The weights are assigned by the MGG team as per (a) the importance of the stated reform and (b) the degree of difficulty for the Department of Education to deliver on the promise.

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1. Twelve-year Basic Education Cycle (addition of two years of basic education to the current cycle) - 2.0 2. Universal pre-schooling (kindergarten) for all 2.0 3. Madaris education for Muslim Filipino children as a sub-system with the education system 1.0 4. Technical-vocational education as an alternative stream in senior high school 1.0 5. Every child a reader by Grade 3 (Grade 1 once universal pre-schooling is realized) 1.0 6. Science and math proficiency 1.0 7. Assistance to private schools as essential partners in basic education 1.0 8. Medium of instruction 1.0 9. Quality textbooks 0.5 10. Covenant with local governments to build more schools 0.5 4.3. Twelve-year Basic Education Cycle. The President, during the campaign period, committed to expand the basic education cycle, from a short 10-year cycle to a globally-comparable 12 years. In keeping with the Presidents commitment, the Department of Education announced that the basic education cycle would be expanded by an additional two years attached to the high school cycle. To plan for this eventuality, a multi-sectoral task force was established to detail the entire K-12 implementation with the following timetable: Curriculum Review and Enhancement to start with the development and nationwide implementation (pilot) of the Basic Education Curriculum for Grade 1 and HS I by SY 2011-2012. The 12-year curriculum to be implemented starting Grade 1 in SY 2012-13; the Senior High School curriculum to be developed and validated on or before 2015 with the implementation of Grade 11 starting SY 2016-17 and Grade 12 in SY 2017-2018. Training of Grade 1 and HS I teachers using the Basic Education Curriculum is scheduled for SY 2011-12. Training of Grades 2 to 12 teachers will be implemented in subsequent years. Building of the senior high school infrastructure in public high schools is targeted on or before 2015. Procurement of senior high school textbooks 15

is timed for SY 2016-17. Free senior high school education will be made available by DepED in public high schools. The plans are reasonable and the levels of budget support in 2011 and 2012 demonstrate the Governments commitment to the addition of two years to the basic education cycle. This includes 2011 budget allocations of P7.2 billion to build 10,724 new classrooms at P685,000 per classroom nd P3.8 billion for the repair of 4,364 classrooms and 14,925 water and sanitation facilities. The real risk in the plans, however, is in three areas: 1. The addition of two years at the high school level rather than distributing this equally to the elementary and high school levels means that the additional students will have to be schooled in secondary schools which are more overcrowded today than public elementary schools. Larger high schools will mean lower quality achievement as already evidenced in current education performance indicators. (The evidence show that smaller schools perform better than larger overcrowded schools.) 2. The plan to add the additional two years will not be realized until SY 201617 and SY 2017-18. Both years are after the PNOY Administration andcould be subject to a new administrations priorities for basic education. 3. With the additional two-years added to the end of the current high school cycle, there is the risk that universities will have no freshman intake for two years unless there is an intermediate mechanism to ensure enrolments for that period of time. Universities, most of which are private and rely on tuition to operate, cannot afford not to have freshman intake for one, let alone two, years. Unless adequately addressed by DepED and CHED, this will lead to a lessening (if not withdrawal) of support for the additional two years of basic education by universities and could lead to this becoming an election issue in 2015-16.See (2) above. Specific assessment. Plans and budgeted resources point in the right direction. The longer-term downside risk, however, still has to be addressed in the plans. Grade: 7.5 (weight of 2.0) 4. 4. Universal pre-schooling (kindergarten) for all. The President promised that all public schools children will have pre-school as their introduction to formal schooling by 2016. DepED has in fact moved up this timetable by requiring all 5-year olds to attend pre-school as a pre-requisite before entering Grade 1 by SY 2012-13 notwithstanding the current lack of preschool teachers and classrooms. To attain this objective, DepED has began collaborating with the DSWD and LGUs to secure Day Care Centers for this purpose.

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The emphasis on universal kindergarten is a step in the right direction. To ensure that young children are ready for schooling when they reach age 6, they need foundational preparation in terms of psychosocial stimulation, health and nutrition and in a play-based setting. Experts have pointed out that what happens in early childhood influences how the rest of childhood and adolescence unfolds. For universal kindergarten, the Government allocated P2.3 billion for a targeted 2.92 million 5 year olds in 2011. The downside risk on this is two-fold: (1) There are not enough trained early childhood development teachers to handle such an immediate roll-out of universal kindergarten and therefore the next few years will be an interim solution with DSWD and LGUs that may undermine the long-term quality considerations expected of pre-schooling. (2) Why focus on universal pre-schooling for 5-year olds when over half of all 6-year olds are still not in Grade 1? The numbers to consider are actually higher than planned and therefore more difficult to attain. Specific assessment.Unlike the additional two years of high school which may be too long in terms of implementation,it might be the case that universal kindergarten is being rolled out too quickly for DepED elementary schools to absorb and do a good job on. Grade 5.0 (weight 2.0). 4.5. Madaris education for Muslim Filipino children as a sub-system with the education system.The pronouncement of the President was to provide a full basic education for all Muslim Filipino childrento give proper respect to their culture while providing a sound curriculum I n English, Filipino, Science and Math. Madaris education, with subjects in Arabic Language and Islamic Values Education [ALIVE] can be integrated in our public school curriculum as additional subjects. DepED has made much progress in this area since the implementation of the Madrasah elementary education curriculum in SY 2005-06. A kindergarten program for public and private madaris (Tahderriyah) was rolled out in 2010 and is now being tested in 212 schools nationwide. In the 2011 national budget (General Appropriations Act), the Government increased the funds for the Basic Education Madrasah Program by 50% to P300 million. On the other hand, the dedicated office to develop and test out the implementation of the Madrasah curriculum in the DepED central office has been

17

dismantled. The responsibility for Madrasah curriculum development has been distributed to other units during this critical phase in its development. Specific assessment. It is not clear how prepared school divisions are to implement the Madrasah curriculum on their own. With the abolition of the previous institutional arrangement of a key DepED official with rank of undersecretary to oversee the development of this critical program (in place since 2004), the risk is that of backsliding on implementation and quality. Grade 2.5 (weight 1.0). 4.6. Technical-vocational education as an alternative stream in senior high school.One of the platforms of the President is to reintroduce technical-vocational education in our public high schools to better link schooling to local industry needs and employment. This is important because up to 48% and 42% of all senior high school boys and girls respectively are more interested in work after high school or have no plans to go on to university (DepED survey, February-March 2005). Since 2008, there has been work to re-develop the Career Pathways-Technology and Livelihood Education (CP-TLE) curriculum for general secondary education and look after a very limited number of schools under the Strengthened Technical-Vocation Education Program (STVEP). The implementation of the CP-TLE and the tech-voc curricula, however, is hindered by inadequate equipment and facilities and the limited number of trained tech-voc teachers. An encouraging sign is that the 2011 appropriations for the implementation of the Re-Designed Technical-Vocational High School Program was increased by 78% to P535 million from P300 million. This, however, is a very small amount for structural change to happen across the country in this area. Specific assessment.The DepED is working on existing programs and has no roadmap to expand this significantly. There is limited scale at this stage in time. Grade 2.5 (weight 1.0). 4.7. Every child a reader by Grade 3 (Grade 1 once universal preschooling is realized).The focus given by the President on childrens reading skills is noteworthy. DepED has responded by allowing divisions to innovate on different reading projects both in partnership with the private sector (Sa AklatSisikat, Bright Minds Read [Macdonalds]) within the system using their own resources. Of all the commitments, the implementation of this program is the most decentralized banking on the pedagogical expertise of division, district and school-based educators.

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What the Department should be providing more of are reading books (not textbooks) for children and more training in reading for teachers. Specific assessment. Grade 5.0 (weight 1.0) 4.8. Science and math proficiency.The President promised to rebuild the science and math infrastructure in schools so that we can produce more scientists, engineers, technicians, technologists and teachers in our universities so that this country can be more globally competitive in industry and manufacturingTo build a culture for science and math in our schools, we need science/math clubs and elementary, high school science/math fairs. The current program has been focused on existing DepED regional and division science high schools and the public resources assigned to this has not been large (P39 million for 16 regional science high schools). Computerization of school, however, continues with P1.8 billion allocated in the 2011 national budget. This will allow 5422 computer packages to be provided to the same number of high schools. While this is still a small computer-to-student ratio, it does bring close to 100% of all high schools into the ICT world. More strategic work needs to be done in this area. Specific Assessment. Grade 2.5 (weight 1.0) 4.9. Assistance to private schools as essential partners in basic education.The Government assistance to students and teachers in private education (GASTPE) has been substantially increased. From P3.9 billion in 2011, DepED has allocated P5.8 billion for close to 2000 private high schools to take in 910,902 high school students from poor households. The education service contracting scheme (ESC) aims to contract private high schools across the country to fill empty seats with students from low-income households (i.e. those with a total annual income of P144,000 or less). The increase in coverage is a major strategy for dealing with the overcrowding in public high schools in many parts of the country. The increase in coverage is 32% over 2010-11 beneficiaries and 20% over target in 2011-12. The DepEDtarget for 2012-13 is 1 million students. Specific assessment. Grade 10.0 (weight 1.0) 4.10. Medium of instruction. One of the pronouncements of the President is to become tri-lingual as a country: Learn English well and connect to the World; Learn Filipino well and connect to our country; Retain your mother tongue and connect to your heritage.

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DepED is pursuing the Mother Tongue-Based Multilingual Education (MTBMLE) which started in 2000 as the Lingua Franca Education Project. Budget support has been expanded in this important area (P77.6 million in 2011). The conduct of training of trainers on MTB-MLE is on-going. Specific assessment. Grade 10.0 (weight 1.0) 4.11. Quality textbooks. The President emphasized that I will not tolerate poor textbook quality in our schools. Textbooks will be judged by three criteria: quality, better quality, and more quality. DepED has continued initiatives under the previous administration to improve on the quality and procurement of textbooks starting with the adoption of more stringent requirements for textbook content evaluators and meeting with publishers to strengthen the collaboration for ensuring quality textbooks. In early 2011, DepED held the Integrity Initiative Forum with publishers and suppliers where the latter signed an Integrity Pact declaring, among other pledges, that they will be aboveboard in their dealings with DepED and would not use influence-peddling in the conduct of their business with the department. The thrust of DepED is to make textbook development and procurement transparent and participatory. During the last twelve months, however, the reforms are in the area of preparation and foundation-setting principles. No textbook procurement of scale was undertaken since the PNOT administration took office. Specific assessment. Grade 5.0 (weight 0.5)14 4.12. Covenant with local governments to build more schools.The Presidents commitment during the campaign was to build more schools in areas where there are no public or private schools in a covenant with LGUs so that we can realize genuine education for all. The nuance of this statement is not just to build classrooms (in already overcrowded schools) but to build new schools (where the classrooms would be located). The key to the success of this reform item is local government participation because LGUs alone can answer for land. In early 2011, DepED signed a memorandum of agreement with the different leagues of local governments to implement a cost-sharing, counterparting scheme in the construction of schools and classrooms. Under this program, the initial 50% of school-building cost would be borne by participating LGUs. DepED would release the 50% share I construction once the LGU counterpart has bee fully expended. To date, DepED has signed MOAs with 7 LGUs (3 cities and 4 provinces) to build 720 classrooms.
Note: Textbook quality is an on-going and regular program of DepED. The focus is on quality implementation and hence, less difficult to undertake than structural reform. This explains the lower weight assigned.
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So far, however, there have been no additional schools established through this partnership with LGUs outside of newly-legislated schools. Some participating LGUs have noted that they are ready with their counterparts but bureaucratic processes in DepED have yet to be streamlined. Specific assessment. Grade 5.0 (weight 0.5) Table 4. Scorecard on Basic Education Platform 1. Twelve-year basic education 2. Universal pre-schooling 3. Madaris education 4. Technical-vocational education 5. Every child a reader by Grade 1 6. Science and math proficiency 7. Assistance to private schools 8. Medium of instruction 9. Quality textbooks 10. Covenant with local governments to build more schools Weight 2.0 2.0 1.0 1.0 1.0 1.0 1.0 1.0 0.5 0.5 Score 7.5 5.0 2.5 2.5 5.0 2.5 10 10 5 5 Total 15 10 2.5 2.5 5 2.5 10 10 2.5 2.5

Average Grade (Overall Grade)

5.68

With a score of 5.68 , the Aquino administration has accomplished some of its promises but much more is expected. 5. Environment
President Aquino has made at least five (5) campaign promises related to the environment, to wit15: 1. Caring for the Environment. From allowing environmental blight to spoil our cities, where both the rich and the poor bear with congestion and urban decay to planning alternative, inclusive urban developments where people of varying income levels are integrated in productive, healthy, and safe communities. 2. Sustainable Resources. From a government obsessed with exploiting the country for immediate gains to the detriment of a government that will encourage sustainable use of resources to benefit the present and future generations.
15

President Aquinos 16-point Agenda. http://www.noynoy.ph/v3/platform.php. See also, http://antipinoy.com/noynoy-truth-o-meter. Last accessed 13 July 2011

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During the campaign, the President made 24 additional promises, three of which referred to environment:16 3. Strictly enforce environmental laws. In celebration of Earth Day on April 22, 2010 then Presidential candidate B. Aquino vowed to make disaster preparedness and the strict enforcement of environmental laws as key objectives of his administration. 4. Safer sources of renewable energy. The President declared that he would rather exhaust other means than resort to nuclear power. We have other perceivably safer sources of renewable energy. Nuclear energy has reemerged as an option to satiate the worlds present and future electricity needs. However, it continues to face social acceptability problems because of fears about the safety of its use. There are other sources of energy that have less chances of endangering the lives of people. In the case of the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant, it has a large amount of documented safety hazards and may pose a threat to the safety and/or well-being of the residents around it. 5. Population management via responsible parenthood. The President announced that his administration will fully support the crafting of a firm policy that will address the serious problem on population. It will be based on the idea of responsible parenthood: imposing on parents that they should play a key role in ensuring that each and every child they bring into this world has the opportunity to lead a good life, and educating them about the means with which to plan their families so they can create families based on their ability to sustain their needs. In the process of providing a range of options and information to couples, both natural family planning and modern methods shall be presented. How have these promised been carried out? 5.1. Caring for the Environment. 5.1.1. President Aquino issued EO 26 on February 24, 2011 establishing the National Greening Program (NGP), a 6-year reforestation program targeted at greening some 1.5 million hectares of degraded forest lands. Personally launched with an inter-agency team, Aquino cited the goals of the NGP to develop a sustainable forest resource base to accelerate the national greening campaign and rejuvenate rural economies in parts of the nations most chronically poor areas in the uplands, ultimately providing livelihood opportunities for some six million families in the upland areas across the country within six years. Aquino earlier issued Proclamation 125, declaring 2011 as the National Year of Forests in the Philippines, in support of the UN declaration.
16

The Promises of Benigno C. Aquino III. www.blogwatch.tv last accessed 15 July 2011

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5.1.2. The environmental targets have yet to be reflected in the Medium Term Philippine Development Plan (MTPDP) for 2011-2016. It will need to ensure broader citizens participation requiring mechanisms for engagement with the National Economic Development Authority (NEDA). 5.1.3. One major challenge for the administration is the rise in rise in environment-related murders. Six (6) environmental activists have been killed under the Aquino administration, among them Eliezer Billanes, Gawad ng Bayani ng Kalikasan awardee, who was killed on March 9, 2009, because of his staunch opposition against the Xstrata mining project in the Socsargen region.The other 33 cases of killings among environmentalist activists since 2001 remain hitherto unresolved. In response, the President has also given 7 posthumous awards for these environmental heroes for their efforts, but prosecution support and outcomes are wanting. 5.2. Sustainable Resources 5.2.1. Aquino ordered the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) to suspend the processing of new applications for large-scale mining starting January. DENR Sec. Paje has cancelled approximately 500 mining claims and has been reviewing 500 more through directives to MGB regional directors to screen pending and inactive mining applications on February 20, 2011 for the first 50% of claims, and on December 2011 for the balance. Under Aquino's term, mining investments increased by 65% in 2010 from 2009 while $17.35 billion worth of more mining investments are projected by 2016. The administration has also repeatedly issued statements to media in support of mining liberalization. Aquino's appointment of the former Executive Director of Philippine Mining Development Council (PMDC) as DENR Secretary and Presidential Adviser on Mining further indicates his adherence to the previous administrations path to mining liberalization. Much remains to be seen if law enforcement will mitigate the ecological footprint from increased mining activities. 5.2.2. Executive Order 23 imposed the indefinite and comprehensive nationwide restriction on logging. A nationwide logging moratorium on Philippine national and residual forests was imposed to protect and stop the destruction of watersheds and river systems and created a task force to lead the governments campaign against illegal logging. Under EO 23, DENR is instructed to stop logging firms from cutting trees while it is in the process of reviewing all existing logging agreements. DENR, through MO 52, is now mandated to immediately cancel the concessions of logging companies that have violated forest laws, while ceasing from issuing and renewing logging contracts and tree cutting permits in all natural and residual forests. EO 23 has been criticized for loopholes in the sense that it has not revoked or categorically banning commercial logging but only stops DENR from granting new contracts while reviewing existing contracts.

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Loopholes involve the ability of special interests to lobby for labeling natural and residual forests as plantation forests and secure an exemption. 5.2.3. A major challenge for the administration is the increase in coal dependence and extraction, with 2010 coal production reaching 3.6 million metric tons (MMMT), approximately 40% more than during the same period in 2009. Further, 10 (ten) more coal power plants are projected to be constructed within this decade. 5.3. Strictly enforce environmental laws 5.3.1. Despite pronouncements of finding a balance for resource use and environmental protection, mixed record in enforcing the coal ash Philippine Clean Air Act or Republic Act No. 8749 as certain provinces such as Cebu have experienced coal ash residues, listed as an air pollutants in the Act, prompting Cebu local government officials to take action themselves to suspend the companys (KEPCOs) business permits. President Aquino has praised KEPCOs record as being very friendly to the environment despite current host community experience. 5.3.2.DENR has yet to implement the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act (Republic Act 9003) in regard to prohibiting the operation of any dumpsite by any of the country's over 1,600 local government units (LGUs) by February 2006 or over five years ago. As background, these dumpsites must be replaced by a sanitary landfill (SLF), with local government units allowed to share an SLF. It also mandates the LGUs to come up with a 10-year Solid Waste Management Plan that must have been completely in place by 2011. 5.4. Safer sources of renewable energy On June 16, 2011, President Aquino through the Department of Energy (DOE) launched the National Renewable Energy program that aims to promote increased share of renewables in the countrys energy mix. President Aquino has likewise pronounced a bias and need for moratorium against the revival of nuclear power in the country, in response to the controversy generated by the Japan nuclear incident. 5.5. Population management via responsible parenthood President Aquino has verbally affirmed his support for state provision of modern and natural family planning methods, and the underlying recognition of the role of large family sizes and increasing population to the countrys sustainable development. However, he has stopped short of certifying any of the related bills (e.g., Responsible Parenthood, Reproductive Health Bills, or even a purely natural family planning alternative) as a priority measure.

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In the meantime, because of such inaction, the Philippines climbed higher on the Annual Ranking of Failed States17, thanks to high population pressures. The Philippines is in the same league as Equatorial Guinea, Egypt, Laos, Pakistan, and Bangladesh in terms of population pressures, (7.7/10); overall, ranked worse than West Bank, Papua New Guinea, and Angola. Further, the countrys resulting ecological state continues to worsen with such inaction: The Philippines has less than 10% of its forest cover and coral reefs remaining18, while only 39% of 525 water bodies are potential sources of drinking water.19 44% of the population earn less than $2/day, and 2/3 of the population are engaged in unsustainable environmental and natural resource usage.20 The Philippines shares the vicious cycle of high population growth, social conflict; large migration; depleted ecosystems, food, water and energy insecurity/insufficiency/dependence; failing governance; failing health care and education systems as political and environmental hotspots as Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Burundi, Haiti, Indonesia, Nepal, Madagascar, Mongolia, Pakistan, and the Solomon Islands.21 Growing population, combined with inconsistent governance, has increased the Philippines resource demand from less than its own biocapacity in 1961 to over twice its domestically available biocapacity in 2002.22

17

Foreign Policy Magazines Annual Ranking of Failed States. www.foreignpolicy.com. The Philippines climbed up the ranking and is now at 53 (2009) from 58 in 2007, driven by a key component: population pressures 18 Conservation International. Philippine Biodiversity Conservation Profiles. 2002. Pp.3-4. 19 EMB. 2006. National Water Quality Status Report 2001 to 2005. http://www.emb.gov.ph/wqms/20012005%20NWQSR/NWQSR%20-%20Body.pdf and, World Bank. 2003. Philippine Environment Monitor 20 State of the Philippine Environment: A Progress Report, February 2006 21 Diamond, Jared. Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Survive. Penguin. 2005. pp. 496-499; 515-516 22 World and Country Trends. Global Footprint Network. http://www.footprintnetwork.org/en/index.php/GFN/page/footprint_for_nations/

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Table 5. Scorecard on the Environment Platform Caring for the Environment Sustainable Resources Strictly enforce environmental laws Safer sources of renewable energy Population management via responsible parenthood Total Average Score 5 6 2.5 7.5 2.5 23.5 4.7

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

6. Health
The Aquino Health Agenda (AHA) is geared towards providing Universal Health Care for All Filipinos in order to achieve better health outcomes, a more responsive health system, and institute equitable health financing. The AHA was launched in order to improve, streamline and scale up reform interventions adopted in the Health Sector Reform Agenda (HSRA) and implemented under the FOURmula One for Health (F1) framework. The Department of Health (DOH), as mandated by the President, continues to implement the Kalusugan Pangkalahatan or Universal Health Care (UHC) program. Through this, the health inequities in the country are being addressed by ensuring that the poor and the vulnerable sectors in society receive the benefits of health reform. Three strategic thrusts are being pursued to accomplish the AHA: 6.1. Financial risk protection through expansion of the PhilHealth enrolment of the National Health Insurance Program (NHIP), together with improvements in PhilHealth benefits delivery. The Aquino administration has provided health insurance to an additional 2.0 million poor Filipinos. But the fact remains that majority of Filipinos are still outside the health insurance system. Their coverage is also relatively small to cover their medical expenses. About 42 percent of Filipinos are covered by health insurance but the health insurance protection in many provinces is below the national average. Despite repeated efforts of increasing health insurance enrolment through PhilHealth Sabado or the National PhilHealth Registration Day, not one LGU has been declared to have provided 100 percent coverage for its constituents. Limitations in health financing have resulted to out-of-pocket expenses as the primary source of health expenditures. Since there are no zero co-payment

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schemes in hospitals, the poor are still afraid to go to healthcare facilities for fear of incurring large medical debt. By and large, the costs of medicines and medical care are beyond the reach of the poor. Not all healthcare facilities are accredited with PhilHealth. Hence, despite their PhilHealth enrolment, patients are still unable to avail of PhilHealth benefits if they are treated in non-accredited health facilities. Logistical problems remain to be a major challenge. Hospital databases have yet to be linked to PhilHealth to facilitate processing of claims. Data need to be systematically organized for a solid assessment of how the poor have been helped. For example, the number of Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) beneficiaries who are enrolled in PhilHealth is still unavailable. 6.2. Improved access to quality hospitals and health care facilities. Despite efforts such as the groundbreaking for a new outpatient department for the Negros Oriental Provincial Hospital and the Corazon C. Aquino Hospital in Dipolog City, many health facilities have suffered neglect due to inadequate financial resources and the fragmentation of health services as a consequence of devolution. The construction, rehabilitation and/or support of rural health facilities, provincial and LGU hospitals have been few and far between. The number of additional Basic Emergency Obstetric Care Centres (BEmOCs) or Comprehensive Obstetric Care Services (CEmOCs) to help address the rise in maternal mortality cases remains limited. Public-private partnerships and the governments investments in health infrastructure have also not increased to significantly support the repair, rehabilitation and construction of priority health facilities. There is no targeted health facility enhancement program in place as well as a unified, streamlined process for hospitals to acquire the proper DOH licensures and PhilHealth accreditation. The poor continue to lack access to quality and affordable healthcare programs. In impoverished areas of the country, health facilities are non-existent or lack even the most basic supplies and equipment to deal with the simplest medical emergencies. 6.3. Attainment of health- related Millennium Development Goals. Health inequity in the country needs to be addressed. The nutrition status of children below 12 years old has worsened over the last five years while the cohort survival rate of elementary school children has not reached the 70% mark over the past 25 years. Around 200 women for every 100,000 births die. Maternal and reproductive health indicators in the Philippines are still one of the worst in the Asia Pacific region. There has been no definitive and concerted action, particularly in helping achieve MDGs 4 (reduce child mortality) and 5 (improve maternal health).

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Table 6. Scorecard on Health Platform 1. Universal Health Care Roadmap through a refocused PhilHealth program 2. Improved access to quality hospitals and health care facilities 3. Attainment of MDG 4,5,6 Total Score Average Score Score 4.0 2.5 2.5 9 3.0

The implementation of the health agenda remains one of the most serious concerns of the administration. Implementing its three strategic thrusts entails faithfulness to the common strategic framework, efficient coordination among all stakeholders, and promotion of participative governance especially within the DOH. All critical stakeholders, down to the local level, should participate in the development and implementation of all policies and programs being spearheaded by the DOH.

7. Economy
7.1. Inclusive Growth. The President promised a government that merely conjures economic growth statistics that our people know to be unreal to a government that prioritizes jobs that empower the people and provide them with opportunities to rise above poverty.We will have broad based and inclusive economic growth through increased incomes by generating quality jobs and attracting more investments. 23 Inclusive growth, per the PDP means high growth that is sustained, that massively creates jobs and reduces poverty. Thus, The Plans broad thrusts are massive infrastructure development, higher governance standards, human development and human capital formation, direct poverty-relief, and employment generation. Complementary strategies that are required are macroeconomic stability -- low inflation and sustainable fiscal balances. The targets: Annual GDP growth of 7-8%; Investment ratio (GDI/GDP) reaching 22% (equivalent to roughly 26% using new series NIA)by 2015; Net new jobs of 1 million a year, unemployment at 6.8-7.2% during the period; poverty incidence at 16.6% by 2015. In the first three quarters under the Presidents watch, the countrys Gross Domestic Product (GDP) grew by 6.2 percent; investment ratio was 22.6%(and net foreign direct investment was 65% larger than it was in the previous period); average net new employment of 873 thousand jobs (alternatively, employment increased by 536 thousand jobs between July 2010 and April 2011), most recent (April) unemployment rate at 7.2%.

Points 2, 6, and 7 of the Presidents 16-point Social Contract with the Filipino People. The action plans were culled from his campaign promises, most of which have been incorporated in the Philippine Development Plan 2011-2016.

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One of the factors influencing the improvement in the GDI/GDP ratio is the increased business confidence, premised on the expectations by the private sector that the governance/anti-corruption/increased government efficiency commitments will be fulfilled. To the extent that they are not, the sustainability of the growth is imperiled. Moreover, actual government consumption and investment expenditures have been reined in to keep the fiscal deficit on target, in the face of lower-than-expected revenue collections. This, too, will have a negative effect on growth sustainability. With regard to poverty, no official data are available. But the Conditional Cash Transfer Program, which serves as a safety net in the short run and breaks the intergenerational transfer of poverty in the long run, is very definitely on track reaching 2 million during the first half of the year (target for the whole year 2.3 million) 7.2. Housing and Transportation Infrastructure. The President promised that government will improve infrastructure in transportation and housing, which will generate jobs and also support investments. Budgeted infrastructure outlays for 2011 were reduced in both absolute (levels) and relative (share of GDP) terms, in favor of higher outlays for social/human development spending. The assumption was that the Public-Private Partnership program (PPP), which is one of the flagship program of the Aquino administration, would kick in and more than make up for the difference. The PPP rollout, however, has been delayed four projects that were scheduled to be bid out by the beginning of July did not push through. With respect to housing, the most recent reports show that 4,000 social housing units are completed/to be completed shortly for PNP housing, with 9 units turned over. Per the PDP, the 2011 target for direct housing provision by the NFA is 190,000 units, which means, even assuming slow start-ups, that 45,000 units (distributed among resettlement, slum upgrading, sites and services, etc.) should have been completed by end-June. That obviously has not been the case. 7.3. No New Taxes. The President announced that we will refrain from imposing new taxes or increasing tax rates. The President has kept this promise, so he is on track. However, the weight for this objective has to be negative, because it is inconsistent with the Tuwid na Daan premise that underlies PNoys Social Contract i.e., that the measure chooses the welfare of the people, of the greater number, over political considerations. The implicit (and wrong) assumption behind not imposing new taxes is that all new taxes are onerous. In keeping this promise, he was forced to depend on improved tax administration (which has a long gestation period) to attain a much-needed increase in tax effort. The result: lower than expected revenues, leading to expenditure constriction to keep within the deficit, slower growth (and to the extent that infrastructure expenditures were further reduced future growth potential). 29

Reforming the Sin Tax would have been a win-win situation for the administration. It is not a new tax, nor does it increase tax rates. The proposed reform would increase only the tax base (which are 1996 prices), and have automatic inflation indexing. Plus it is for the greater good (more non-smokers than smokers), and would have increased the tax effort by close to 0.5 percentage points. 7.4. Increasing Government Revenues. The President assured that We will plug revenue leakages by having competent and trustworthy tax collectors, broadening the tax base. The PDP target is to increase the tax effort tax revenues/GDP to 15.6% of GDP by 2015, to be achieved through an annual incremental 0.3 percentage point annual rise in the collection effort of BIR and 0.1 percentage point for the BOC. For the first three quarters of the Presidents watch, average collection effort of BIR and BOC were 8.926% and 2.753% of GDP respectively. The average collection effort for the same periods in the preceding year were 8.729% and 2.816%. While the collection effort of BIR rose by 0.197 percentage points, clearly it was below target. The BOC collection efforts, instead of increasing by 0.1 percentage point, actually decreased by 0.06 percentage point. The inability of the BIR to achieve its target may perhaps be explained by the refusal of the administration to increase taxes coupled with the long gestation period of reforms in tax administration. But there seems to be no other explanation (than inefficiency) for the BOC performance. 7.5. Reducing Overhead Costs of Government. Another promise of the President is to instruct DBM to lead an internal government review of all its costs and present a plan to reduce government overhead within six months. A google search shows no news reports regarding a review being conducted or the results of such a review. The DBM website contains no reference to one being conducted. 7.6. Modernizing the Agricultural Sector. The president stood on a platform of treating the rural economy as just a source of problems to recognizing farms and rural enterprises as vital to achieving food security and more equitable economic growth, worthy of re-investment for sustained productivity. The action plans focused on in this assessment are the following: We will review policies and programs to enhance productivity and modernize the agricultural sector. When we change administrations, there must be a complete review of all the programs in the Department of Agriculture. We can do a lot for our farmers given the present budget of the Department if we eliminate the leaks and focus on the efficient use of resources. For example, we must stop eating up millions in mere 30

administrative costs as in the case of NABCOR, which charged our government P60 million because it served as a useless conduit to regional offices. We can find no record, in the DA website or google search of any such review. However, the President in his June 30 speech, adverted to the NFA and the possibility of rice sufficiency by 2013. With respect to the latter, it must be pointed out that the 15% increase in production this year was due more to an increase in hectarage planted than to yield. As a matter of fact, the yield this year is roughly equal to the yield in 2009. With respect to the NFA, the problem has always been structural. Unless that is resolved, NFA will continue to lose money although maybe not in the hemorrhage proportions that has been occurring, in the past decade. At the beginning of the administration, both Finance Secretary Cesar Purisima and DBM Secretary Florencio Abad led the third serious attempt in the past two decades to Over the past two decades, three serious attempts to restructure/dismantle NFA. That they seem to have changed their minds should be a matter of great concern. Table 7. Scorecard on the Economy Platform 1. Inclusive economic growth GDP growth (6.2); Investment ratio (8); employment (7.2) average 7.1 Poverty alleviation 7.5 2.Infrastructure on transportation and housing Infrastructure (2.5); Housing (2.5) 3. No new taxes 4.Plug revenue leakages BIR (6.6); BOC (0) 5.DBM review and plan to reduce overhead costs 6. Modernize the agricultural sector Average Score Weight 7.3 5.0

2.5

1.0

7.5 4.95

-1.0 1.0

0 2.5 4.4

0.2 0.3

The weighted average of the performance of the PNoy administration on these action plans comes out to 4.4 , which, per our scale, implies lower than expected (7.5 signifies that the actions are on track). The main reason for this is immediately seen to be the negative weight given to the only objective where the President is right on target: his refusal to impose new taxes or increase tax rates. It should be noted that had the President broken his no-new-taxes promise, his score would have improved not only because there would be no negative values, 31

but also because the scores for tax collection as well as infrastructure expenditures would have increased. Table 8. Summary of Scores Platform 1. War against Corruption 2. Public Finance 3. Governance 4. Environment 5. Education 6. Health 7. Economy Average Score 4.8 5.8 4.5 4.7 5.68 3 4.4 4.69

The initial gains of the Administration in implementing its platform are well recognized. The President sets an example of honesty and good intentions. Many of his Cabinet members are competent and strongly committed to public service. The DILG and the DBM have set good examples in transparency and participatory governance. Education has been prioritized. Inclusive economic growth has been fostered by a President with a strong social capital. The CCT holds a strong promise in poverty reduction. But a score of 4.69 indicates that many challenges that need to be addressed. These are addressing the budgetary deficit through increased revenue collection, increasing and improving health services particularly the poor, improving access to quality education, improving the productivity of the agricultural sector, and providing better infrastructure. Many of these needs are predicated on a stronger revenue effort. Improvement in revenue administration requires structural reforms as well. Governance need to be strengthened through a coherent and objective appointment system. The rule of law should apply to everyone, including friends, family and supporters. A performance-incentive system for all government agencies and local governments will enforce accountability. Irregularities reported by COA should be on top of the accountability agenda. The examples of participatory governance by DBM and DILG need to be scaled up so that more and more communities can be empowered to participate in decision-making. The strict enforcement of laws on the environment and a good population management do not only call for political will but integrity and transparency in decision-making and implementation. 32