Aquino underscores private, public sector harmony in SONA

The never-ending horror story in business registration is a now a thing of the past, as the Aquino administration is pushing for a harmonious relationship between the private and public sectors to attract more investments to spur economic growth. Fifteen minutes is what you need now to complete registering your business, President Benigno Aquino III said Monday in his first State of the Nation Address. "What used to be a check list of 36 documents will be shortened to a list of six, and the old eight-page application form will be whittled down to one page," Aquino added. It used to take four to eight hours depending on the day, but registering a business is now replaced by a 15-minute procedure, the President said. In his SONA, Aquino stressed on the harmonious relationship between public and private sectors as this would result to more infrastructure that will be beneficial to every Filipino. "We will be able to construct the needed infrastructure in order to help tourism grow," Aquino said. In agriculture, he said people would have access to grains terminals, refrigeration facilities, orderly road networks, and post-harvest facilities. Aquino said if the government can fix the food-supply chain with the help of the private sector — instead of importing — "we will hopefully be able to supply for the needs of the global market." The prices of commodities, he said, will go down if the country has an efficient railway system. "It will be cheaper and faster, and it will be easier for travelers to avoid crooked cops and rebels," Aquino said. He vowed that the build-operate-and-transfer projects will go through quick and efficient processes. "With the help of all government agencies concerned and the people, a process that used to take as short as a year and as long as a decade will now only take six months," he stressed. Opposition from civil society Despite the applause the punctuated his speech, Aquino's SONA was fodder for critics. The SONA was strong in condemning corruption and revealing shocking cases of graft in the Arroyo administration, said Walden Bello, Akbayan party-list representative. "But it lacks hardheaded solutions," he stressed. There was no mention of agrarian reforms, wage increases for workers, the need to reverse trade liberalization, or the need to address foreign debt, he said. "We need teeth but teeth were missing," Bello added, saying he hopes to see tougher policies in the next few weeks. Freedom from Debt Coalition secretary-general Milo Tanchuling also criticized the SONA, saying the BOT scheme only creates more debt. "We are bothered that President Aquino has proposed a policy which the civil society has long opposed, particularly the public-private partnership as a palliative to the deficit problem," Tanchuling said. Alliance of Concerned Teachers Rep. Antonio Tinio was not impressed either. "Dadalhin tayo ni Noynoy sa landas ng lalong pahirap. More privatization is not the solution. Noy's cure-all for the country's problem is privatization," he said. "(Aquino) has packaged himself as the privatization president, with public-private partnerships supposedly the key to delivering on infrastructure, social services, even national defense. However, our experience with privatization of energy and water has proven that this path mainly benefits the big foreign and local corporations at the expense of the people," Tinio said. —With a report from Jam Sisante/VS, GMANews.TV