RP unlikely to attain most of the MDGs

In a dramatic reversal of longstanding US policy, Barack Obama stood before the UN General Assembly last month and declared that the US would return to active cooperation and support of the world organization and would do everything it could to bring about the attainment of the goals embodied in the Millennium Declaration. That was the US President talking, and he knew about the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). In contrast, most of the candidates for next year’s election for the presidency of the Philippines don’t know about, or have little familiarity with, the MDGs.

This is deplorable for two reasons. The first is that the Millennium Declaration is an international agreement entered into by the heads of state of 191 UN members — President Joseph Estrada signed the document for the Philippines — and the second reason is that MDGs are the stuff of national progress and development.

When it has attained the eight MDGs — eradication of extreme poverty and hunger, achievement of universal primary education, promotion of general equality and empowerment of women, reduction of child mortality, improvement of maternal health, halting of the spread of HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases, ensuring of environmental sustainability and development of a global partnership for development — a country will have taken a grant stride in the direction of laying a firm foundation for economic development and social stability.

In this country the MDGs are up against three formidable obstacles. One is time. The Millennium Declaration set a 15-year time frame for the attainment of the MDGs. The Declaration was completed and signed at the start of the millennium. Thus, 2015 is the deadline for the MDGs’ attainment. That is barely six years away.

The other formidable obstacle is lack of political will. In the context of the MDGs, political will means resources, and the provision of resources for the attainment of the MDGs has not been high in the totem pole of fiscal priorities of the administration of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. There are not enough resources for MDG concerns — subsidies for schoolchildren, classrooms, textbooks, health care facilities, especially for infants and pregnant women, resources for disease prevention and control and, in the wake of the most recent typhoons, facilities for environmental planning and disaster mitigation.

The latest data for this country’s standing with regard to MDG No. 1 (eradication of extreme poverty and hunger), No. 2 (achievement of universal primary education), No. 4 (reduction of child mortality), and No. 5 (improvement of maternal health) make very somber reading. Around 30 percent of survey respondents indicated that they have had to skip the equivalent of a day’s meal in the last three months, only a small fraction of primary schoolchildren reaching high school, thousands of infants dying annually before the age of five and 11 out of 1,000 Filipinas dying from childbirth every day — these statistics make one look up to heaven and ask the God why these things are happening in a county as naturally well endowed as the Philippines.

There is really no need to look up to the heavens because the explanation is obvious, which is a combination of corruption, waste —- as in Mrs. Arroyo’s frequent foreign travels with dozens of Congressmen in tow — and bad public-spending priorities.

The third formidable obstacle that this country faces in its effort to bring about attainment of the MDGs is a non-governmental institution. I refer to the Roman Catholic Church. Like its predecessors the RH (reproductive health) bill being heroically pushed by Albay’s Rep. Edcel Lagman is facing ferocious opposition from the men of the cloth. Given Ms. Arroyo’s pathetic fear of the wrath of the Catholic Church, the Lagman bill is in for a hard fight. But the fight can be won. It has to be won, because without the family-planning provisions of the bill, the MDGs relating to maternal health and infant mortality will be virtually impossible to achieve in the face of an annual population growth rate of around 2.1 percent.

With the 2015 deadline, only six years away, there is every possibility that the Philippines will not be able to achieve four of the MDGs, namely, No. 1 (eradication of extreme poverty and hunger), No. 2 (achievement of universal primary education), No. 4 (reduction of child mortality) and No. 5 (improvement of maternal health). But can things be turned around? They can, but the man who succeeds Gloria Arroyo must be as focused on the MDGs as Barack Obama has indicated he is.

Today is the start of the annual three-day program of activities to promote the MDGs. The Philippines is attempting to repeat its Guinness Book of World Records win in 2008, when 35 million Filipinos pledged to “Stand Up and Fight Poverty.” If you want the Philippines to maintain its Guinness crown, get involved in a “Stand Up” activity today. Or get hold of an “I Vote For MDG” pledge card from your local government or civil society group, fill it up and register it. –Rudy Romero, Daily Tribune

(My e-mail address is rudy_v_romero@yahoo.com)