President Aquino pressed on with his verbal attacks against the Supreme Court (SC), this time blaming the judiciary for country’s worsening economy.
Responding to mediamen during the Bulong-Pulungan Annual Christmas Party at the Sofitel Philippine Plaza, Aquino promised a better Philippine economy next year, with his administration’s plan to go into massive infrastructure spending.
However, Aquino noted that the present judicial system still presents a major challenge in his bid to improve the economy.
“We are not changing priorities, the very first problem that I had during the campaign was jobs — it is still the economy that is still the priority. However, these things do not exist in a vacuum, they all interact, a judicial system that doesn’t promote stability and certainty does not enhance the economic environment,” Aquino said.
“Conversely, an economic environment that does not have a level playing field will not see as possible but may I just say this afternoon in fact in about an hour’s time, I am meeting with the economic team and primarily one of the questions that we will be addressing is how — we are in transition from before that the money of government or the public’s money was being spent as if it were going out of style to now the transition to prudent spending has imposed a change in culture that couldn’t happen overnight,” he added.
Aquino maintained that SC Chief Justice Renato Corona should “perhaps revisit the oath that we all in the government have to undertake and remember exactly to whom he made the promise to and what was promised.”
Aquino admitted that his administration made a slow start in infrastructure spending but only because he wanted to put in place all the needed safeguards on public spending.
“During the Sona (State of the Nation Address), we had a very few output, and we are now very close to the target that was set. And I guess that’s the essential point; that safeguards should be in place but they shouldn’t also be constricting, but there should also be a rapid transformation from spending it out of style to spending it prudently,” he said.
But with the safeguards now in place, Aquino said that his administration is ready to embark into massive infrastructure spending and intensify its Public-Private Partnership (PPP) projects to pump-prime the economy.
For instance, Aquino said that the Daanghari-South Luzon Expressway (Slex) connection is now its final bidding and construction is expected to begin in January.
Also, Aquino said that his administration is “completing all of the studies prior to actually bidding the other PPP projects” while the Ninoy Aquino International Airport Terminal 1 will undergo structural rebuilding.
“There is a step-by-step process, the structural and functional things that have to be done first then, of course the aesthetics after that. I’ll also be reviewing this afternoon, there is a plan, for instance, PPP, 45,000 school-rooms by next year. We want to re-evaluate how realistic that figure is and what are still necessary steps to be done to be able to effect that. Now if we get that in addition to the schools that were built this year, we are very, very close to meeting the 66,000 deficit and all in a period of roughly about two years,” he said.
“I’m also be asking the economic team later, the initial target for the Nlex-Slex connector is 2014. So I want to know, and there is a new proposal that basically has a new route that will cost about roughly a third of the proposal which we already have on hand, and since we’re talking billions, one-third for the new proposal really is worth investigating and examining. So, a lot of, a little bit more accelerated spending, were frontloading, we hope to, if the budget is signed by Dec. 15, we hope to release most of it by January. So we frontload every endeavor that government seeks to do next year,” Aquino added. –Virgilio J. Bugaoisan, Daily Tribune
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