Activists on Aquino, Arroyo:  Like student, like teacher

When it comes to handling the issue of oil price increases, a militant group said President Benigno Simeon Aquino III is no different from his teacher -- former President and incumbent Pampanga Rep. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, who  is currently under hospital arrest over charges of electoral sabotage.

“The Aquino government has so far been grossly insensitive to the plight of the people. It has flatly ignored calls to remove the value added tax (VAT) on petroleum products. Its allies in the House of Representatives have sat on urgent bills reviewing the oil deregulation law,” said Renato Reyes, Jr., secretary general of the militant umbrella group Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan). Arroyo was once Aquino’s economics professor at the Ateneo de Manila University.

“The economics student Noynoy Aquino seems no different from his economics teacher Gloria Macapagal Arroyo in terms of their neo-liberal economic philosophy. Both favor deregulation and privatization. Both favor the VAT on oil. Both rely on failed targeted subsidies that do not have a significant impact on consumers,” Reyes said in a statement issued on Friday.

The statement came a day after Arroyo released a paper entitled “It’s the economy, student” where she criticized Aquino's supposed “obsessive pursuit of political warfare” that she said has slowed down the country’s economy.
 
“Rather than building our nation’s achievement, this regime has extolled itself as the sole harbinger of all that is good. And the Filipino people are paying for this obsession,” she said in the paper she wrote while recuperating from a series of operations last year. The paper was read to the media by economist Gonzalo Jurado, the former President’s economics professor at the University of the Philippines (UP), at a "colloquium" or academic meeting called by Arroyo's staff at the Manila Hotel. The former President is currently detained at the Veterans Memorial Medical Center (VMMC) as she faces a charge of electoral sabotage of the 2007 elections.
  Later in the day, at a press briefing, presidential spokesperson Edwin Lacierda described Arroyo’s critique as “a political manifesto disguised as an economic paper” that was presented at “a press briefing masquerading as a colloquium.”

“Lumang tugtugin. Sourgraping, it’s all about sourgraping. She is trying to paint the picture of gloom and doom for this country and it’s totally opposite to what business analysts have been saying,” he said. Long-term measures After a P1.80/liter increase in oil prices this week, Bayan said there was a need to implement long term measures to protect the country from price speculation and profiteering.

Bayan blamed the global oil cartel and price speculators for the rise in fuel prices.

Bayan claimed that the House Energy Committee "has not held a single hearing on various bills that have called for the review or repeal of the oil deregulation law. Various groups have asked House Speaker Feliciano Belmonte last year to schedule the bills for public hearings."

“Removing the VAT on oil will not devastate the economy. It will in fact have a positive effect since lower oil prices will allow consumers to purchase other basic necessities. Even the proposed fare hike can be set aside so long as oil prices go down,” Reyes said.

“The people’s disgust over the country’s economic conditions is fast catching up with Aquino. The President cannot expect the people to forget about their economic woes just because the impeachment trial is coming up,” he added.

No major achievements

“Aside from the belated filing of charges against Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, there’s really nothing much that the present administration has achieved since it started its term. This is especially true for the economy. There has been no outstanding achievement in land reform, national industrialization and job creation and in poverty eradication. Aquino has shunned calls to remove the oppressive VAT on oil and power. The much-vaunted conditional cash transfer program has not made a dent on poverty,” Reyes said.

“Unemployment and overseas migration are also at an all-time high. Oil prices, water and power rates are soaring to new heights,” Reyes added. - VVP, GMA News