PGMA's Speech during the Opening Ceremonies of the 2003 Corporate Social Responsibility Week |
Meeting Room 5, Secretariat Bldg., PICC complex, Roxas Blvd., Pasay City (09 July 2003) |
| Thank you very much, Dinky for
your kind introduction. Dinky is on loan from the NGO community to the national
government. Thank you also very much, Vicky Garchitorena for your wonderful report. Vicky has a foot in the NGO world and a foot in my governance as a pro bono senior adviser for poverty alleviation. I'd like to congratulate the League of Corporate Foundation president Malou Erni. And I'd like to thank you and Petron for the many projects that you have been undertaking to help the government. I see your projects very frequently especially in terms of enabling our poor young people acquire the requirements for education. I'd like to greet also our other partner or twin -- or in a way our triplets -- in poverty alleviation in government, not only because we are the same size, we have the same thinking, Ging Deles, the head of the National Anti-Poverty Commission. I'd like to thank all the other government officials who are here. And of course the officers and members of the league of corporate foundation, guests, ladies and gentlemen. First of all, I'd like to congratulate the League of Corporate Foundation for organizing once again this Corporate Social Responsibility Week, as Vicky said, for the third straight year. And, as Vicky also said, in this third celebration, it's also the third time that I join you. Kasi, as your conference theme says, "ka partner ka." i say, partner tayo to serve the ideals of responsive and responsible leadership. Partners to promote social and moral recovery. And i would like to congratulate the corporate foundations for promoting social responsiveness and a better life for all. I'm gratified -- again, as Vicky said -- that almost everybody who has been with us in the past two years is still with us today. And I'm also glad, as Vicky and Malou said, that you are even more now. This display of loyalty to a common cause is bolstered by more new faces, companies and organizations joining our ranks. Even the most ardent of business competitors have come together in one powerful showcase of cooperation and unity. Look at Shell and Petron, both being strategic partners in this conference. We are partners, not rivals in this battle -- the battle against poverty, the battle to end the degradation of our people's spirit. Last year, I told you that the biggest concrete problem in our country is unemployment. And you responded by focusing your programs, as Vicky showed in the chart, over 60 percent on livelihood generation, and I thank you for that. I thank you, too, that the larger focus of your programs remains in livelihood generation. But I do thank you for what you're doing for human development. I thank you, for instance, for including in your program line-up support for the government's initiative to provide potable water for the 100 waterless municipalities in our country under the Kalahi program. The government has been working hard to attain the goals of human development based on the guidelines set by the United Nations. It has been an uphill road, as Vicky says, around the world these are not the best of times, but we are not making any excuses. We are determined to accord every Filipino a life of dignity, productivity and security. Our foremost thrusts for human development today are peace in Mindanao under the aegis of the Constitution, and dealing with the drug problem comprehensively and with finality. These are being pursued against the backdrop of larger reforms of governance, of the electoral system and of the fundamental underpinnings of economic growth with equity. Every Filipino has a role to play in the total human development of our people. Our sense of national community must be strengthened to meet the challenges of peace, security and development. The trial of the Rizal day bomber is a tribute to our sense of national community to meet the challenge of security. Let this trial stand as a grim reminder that terrorists will never escape the long hand of justice. The confession of Yunos Muklis outlines a threat that lives and moves with us from day to day and against which we must exercise unrelenting vigilance across transnational borders. It is ever present, and it may strike at any time. We must be alert against it individually and collectively. But even as we must remain alert against terrorism, we must also remain open to peace. And the government is open to peace with your help, with the help of the corporations, the help of the foundations, the help of the official development partners, because as you lend financial support to this search for peace, the search becomes easier. Let me take this opportunity to welcome the developmental assistance of the United States relative to the peace process -- at least 30 million dollars this year; at least 20 million dollars next year; even more once the signature, the ink on the final peace agreement has dried. Our strategic partnership with the U.S. comes full circle from an alliance against terrorism to an alliance for peace. We are one in combating terrorism and poverty, and in pursuing peace and development. This is a part of the new perspective of political and economic security in the Asia pacific that has emerged in the post-Iraq war period. I also ask the official and corporate development community to help us mainstream distance learning in the 500 insurgency- influenced barangays where teachers fear to tread. The knowledge channel foundation is already helping us there. In this distance learning system that we call the strong republic grade school, the students are taught by television. Where the knowledge channel can reach them, we want to reach them. Where television cannot reach them, they are taught through technovans which house a television set and instructional materials in reading, writing and arithmetic. I hope the corporate foundations can provide some of these facilities to access the TV channel or facilities to provide for the technovans. I also hope you can help us close the school building gap, referring to the schools where the student-classroom ratio exceeds a 100 to 1. A smaller ratio than that can be addressed by mandating two shifts -- a morning shift and an afternoon shift. But a bigger ratio than that certainly would not be met by mandatory shifting and certainly would require additional classrooms. By this reckoning, defining a school building gap to mean the schools or the student-classroom ratio is more than a 100 to 1, I estimate we have a manageable classroom gap of some 2,500. And I think this is manageable enough for the NGO sector to help us with. The federation of the Filipino-Chinese Chambers of Commerce is already helping us there. And I hope the other corporate foundations can also contribute to closing this gap. The bonds of EDSA were forged not only by the quest to reach out to the less fortunate but also the quest for good governance. You, in the corporate foundations are also the same corporations who had been fighting for good governance. And so, I thank you, too, for this staunch advocacy. For instance,I thank the governance advisory council, whose members come from corporations who belong to your ranks, for working together with the presidential committee on effective governance to coordinate the efforts of government, business and civil society. You will recall that in response to your own recommendations, I required all appointed directors in the corporate boards of government-owned-and- controlled corporations and government financial institutions to take an orientation course on corporate governance. You will also recall that it was to a large extent -- because of the support you gave to the advocacy for modernizing elections -- that i made available at long last after many years of hoping, the funds needed to fully computerize and accurately count and tabulate our people's votes in 2004. These are contributions to good governance as well as contributions to the long-term maturity of our people. I also recall, in a couple of surveys, that the business community is willing to contribute to fighting corruption. And I hope therefore that part of your foundation money could go to support the anti-graft commission in the very expensive and tedious task of lifestyle checks. Everything that contributes to a disciplined, law abiding and upright society must be integrated into the universe of good governance. This includes the war against drug syndicates. These groups will be the principal targets of law enforcement operations as we move forward. This will be reinforced by international cooperation so that we can work with other police agencies to close the dragnet. This is a transnational effort as much as it is a community effort domestically. We must exploit the full range of actions needed to neutralize these syndicates, and either run them to the ground or bring them to certain justice. Let me thank you for being able to more than comply with quantitative commitments that you gave last year. I have to thank Mirant for that huge, huge investment you have put -- not investment in the sense of your ordinary power projects, but investment that you have put in human development -- by making all those barangay electrification projects to the tune of over a billion pesos, which in one sweep doubles the accomplishment rate of the commitment of the league of the corporate foundations. In closing, let me once more commend you for consistently leading the business sector in addressing its social responsibilities. With your continued support and commitment, our momentum of growth and progress will be sustained well into the next millennium. Already, Vicky said, that there is a statistical reduction in hunger. There is a statistical reduction, too, in unemployment, but still much too big even now. We have a long road ahead of us. But together, we will achieve our vision of good corporate and public governance that will continue to lie at the foundations of a peaceful, progressive and prosperous society. Maraming salamat na tayo ay magka-partner. Kailangan talaga magka-partner tayo para sa ganun umunlad ang ating bansa. Maraming nagagawa pag sinasantabi ang pulitika. Maraming salamat sa inyong lahat. |