CRACKS in the Duterte administration have surfaced, as the chief of the Presidential Commission on the Urban Poor (PCUP) slammed the mouthpiece of the Department of Finance (DOF) for claiming that the increase in the Social Security System (SSS) monthly pension is good only for pogi points.
PCUP Chairman Terry Ridon said “calling the SSS pension hike and the land-use conversion moratorium mere short-term populist initiatives for pogi points is an unacceptable slight aimed squarely at millions of income-poor pensioners, farmers and urban poor.”
Finance Spokesman Paola Alvarez claimed the pension hike and land-use moratorium are mere “populist proposals willy-nilly just to earn political pogi points for the Duterte administration.”
Ridon ridiculed the Alvarez tack that taxpayers may be forced to fund the proposed P2,000 increase in SSS pensions without corresponding adjustment in members’ contributions with SSS itself, saying it has the funds to support the increase.
“It might be incorrect to say that revenue will take a hit by approving the pension hike, because as soon as the President gives his approval, it becomes state policy to provide funds to the pension fund. It is no different from the budget given to the other propoor programs of the administration,” he added.
Ridon, who previously sat as member of the committee on ways and means in the 16th Congress, said the government should look somewhere else to raise the revenue it needs for infrastructure spending in the next six years.
“If additional revenues are the concern, a most basic initiative would be to raise the level of efficiency in tax collection, both in the BIR [Bureau of Internal Revenue] and Customs, and not to flatly reject clearly pro-poor programs of different agencies.”
Ridon said he feels personally slighted by the statement that the pension hike and land-use moratorium merely “panders to short-term populist initiatives.”
“The President was swept to power on the strength of his support for the pension hike, and his clear concern for the day-to-day problems of our people. This was not something made up just to grab the headlines of the evening news,” he noted.
Ridon also said that these initiatives put the ordinary Filipino at the center of government programs. “How can you argue against ensuring support for our seniors till the end of their days? How can you argue against protecting peasant lands from being converted into malls and subdivisions?”
He added social development agencies might also discuss among themselves to present a separate position paper on the pension hike and land use moratorium.
“By opposing social justice measures directly benefiting the daily lives of our people, we betray our promise to take care of them, especially their day-to-day concerns,” Ridon said.