under our noses

 

while everyone is so busy with driving GMA out of malacañang, several developments in the political and economic areas have gone by unnoticed.  the court of appeals threw out a motion for recon on a february ruling lending an executive order banning second-hand imported vehicles from entering the country.  i've been told the cement industry also lost a battle for the imposition of a safeguard quota on imports.  both developments have dire consequences for workers in both industries, and malacañang seems to have forgotten the role it plays in championing both causes.  the palace is all about gma's political survival?  yes, and this is proof of that.  malacañang was nowhere to be found to take further steps to protect the local automotive and cement industries.  now here comes neda with its irr on the id system.  despite so much protests against the proposal, the plan is being pushed through.  this government keeps acting on the wrong things.  while it is selling out the interests of thousands of workers by default, it is imposing paranoid policies like the id system. survival at all costs, even at the people's expense.

 

and just for sugarcoating, the dole secretary comes out on tv this morning brandishing the creation of more than half a million jobs as of july 2005, proof, she says, that GMA was able to fulfill her SONA promise.  but anyone with half a brain would be tempted to ask:  what kind of jobs are these anyway?  contractual?  seasonal? piece-rate? jobs with turn-overs every six months?  considering that government agencies like the BLES and NSO have also changed the definition of 'unemployed' one wonders how this so-called half a million jobs as of july this year interrelates to the expected drop in the unemployment rate because of this new definition.

 

with all this talk of impeachment and resignation and jueteng and wrietapping, so many battles with so many casualties are being lost and no one it seems, even cares to know.