By Atty. Howie Calleja
Political pundits will say that during an election the most important figures are the credible voting preference surveys that would project the potential voting trends in an electoral exercise. For these experts such data would help shape the various campaign strategies and political alignments needed to win in this 2022 Polls. But for concerned Filipinos like me, I tend to look at other social figures which bear more significant weight in our day-to-day lives more that what these voting preference surveys have to offer.
First, as of March 2022, we have a national debt (unpaid borrowed funds carried by our national government) amounting to ₱12.03 trillion ($232,255,149,900). This means that our debt-to-GDP ratio, which reflects the ability to pay obligations, will jump from 39.6 percent in 2019 to 53.9 percent in 2020 and 58.1 percent in 2021. As such, our Domestic debt totaled P8.37 trillion, 2.4% or P197.38 billion higher compared to end-December. This was mainly due to the P300-billion provisional advances availed of by the government from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas; while our External debt reached P3.66 trillion, P103.7 billion or 2.9% higher than end-December. The increment in external debt was due to the Philippine peso’s depreciation against the dollar, as well as the net of our external obligations. Why does this figure matter? Our next president should have the overwhelming support and confidence of investors to help us out of this predicament as well as the financial savviness to maneuver our country through this financial difficulty.
The high demand and low supply (prompted by the Russia-Ukraine conflict) will drive the oil and gas prices up in the world market; thus Bloomberg foresees that a “10% rise in oil prices could add a 0.4 percentage points” to Philippine inflation. To add, Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) governor Benjamin Diokno also sees the high oil prices to drive inflation as high as 5.5% to 6%. This is above BSP’s expected rate, which is between 2% to 4%. In the long run, continuous oil price hikes can slow down the growth of an economy. Like an ordinary Filipino household, the Philippine economy, in general, is also up for a bumpy ride. Production, transportation, and manufacturing costs are also driven up by high oil prices. Furthermore, a Bloomberg article from this February sees the Philippines and India among the Asian countries taking the worst hit from the oil war spike. Again, why does this figure matter? We can never entrust our next administration to the same individuals who have bankrupted our national funds. We cannot afford to lose more money at the expense of the poor and marginalized in our society.
Finally, to quote FITCHRATINGS (cf. February, 2022) “The Philippines’ structural indicators remain weaker than those of peers. These include per capita income, governance standards and human development as measured by the World Bank Governance Indicators (WBGI) and UN Human Development Indicators. Philippines fell in the 43rd percentile of the UN’s Human Development Index, compared with the 71st percentile of the ‘BBB’ median. (The) Philippines has an ESG Relevance Score of ‘5’ for Political Stability and Rights as well as for the Rule of Law, Institutional and Regulatory Quality and Control of Corruption, as is the case for all sovereigns. This reflects the high weight WBGIs have in our proprietary sovereign rating model. Philippines has a medium WBGI ranking in the 39th percentile, reflecting a recent record of peaceful political transitions, a low indicator for political stability and absence of violence, a moderate level of rights for participation in the political process, moderate institutional capacity, established rule of law and a moderate level of corruption”. So, why does this figure matter? Our country’s political, social and economic structures has been marred by incompetence, corruption and political accommodation in this current administration. Meaningful change must characterize our next set of national and local leaders.
These are the figures that matter because these are the figures that truly affect us as a nation. And we pray that our voters would not just join in the bandwagon effect of these political voting preference surveys just to have that feeling of being part of “the winning candidate” — all at the expense of the real need of our country. And, may I just add that though it has not yet been scientifically verified, the VP Leni-Kiko Rallies all over the country have become a living testimony of these “figures that matter” as well because it mirrors a genuine groundswell of people that surveys will fail to capture.
