Urban poor want pork retained

Letter to the Editor
Philippine Daily Inquirer

10:51 pm | Friday, October 18th, 2013

How can government leaders afford to enrich themselves with public money?

More or less, 21 million informal settlers are struggling to survive because they don’t have jobs or access to healthcare, education, potable water, etc. Meanwhile, those who are supposed to help them, as a matter of law and duty, are stealing billions of pesos that are intended to liberate them from poverty. Without the whistle-blowers, the extent of their plunder would have not been revealed. We have always suspected so much taxpayer money was being lost to corruption, but we never imagined the extent revealed so far.

Prominent politicians have been implicated in the pork barrel and Malampaya Fund scam, as well as in the DAP (Disbursement Accelaration Program) scandal. But now the blame has shifted to President Aquino. And aside from the pressure to abolish the pork barrel, there are now calls for his resignation, even threats to impeach him.

What happens now to those who stole people’s money? President Aquino is not perfect, but he is definitely not a thief. Are we really serious in our effort to rid government of corruption? If we are, then we should start presenting solutions so public money doesn’t fall into greedy hands. If the President has any explaining to do, so be it but, first of all, let’s go after and punish the thieves.

A week ago we gathered leaders from the Tondo area, from the  esteros  and relocation sites to get their opinion on the pork barrel. Unlike most of the elite that joined the Million People March in Luneta, they feel the pork barrel can stay as long as there are checks and balances to ensure that money allocated for development would be spent properly. They asked: “If you remove the pork, where will the poor get the money to spend for emergencies?”

The people suggested that fund allocation and implementation of the projects be removed from the hands of the legislators and new mechanisms be set up for close monitoring of the disbursements and projects. Fund allocations should also be made public so that the intended beneficiaries can monitor the disbursements in their respective areas.

—ALICIA GENTOLIA MURPHY,
Urban Poor Associates,
urbanpoorassociates@ymail.com

Democracy and Respect

Commentary

By Denis Murphy

Philippine Daily Inquirer

We carry our democracy, as we do our faith, in fragile earthen vessels, to use St. Paul’s words. Although we know from experience that democracy can be lost in the country, we are still careless in how we act as democratic citizens. We forget that democratic government, in which free men and women hand over part of their freedom to one of their peers to lead them in a search for the common good, is one of the supremely great achievements of human history. It can be lost, however, like grace and innocence.

Respect and humility are essential parts of the good citizenship needed in this aggressive age, both on the side of the ordinary citizen and on the side of the elected officials. Even if we disagree with what our presidents decide—even if they sink us in debt or drag us into war—they remain the embodiment of the entire people’s aspirations and are still deserving of respect. Our presidents are not Moses, but some of the thunder, smoke and lightning that surrounded Moses on Mount Sinai still surround our presidents, even in their weakest moments.

A secret service agent in Washington or in Manila may have lost all respect for the president as a man, but the agent is still willing to “take a bullet” for him because of his respect for the office and the entire people.

We should criticize, but without hostility. Isn’t that the core of the nonviolent teaching of Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King? Nothing of lasting good comes from hatred, insult, or ridicule.

Presidents, in turn, should respect ordinary citizens. An example of how respect can be shown by a president is seen in the decision of US President Barack Obama to punish Syria for its use of poison gas. He was, and maybe still is, determined to launch the missiles, even if 80 percent of the American people and the great majority of men and women everywhere in the world, from Pope Francis down to the poorest scavenger, oppose such a strike.

The American president has in that country’s law a legal right to make such decisions. If it were a technical matter of pipelines or mining practices, or concerns over the best use of interest rates, a president may justifiably think the ordinary people do not know enough about the matter to question his decision. The Syrian affair, however, is a matter of war, and people in the United States and around the world know all about war. President Obama, I believe, should listen to the people and respect their judgment in such a matter.

Is there an issue about which President Aquino may feel compelled to change his mind and do what the great majority of his people want him to do? Though I am not an economist, it seems clear the President has been very hesitant to interfere in the workings of the marketplace. He has let business people continue on the road they were on, albeit with a concern to limit corruption and to increase the country’s competitiveness. As a result, we have an economic surge that is jobless and its benefits are skewed toward the well-off members of society.

A case can be made that by an overwhelming majority, the Filipino people would want the President to intervene in business activity to secure more jobs for the unemployed and to narrow the income gap between rich and poor, if they had a chance to vote on the matter. They would surely want him to try to do both.

As Presidents Obama and Aquino get deeper into their administrations, they should ask more insistently than ever if there is something very important that all the people want them to work on. It may be the key to the historical success of their administrations.

President Aquino, in his “Covenant with the urban poor” (March 6, 2010), promised to examine the possibility of public works programs where workers would receive both food and cash for their labor: “We will create large-scale public works programs that can generate a substantial number of jobs for poor men and women. At the onset of our term, we will emphasize labor-intensive public works programs that can generate significant numbers of jobs for our poor people and give them access to at least the minimum amounts of money, food and dignity needed for their daily survival and wellbeing. Recognizing that the primary and most important resource of our country is its people, we will emphasize the creation of jobs that empower the work force, jobs that build capacity and create opportunities for the poor and marginalized.”

There is much manual work to be done throughout the country. On TV we see hundreds of men digging out a village lost in a mudslide in Zambales. Why can’t we dig safe places for the families threatened by mud flows before the damage happens? We are still not doing a good job of replanting forests; farm roads need construction and sea walls need to be built around our low-lying cities, such as Malabon. Millions of poor families need decent housing.

One of the great dangers we face is the generation of young men growing up in our slum areas with no work and no skills. In 18th-century England, these young men were taken into the navy. In the Bronx of my youth, the young men who didn’t like school or office work joined the Marines. Maybe public works programs are our solution. We have the problems, and we have the young men to do the work. Mr. President?

Denis Murphy works with the Urban Poor Associates (urbanpoorassociates@ymail.com).

Lessons from a departed sister

On July 9 I got one of those phone calls from overseas we always fear: My sister Maggie, a member of the Sisters of Charity, was very sick. The next day my wife Alice and I were on that long flight across the dark Pacific with plenty of time for somber self-centered thinking. Irish pessimism told me Maggie was dead, though we didn’t know for sure. I was alone now, I realized. All the others I grew up with—brothers, Maggie, parents, cousins—all were gone. If there was no one left to talk to about those days, would the memories themselves pass away? I also realized I had lost the best sister any man ever had.

I learned many things in the days after Maggie’s death. I had, for example, a small glimpse of God’s care of his aged followers; I learned of incidents in our family history that may have influenced what I have wound up doing in life: I recalled special memories of Maggie here in the Philippines, when we visited the Mangyan in their village outside Calapan, Mindoro. And I realized once again that the kindnesses we show people remain in their memories long after all other memories of us have faded.

At my sister’s funeral Mass about 200 Sisters of Charity attended. Nearly all are retired. The youngest nuns are in their 50s; only 10 percent of the nuns can put in a full day’s work. As an institution, the Sisters of Charity of New York are comparable to a retired person close to God after long years of loyal service. During the Mass I watched the older nuns prepare the ciboria and other vessels for Holy Communion. They were like sisters (small “s”) in their mother’s kitchen preparing a meal. They were so at ease, so at home there at the altar, so close to one another that God, who is mother and father, was clearly among them, chatting with them and helping shoulder to shoulder. God has a special love for the poor, the Church teaches. He has an equally special love for the old people who have served Him loyally all their lives. I was very happy Maggie was with the Sisters.

Cousins told me our great grandfather was evicted by England in the 1800s from the small farm he had outside Cork City, Ireland. The Murphys walked into the city without land or money and became what we now call “urban poor.” I’ve often wondered how I wound up in life working with urban poor people in Manila, especially those in danger of eviction. The apple doesn’t fall very far from the branch.

I remembered the day we went with Maggie to visit the Mangyan outside Calapan. We knew the Holy Spirit nuns who worked there, especially Sisters Magdalena and Victricia. The Mangyan gathered after dinner to greet the visitors. They sang and danced and told stories of their past. When Maggie’s turn came, she talked about the people of New York City and their tall buildings, crowded and noisy streets, and subways. She described how people went underground in the morning to get a train to work and came up at the end of the day. As she talked we noticed the people were troubled.

Much later Sister Victricia told me the Mangyan understood that New Yorkers lived underground like snakes and other wild animals. They felt so sorry for New Yorkers that every Sunday they prayed for them at Mass. Politicians like Mayor Michael Bloomberg may take credit for the progress that city has made in recent years, but maybe it was really due to the prayers of the Mangyan people.

In dealing with the illnesses of old people, Maggie, like most doctors and nurses, had her own bag of tricks. Kindness and street smarts are needed. In the last conversation we had by phone only a week before the fateful July 9 call, she told me about Henry, 87, who was a regular patient at her clinic for old people in Richmond University Medical Center, Staten Island  (the old St. Vincent’s Hospital). Henry complained of fits of sneezing. My sister examined him but could find nothing wrong. She did notice that every time he touched his chest, he started sneezing. She finished the examination, then told him in a very serious tone of voice:

 “Henry, you must not touch your chest ever again. Can you do that?”

“Yes, Sister.”

“Promise me now, you won’t touch your chest.”

“Yes, Sister.”

He returned a few months later. The sneezing had stopped and he said he had never again touched his chest.

All the people I talked with about Maggie—patients, colleagues, fellow sisters, friends and relatives—mentioned her unfailing kindness. The people we most admire in life are those who show kindness to all.

Meanwhile in the United States, columnist Charles M. Blow wrote in the New York Times (Aug. 10) of signs that Americans are becoming a people without pity or kindness. A cross section of Americans was asked, “What factor was most responsible for the continuing poverty in the country?” The respondents were given a list of possible causes. The cause singled out by most people interviewed was: “Too much welfare prevents initiative.”

To these people, poverty wasn’t due to a lack of education or of opportunities to work. Instead, they made the victims the guilty party. The poor are guilty because they are poor. The same results might be found here if such a test were administered. The Philippines cannot compete with other powerful countries if it relies solely on the skills of the capitalist world. It can compete and find its own appropriate mix of capitalism and culture if it remains a country of kindness and pity. Each people must moderate capitalism in their own way.

One more anecdote. My sister attended a community organization meeting in Lucena, Quezon, in 1982. One morning, instead of attending the sessions, Maggie, Fr. Tom Steinbugler and myself went to a nearby beach to swim. Suddenly there was a cry of shock and pain from Tom. He was bent over in the water. We got him up on shore and saw he had been bitten or stung by a jellyfish across his stomach. He had a hard time breathing.

My sister told him to bend over and breathe deeply. She told me later she didn’t know what to do. Tom later told me he feared he might die, and might have to go to confession to me. I thought we should urinate on the wound, but no man can pee on his own stomach, and I knew he’d rather die than have me pee on him. There was all this confusion, and then a woman from a fisherman’s shack farther up the beach came running with the traditional cure, vinegar. We put some on the red ugly wound and soon the crisis was over. The woman had seen our problems and knew right away what to do.

We were three very well educated persons there, but none of us knew what every adult and child in that area must know—that vinegar is the cure for a jellyfish sting. They also knew it was foolish to go in the water in the jellyfish season.

Denis Murphy works with the Urban Poor Associates (urbanpoorassociates@ymail.com).

The road to a housing solution

Since the start of President Aquino’s administration, urban poor people have worked with then Secretary Jesse Robredo and later with Secretary Mar Roxas of the Department of the Interior and Local Government to come up with a housing plan acceptable to both the poor and the government.

An estimate of all this work is that never in Philippine history have so many meetings been held with so few concrete results. Another estimate admits the big number of meetings but says they were necessary to produce essential agreements that will guide work in the future. We are not yet there.

By Denis Murphy

Philippine Daily Inquirer

11:28 pm | Wednesday, September 18th, 2013

Let us look at one group’s understanding of what those essential agreements are. Different groups may have different insights. Here are three proposed by the Anti-Eviction Task Force: 1) Reliance is put on the one-story house and there is growing suspicion of the usefulness of five-story walkup buildings; 2) The value of near-city resettlement sites is clearer than ever, especially as a stopgap measure until the government is able to gather its forces and find land for the poor in the cities; and 3) The absolute importance of people’s participation in the planning of the houses they will occupy is recognized.

One-story houses. Poor people have lived in one-story homes for generations, and want to live that way in the future. They want to be able to walk out the front door into the sunlight. They want a tree planted by their door, where they can sit in the shade and watch the children play. Such an image—people sitting under their own vines or fig trees—is used in the Old Testament to describe life in God’s coming Kingdom. (Micah 5:4) Poor women want a vegetable or flower garden. Children want a dog in the house.

They can’t have any of these good things in a five-story walkup tenement. They also need a place to store their tricycles, carts, fishing gear. They want to be able to get out quickly if there is a fire.

When they have a little money, the poor build a second floor and work for a title, and then they feel they have something important to leave to their children when they die. This desire to leave something of value to their children is behind people’s longing for titles.

A home on the ground is also the only home most poor families can afford. A decent one can be built for P80,000-P100,000. They can afford to amortize this cost at about P300 a month if the government gives half of the total cost through a grant. If we raise the amount required for amortization, we are in danger of cutting into their other essential expenses for food, medicine, school and clothes.

A decent starter one-story house can be built for P30,000. On the other hand, the government and private builders say it costs P400,000-P500,000 to build a 20-square-meter unit in a five-story walkup. Even if the government gave a P200,000 grant, the family will still have to pay P900-P1,200 a month in amortization. Some families can do this, but at least an equal number of poor families can’t. Can a poor country with 4 million urban poor families in need of housing give subsidies of P200,000 or more to each family?

Five-story walkups allow for higher density than one-story housing. But the advantage of height comes in a big way if we talk of 15-, 20-, or 30-story buildings, as in Hong Kong. There is little advantage when we talk of five stories.

We asked architect Ronnie Manahan, former dean of the University of the Philippines College of Architecture, how many families can be comfortably housed in five-story buildings on one hectare of land. He said: “About 400 at most.” A bigger number will make people feel crowded, which works against good neighborliness. If we give families 25-sq-m lots and one-story housing, we can have 300 families on a hectare (300 x 25 sq m=7,500 sq m; the remaining 2,500 sq m are for roads, public services and playgrounds). The people can eventually build a second floor.

Another advantage of one-story houses is the people themselves can repair them. In five-story walkups repairs are difficult to make, require skilled workers, and cost a great deal of money.

Walkups in general have bad track records worldwide. A study by UN Habitat found that in six projects involving multistory buildings, four had poor results because of high costs and poor management (Urban Economics-Building Assets for the Urban Poor, 2009-2010). The Philippines has its own examples in the row of five-story buildings on R-10 road opposite Pier 18. They are so crowded and so carelessly managed, and have become such vertical slums it is no surprise they are due for demolition.

Near-city relocation. By “near-city” is meant resettlement areas outside the city but close enough for wage earners to commute to work. The Urban Poor Associates (UPA) helped 500 families relocate to San Pedro, Laguna, this year. They use the train to commute to work for P20 one way. UPA also helped 500 families relocate to Bocaue, Bulacan, where they spend P70 back and forth by bus. Some families have together bought a second-hand wagon, which is cheaper yet. The two areas are scenic, with rolling hills and trees, and children can play safely on the ground. Before, they played on the R-10 pier front road, inches from large cargo trucks, or around charcoal pits in Ulingan, Tondo.

In-city housing remains the best solution. Cities where rich and poor populations mix have the highest rates of social mobility, including rates of escape from poverty. The government has to find more idle land in the cities if it wants the best solution.

People’s participation. In the work with Secretaries Robredo and Roxas, the principle of people planning their housing has been central. The current emphasis on “people’s plans” grew out of those meetings. Poor people believe, quite sensibly, that their plans should be the start and guiding principle of their homes. I think all who took part in the meetings with the two men agree that people’s participation is of supreme importance.

The road to a housing solution is a long and bumpy one, but it has led to certain basic principles that are part of the final solution.

Denis Murphy works with the Urban Poor Associates (urbanpoorassociates@ymail.com).

Karapatan sa Pabahay

(This leaflet was distributed to urban poor families who has threat of eviction.)

UDHA Amendments a Call for Decent Housing

2013 September 10. Urban poor groups from various parts of the metropolis led by Task Force UDHA Amendments joined supportive congress persons in filing a House Bill amending Republic Act No. 7279, the Urban Development and Housing Act (UDHA).

Authors of the proposed House Bill are Representatives Cresente C. Paez and Maria Leonor “Leni” G. Robredo. Co-authors are Representatives Walden Bello, Ibarra M.  Gutierrez III, Kaka J. Bag-ao, Jose Christopher Y. Belmonte and Benjamin D. Asilo.

The title of the proposed bill is: "An act strengthening and securing the rights of the urban poor against evictions and/or demolitions and to provide adequate housing, amending for this purpose Republic Act No. 7279 otherwise known as 'An act to provide for a comprehensive and continuing urban development and housing program, establish the mechanism for its implementation, and for other purposes' or the Urban Development and Housing Act of 1992."

This bill aims to further secure the urban poor from eviction and demolition of their homes and from relocating them in distant places lacking basic services and livelihood opportunities, thus clarifying the definition of “resettlement areas” that it must be within and/or near city areas. 

The bill further provides that consultation must be effectively done with the active participation of the affected communities, with the right to offer and counter-offer for relocation sites when reasonable and allowable.  This expands likewise the mandate of the law by requiring developers to develop an area for socialized housing equivalent to at least twenty percent (20%) of the total area or project cost, at the option of the developer, not only on proposed subdivision projects but also on proposed condominiums, memorial parks, golf courses and all other land development projects. 

The bill ensures strengthening the requirements in cases of eviction of informal settlers and demolition of their residential structures and broadening of the penalties on the violation of the Urban Development and Housing Act.

The bill also proposes the creation of the Socialized Housing Commission with quasi-judicial powers and authority with exclusive jurisdiction over all issues arising from the implementation of UDHA Law.

 

Celia Santos, Urban Poor Associates Advocacy officer said, “We have been pushing for UDHA amendments for the past 10 years, this is by far the largest support we ever had. We are hopeful that this bill will pass in due time. The task force with the legislators have only one goal, decent housing for all.”

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Justice’s two voices

Commentary

By Denis Murphy

Most people I talked with appreciated Luis Antonio Cardinal Tagle’s impassioned critique of the pork barrel scam and his low-key presence at the Aug. 26 Luneta rally. His actions raise once again the question of how the Catholic Church should address the problems facing people in society today, especially the problems of social justice. To whom should it speak? What response should it ask? To whom should we all speak and with whom should we work?

Traditionally the Church has responded to injustice in two ways. In the first, the road more traveled, the Church describes the problem it wishes to solve, and then calls on the heads of state, the rich and the powerful, to solve the problem. The approach presumes that change in society comes from the top and that the powerful can solve the problems. The second approach has been taken by Jaime Cardinal Sin, Archbishop Oscar Romero of El Salvador and many other Church leaders. They realize basic change in society regularly involves a confrontation between the powerful and the powerless. And they choose to speak in the name of the victims, and have the sufferings of the poor and the powerless front and center in their minds. They end by calling on all men and women of good will to oppose the unjust ways of the powerful.

The first approach may have worked in the Middle Ages, when the popes had real power over kings and emperors, and they in turn had near total power over their subjects. But the approach hardly works now: the people of the world have become democrats in their hearts, even if their governments are still authoritarian.

The first approach reechoes the more conservative priestly tradition of the Old Testament; the Cardinal Sin-Archbishop Romero approach continues the prophetic tradition. The second is effective when the Church not only speaks out for the good of the ordinary people but also involves the people in solving the problem. The Church gives a voice to those who are voiceless and calls on the people to take part in the solution. The prophetic voice arises from the suffering heart of the poor, and engages the poor in working out a solution.

This discussion so far is somewhat theoretical. Luckily we have an example of how the two approaches might work out in practice. This example is found in Pope Paul VI’s visit to Tondo in November 1970.

The pope arrived at the Don Bosco school in Barrio Magsaysay on a Sunday afternoon, and almost immediately gave a rather routine greeting and a talk on moral guidance to the mostly urban crowds gathered on the soccer field there. He spoke in Latin, which was translated by a young Salesian priest. The speech, written by the Vatican Curia, was, in general outline, the speech he delivered in the urban poor areas he visited around the world. It was polite. It didn’t speak of the land problem that raged in Tondo. Toward the end of the speech the pope asked the president to help the poor people, little realizing the president was the cause of the land problem.

Chances are the pope didn’t know of the problem. It was created by President Ferdinand Marcos’ desire to evict 180,000 poor people from Tondo to turn the area into an upscale housing and business center. The poor opposed the plan at a very visceral level. The poor people of the Zone One Tondo Organization were there in big numbers in the hope of hearing the pope support their rights to land tenure security.

Then the pope walked through the muddy streets of Tondo—there had just been a major typhoon—to the run-down shack of a poor family. He stayed there longer than expected and, when he returned to Don Bosco, he seemed stunned by the poverty he had seen. He didn’t speak to the officials and priests around him, but held tightly to the hand of a Franciscan Missionary of Mary sister who was just a few feet from me. He looked sad as if someone had died. He looked around and seemed to see the poor people in the soccer field for the first time.

I thought, maybe the poor family he visited had explained the land problem to him. I thought, he may have regretted the inadequacy of his earlier words. Maybe, I thought, he will call for the microphone and speak from his heart about the poverty he had seen and demand that the president settle the problem in a fair and just manner. I thought we might see a pope speak for justice from his heart, with compassion and righteous anger and with all the power of his office.

As everyone knows the pope didn’t. If he had, the history of our Church would be different. Maybe our secular history would also be very different.

Pope Paul’s talk was a good example of the first way the Church has used to approach problems of injustice. His extempore speech would have been an example of the second manner of approach.

* * *

When actor Martin Sheen was here in 1997 to help promote better housing for the poor, he was interviewed by Dong Puno on TV. Puno began by asking Sheen why he was in Manila. Sheen said, “Because I am a Catholic.” He explained that he had been raised to believe that as a Catholic his job in the world was to help the poor and lessen injustice. When he was asked to come to Manila to help, he said he couldn’t refuse.

We may believe we are not qualified to speak about injustice, but then we should read again the early chapters of the Book of Exodus.

Moses said to God when asked to go to the Pharaoh and speak for the Hebrews: “If you please, Lord, I have never been eloquent…. I am slow of speech and tongue.”

God answered: “Who gives one man speech and makes another deaf and dumb… It is I who will assist you in speaking and will teach you all to say.” (Exodus 4:10-12)

Denis Murphy works with the Urban Poor Associates [urbanpoorassociates@ymail.com].