      Back to Home |
SCMP
Decries the Foreign Ownership of Schools, Land,
Utilities, & Media After the Senate ratification of the US-RP Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA), we are again at a crucial battle as the one-year old presidency of Estrada is pushing for what he labels now as Constitutional Correction for Development or CONCORDE. Worse, we have learned that the President also wants extra powers to bypass the Senate in the signing and approval of certain agreements. In the name of the Philippine patrimony, the Student Christian Movement of the Philippines (SCMP), a member-convenor of the Ecumenical Jubilee 2000 Campaign Network, echoes the opposition of Philippine churches and people's organizations against Charter change (Cha-cha). As we know, certain provisions in the 1987 Constitution prohibits the full ownership, domination and control of foreign monopolies over Philippine patrimony, including agricultural land, minerals, forests and water resources. Specifically, Article XII (Philippine Economy & Patrimony) stresses the cery important duty of the government to enact laws and implement policies that effectively ensure the utilization and development of our human resources and natural wealth for the benefit of the people. But contrary to these ideals, the government's passage of the Mining Act of 1995 and ratification of the VFA are two glaring proofs of the government's violation of the Philippine Constitution. The Mining Act offers the gold and other mineral wealth of our land to foreign mining corporations. Thereby, communities of indigenous peoples are evicted from their ancestral domain and Philippine waters become polluted with the dumping of toxic mine tailings. While through the VFA, foreign military are given criminal immunity, tax exemptions and other extra-territorial rights while poor Filipinos are left to remain homeless, landless and denied of basic rights in their own country. All in favor of foreign monopolies, 100% foreign ownership over land, public utilities, media outfits and other sectors of the economy that must be in the hands of the Filipinos, 100% repatriation of profits, duty-free importation of foreign goods, the granting of tax exemptions and other special privileges to foreign investors, are among the anti-poor and unconstitutional schemes of Malacañang that Estrada wants to justify through the CONCORDE. Ironically, greater poverty and economic displacement are suffered by the common people while foreign and local monopolies are able to extract greater profits from the exploitation of Philippine patrimony. In this light, the SCMP joins the Church and people's organizations in resisting the government's sell-out of Phlippine economy and patrimony through Estrada's Charter change (Cha-cha). To celebrate and fulfill the Biblical Jubilee, we are all challenged by the liberating God to "keep holy the fiftieth year and proclaim freedom to all inhabitants of the land." (Leviticus 25). The SCMP urges the Filipino youth to join the people in the August 20 rally against Charter change (Cha-cha). It is a Christian imperative to oppose the Charter change (Cha-cha) as this contradicts the message of Jubilee. The Filipino people must therefore struggle for the abrogation of economic policies that further strengthen the foreign stranglehold over Philippine economy and patrimony.# |
|