A tycoon or CEO as president?

Our business editor, Iris Gonzales, wrote a thought-provoking piece in her Op-Ed column the other week that wondered if a business tycoon or CEO can be a better future president of our country than the crop of plundering politicians we now have.

- BOO CHANCO

I have thought about that too. There are pros and cons.

True, we need someone with good managerial skills to run our country and with the technical expertise to navigate the perils of the current world economy and geopolitical realities. Also important, probably more important than those two qualities, is possession of true love of country above self-interest and the ability to empathize with the miseries of the poor among us.

Then again, we could get a businessman who has never held a government post like Donald Trump. We should be very careful what we wish for.

My problem with Filipino business tycoons and corporate CEOs is their general detachment to the pains of common people. They are the elite of society with a rent-seeking attitude vis-à-vis their relationship with the government. They are not real risk takers. Many have chosen the property sector because this has proven to be a sure thing. Or be cronies of the Malacañang tenant.

So-called Filipino industrialists of the 50s, 60s and 70s were happy to produce overpriced but substandard products protected by high tariff and non-tariff barriers. No one cared to manufacture products that could compete in the export market. This is why our economy was surpassed by war-torn South Korea and later by another war-torn country, Vietnam.

Our business elite are only focused on assuring what one of them calls, his fiduciary responsibility to his stockholders.

The only Filipino enterprise that flew the Filipino flag abroad was SGV of Washington SyCip whose accounting firm was internationally recognized. The first OFWs were SGV staff assigned abroad.