Rich politicians, poor people

I came across a meme on Facebook that said: "The Philippines is one of the poorest countries but with the wealthiest government officials."

- BOO CHANCO

Okay, we aren't dirt poor like Haiti or some countries in Africa.

Our economic managers insist we will be an upper middle-income country next year and ready to give up our ODA privileges.

But a recent SWS survey revealed that about 60 percent of Filipinos think they are poor. And that's not because they want a Ferrari and can't have it. They want food on the table and almost 50 percent say they are food poor and another 17 percent say they are borderline food poor. Our macroeconomic numbers cover the gross inequality in our society which explains why our leaders are rich and most people are poor.

The point of the meme is more about how our rich political leaders have failed to reduce the number of poor people through the years. The other point has to do with how our politicians became rich, in the first place. Short answer: corruption. The resources of the nation have been dissipated through the years by political leaders who fatten their wallets as our economy sunk while our regional peers became tigers.

There is a mini-documentary on YouTube that asks why the Philippines remains poor in a region of tiger economies. Our problem, the documentary suggested, is that we have been electing lousy leaders. They failed to use our abundant resources to lift our economy and our people out of poverty. Then it says we have also been electing leaders that are horribly corrupt. Even politicians with corruption cases are eligible to run for public office. And they win too.