Kalbaryo
Kalbaryo
Posted 10:52pm (Mla time) Jan 31, 2005
By Conrado de Quiros
Inquirer News Service
Editor's Note: Published on page A12 of the February 01, 2005 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer.
I WAS one of those who applauded what Darwin Calvario did, and I am happy that he has reaped the rewards of his honesty. Calvario is the tricycle driver from Gen. Santos City whose deed has now become part of urban legend, the legend of cab/ jeepney/ tricycle drivers and post office clerks returning money they find in their premises.
Calvario's case is a little more dramatic. Not least because of his name, which as our correspondent, Aquiles Zonio noted, is cruelly apt. Calvario lives a life of Calvary: he is as poor as a church (or mosque?) mouse and cannot afford an operation for his two-year-old son who suffers from an anus that isn't open. The results of that affliction you see in the picture that appeared on page 6 of our Saturday issue: His belly is bloated.
One day a couple of weeks ago, Fate dropped on Calvario a magnificent gift. It took the form of a bag he found on his tricycle containing P270,000 in checks and P26,000 in cash. The money could easily pay for the operation and leave something extra for him and his family. His fellow tricycle drivers advised him not to look a gift horse in the mouth and use the money to good purpose. But Calvario refused. Against the prodding of his fellows and the pounding of his needs, he decided to seek out the identity of Fate.
Next day, he went to Radyo Bombo to report it. And soon enough, Fate came rushing in in the form of Sarah Joe, a businesswoman. The grateful Joe immediately gave Calvario P6,000 and a sack of rice.
Calvario's honesty also did not go unnoticed by the wider public, and soon enough well-wishes, and more importantly cash and tangible rewards, began streaming his way. The mayor pledged to pay for his son's operation, but a doctor topped this by saying he would do the operation for free. The PCSO, GMA Network's Kapuso Foundation and ABS-CBN's Bantay Bata all dropped by and expressed their willingness to help. Truly, one good deed deserves another.
What drove Calvario's story home to me was that at the time it was reported, something else was on our front page that played out as stark contrast. While Calvario was desperately trying to return money he himself badly needed, other people were desperately trying to steal money they did not particularly need. That was the bill to raise the value-added tax (VAT) from 10 percent to 12 percent, which Congress had just passed and was being protested by various groups in the streets. Malacañang itself was busy defending it, saying the new VAT would not affect the poor, only the rich and middle class.
My reason for saying the people who were desperately mounting this theft did not particularly need this money comes from two things.
The first is that no new taxes are needed. All government has to do to raise more money is collect taxes right. The booksellers who are protesting the inclusion of books in VAT have pointed this out: "In 2003, the National Tax Research Center estimated a loss of P127 billion a year from uncollected taxes and VAT from 1998-2002, or a total of P635 billion over five years. In 2002, a Department of Finance study estimated an even larger loss of P243 billion a year if uncollected excise, documentary stamp, interest withholding, fringe benefits, gross receipts and insurance taxes were included. Of the NTRC yearly loss estimate, P41.6 billion, one-third of uncollected taxes, was from uncollected VAT. "
What this means is that the principle behind the new VAT is simply that if you can't collect from the rich, you might as well shake down the poor (and middle class). It's Robin Hood -- in reverse.
The second reason is more patent. The new taxes will not go to improve the plight of the country, it will go to improve the fortunes of public officials, not the least of them the members of Congress who rushed to approve it. As a friend of mine who works in Congress told me recently, the place has become a piggery, populated by swine who can only think pork. In the past, representatives at least made the pretense of justifying appropriation. These days, they do not bother, they just grab everything they can lay their hands on. It's sheer effrontery ("garapalan na"), he said. My friend was particularly worried that at the rate congressmen and other officials were depreciating virtue, which was faster than the peso, the public might take it into its head to stop paying taxes.
Indeed, the way things are, government should be thanking its lucky stars Filipinos are still paying taxes. The last thing it should be thinking of is new ways to fleece them. Remember the phrase, "tama na, sobra na"? The third part is, "palitan na."
Frankly, I don't know why we like to think the poor are naturally lazy and dishonest, which is why they are poor, when this country resolutely shows the opposite is true. The rich are so, which is why they are rich.
If Calvario had not returned the money and been found out, which was more than likely since spending for an operation isn't exactly inconspicuous, he would have been called a thief or a crook, and sent to jail for God, or the hanging judge, knows how long. Yet a group of officials steals several billion pesos from the taxpayers to give to a fly-by-night company to computerize balloting, and the computerization never takes place, and we do not call them crooks, we call them the Comelec. And reward them by giving them more powers to supervise “mano-mano” [manual] counting, and thereby to cheat in addition to stealing. A group of officials steals more billions from the taxpayers by making deals with tycoons and big corporations, and we do not call them thieves, we call them the Bureau of Internal Revenue. And reward them by giving them more powers to collect from the poor, thereby also covering up their inefficiency and crookedness.
Easy to see who's the Kalbaryo ng Bayan.
Posted 10:52pm (Mla time) Jan 31, 2005
By Conrado de Quiros
Inquirer News Service
Editor's Note: Published on page A12 of the February 01, 2005 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer.
I WAS one of those who applauded what Darwin Calvario did, and I am happy that he has reaped the rewards of his honesty. Calvario is the tricycle driver from Gen. Santos City whose deed has now become part of urban legend, the legend of cab/ jeepney/ tricycle drivers and post office clerks returning money they find in their premises.
Calvario's case is a little more dramatic. Not least because of his name, which as our correspondent, Aquiles Zonio noted, is cruelly apt. Calvario lives a life of Calvary: he is as poor as a church (or mosque?) mouse and cannot afford an operation for his two-year-old son who suffers from an anus that isn't open. The results of that affliction you see in the picture that appeared on page 6 of our Saturday issue: His belly is bloated.
One day a couple of weeks ago, Fate dropped on Calvario a magnificent gift. It took the form of a bag he found on his tricycle containing P270,000 in checks and P26,000 in cash. The money could easily pay for the operation and leave something extra for him and his family. His fellow tricycle drivers advised him not to look a gift horse in the mouth and use the money to good purpose. But Calvario refused. Against the prodding of his fellows and the pounding of his needs, he decided to seek out the identity of Fate.
Next day, he went to Radyo Bombo to report it. And soon enough, Fate came rushing in in the form of Sarah Joe, a businesswoman. The grateful Joe immediately gave Calvario P6,000 and a sack of rice.
Calvario's honesty also did not go unnoticed by the wider public, and soon enough well-wishes, and more importantly cash and tangible rewards, began streaming his way. The mayor pledged to pay for his son's operation, but a doctor topped this by saying he would do the operation for free. The PCSO, GMA Network's Kapuso Foundation and ABS-CBN's Bantay Bata all dropped by and expressed their willingness to help. Truly, one good deed deserves another.
What drove Calvario's story home to me was that at the time it was reported, something else was on our front page that played out as stark contrast. While Calvario was desperately trying to return money he himself badly needed, other people were desperately trying to steal money they did not particularly need. That was the bill to raise the value-added tax (VAT) from 10 percent to 12 percent, which Congress had just passed and was being protested by various groups in the streets. Malacañang itself was busy defending it, saying the new VAT would not affect the poor, only the rich and middle class.
My reason for saying the people who were desperately mounting this theft did not particularly need this money comes from two things.
The first is that no new taxes are needed. All government has to do to raise more money is collect taxes right. The booksellers who are protesting the inclusion of books in VAT have pointed this out: "In 2003, the National Tax Research Center estimated a loss of P127 billion a year from uncollected taxes and VAT from 1998-2002, or a total of P635 billion over five years. In 2002, a Department of Finance study estimated an even larger loss of P243 billion a year if uncollected excise, documentary stamp, interest withholding, fringe benefits, gross receipts and insurance taxes were included. Of the NTRC yearly loss estimate, P41.6 billion, one-third of uncollected taxes, was from uncollected VAT. "
What this means is that the principle behind the new VAT is simply that if you can't collect from the rich, you might as well shake down the poor (and middle class). It's Robin Hood -- in reverse.
The second reason is more patent. The new taxes will not go to improve the plight of the country, it will go to improve the fortunes of public officials, not the least of them the members of Congress who rushed to approve it. As a friend of mine who works in Congress told me recently, the place has become a piggery, populated by swine who can only think pork. In the past, representatives at least made the pretense of justifying appropriation. These days, they do not bother, they just grab everything they can lay their hands on. It's sheer effrontery ("garapalan na"), he said. My friend was particularly worried that at the rate congressmen and other officials were depreciating virtue, which was faster than the peso, the public might take it into its head to stop paying taxes.
Indeed, the way things are, government should be thanking its lucky stars Filipinos are still paying taxes. The last thing it should be thinking of is new ways to fleece them. Remember the phrase, "tama na, sobra na"? The third part is, "palitan na."
Frankly, I don't know why we like to think the poor are naturally lazy and dishonest, which is why they are poor, when this country resolutely shows the opposite is true. The rich are so, which is why they are rich.
If Calvario had not returned the money and been found out, which was more than likely since spending for an operation isn't exactly inconspicuous, he would have been called a thief or a crook, and sent to jail for God, or the hanging judge, knows how long. Yet a group of officials steals several billion pesos from the taxpayers to give to a fly-by-night company to computerize balloting, and the computerization never takes place, and we do not call them crooks, we call them the Comelec. And reward them by giving them more powers to supervise “mano-mano” [manual] counting, and thereby to cheat in addition to stealing. A group of officials steals more billions from the taxpayers by making deals with tycoons and big corporations, and we do not call them thieves, we call them the Bureau of Internal Revenue. And reward them by giving them more powers to collect from the poor, thereby also covering up their inefficiency and crookedness.
Easy to see who's the Kalbaryo ng Bayan.
posted by Dante at 2:40 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home