Filipino president puts country on track toward success

Daniel Escurel Occeno

I decided to look up more information on the son of a former woman president after Noynoy Aquino announced he was running for president of the Republic of the Philippines. The newspapers already had candid interviews by the time I found myself in the local public library.

What I read, I automatically assumed he would not win because he was against getting married and having children in the future, if I remembered the article accurately.

I told my cousin that I did not expect Aquino to win when the campaign trail became heated with plenty of competitors. The choices for president were an assortment of men who had been married and some known to like more than one woman, so how was Aquino going to win?

The Filipino people wanted a stable married man and virility?

I told several people Aquino will win the Catholic priest demographic, but I doubted the family-oriented voters would vote for Aquino. I even told my cousin that he should ask Kris Aquino — movie star, game show host and the sister of Noynoy — to have single women be seen with her brother, at least to get front-page pictures and photo opportunities for television.

His opponents will label him a homosexual just based on newspaper accounts that assumed he does not like women and does not care for children. He will not win the presidency, I thought.

I was wrong.

With all of Asia having an elderly population problem, the Philippines have a 25-year-old-and-under explosion. The younger generations even did a campaign registration blitz before the election to increase their demographic strength of electing their chosen president.

The young people in the Philippines are opting to be single with no religion. They are tired of the poverty of the country and the empty promises with false hopes of the Catholic Church encouraging the priesthood or marriage — even without a job to support a family — so the children capable of voting turned to Aquino even though he was middle-aged; he is one of them. He is still single, promising job creation for the majority of the populous.

I even voted for him, and not because I am still single. I voted for him because he and his family campaigned in my province, considered the poorest province in all of the 7,107 islands. He campaigned in the province the last few days, right before the election and it impressed me because many in the capital city believed he would just develop Metro Manila.

Before he journeyed to New York City to attend the Millennium Challenge meetings on ending world poverty by 2015, a write-up of Noynoy Aquino in the newspapers included that the Philippines is already ending its poverty. The archipelago might be ahead of the schedule set by the United Nations.

While in New York City, somebody treated him to a nice lunch or dinner instead of Aquino expecting to eat only hot dogs from the street vendors of Manhattan. Things are really getting better. He should not overdue the self-imposed frugalness.

He should accept gifts. Filipino Catholic bishops accept gifts, and we believe they are single and have no woman to cook for them.

One of Aquino’s goals is to meet with investors to encourage creating jobs in the Philippines.

Try to keep in mind that the younger generation elected Aquino. The working class of 25 years old and under does not really want an industrial nation like Japan or South Korea, but would welcome jobs from the wealthy Filipino-American communities in the United States.

Mall developments in the smaller townships with the population for the smaller provinces, micro-financing and high-tech software developments — not necessarily hardware — are a few of my recommendations.

The middle class is developing but not for a home computer industry. Build-on-demand accommodates the growth.

Solar power to meet the future demand on energy would be strongly suggested, with personal electric automobile manufacturing when the product to sell does not destroy the environment.

Electromagnetic railway trains for Luzon and Mindanao would be another idea because the younger generations do not really want an automobile industry but they need affordable mass transportation to progress that motorcycles and 10-speed bicycles will not be able to accommodate.