The country’s largest labor group urged President Aquino to convene a National Summit, which will discuss solutions for national economic problems, particularly the imminent water shortage next summer.
In a statement, Trade Union Congress of Philippines (TUCP) Executive Director Luis Corral said other issues which should also be included in the proposed meeting would be the looming power shortage, public transportation woes, and the still significantly high unemployment rate in the country.
“Aquino should get down to the task at hand, creating decent jobs and squelching the deficit in power, water and mass transport,” Corral said.
TUCP issued the statement yesterday amid the apparent lack of government preparation for the imminent calamity.
“The high officialdom is playing deaf to the cries of the National Water and Resources Board (NWRB) that El Niño threatens our water supply for drinking purposes, agricultural use and electricity generation,” TUCP spokesperson Alan Tanjusay said.
Water concessionaires earlier warned they may resort to water rationing by next year as the levels in the Angat, which supplies the water in Metro Manila, is expected to further decline with the onset of the El Niño weather phenomenon before the end of 2014.
“The TUCP believes that all sectors of society will rally behind the President once he takes the cudgels for the real issues that plague the country today,” he said.
Corral said the proposed summit would yield better recommendations compared to some of his advisers from the organization, which are “proxy poor, the proxy peasant and the proxy marginalized” as well as those, who want to “lead the country from behind.”
“We appeal to the President not to be distracted by those who wish to waylay economic gains and not to be hijacked by those who wish to take advantage of him when too much of his political capital is being wasted in the legal equivalent of saloon brawls,” Corral said. - Manila Bulletin / Yahoo
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