The political perils of the ‘4Ps’

TENS OF thousands of new personnel hired, trained, supervised, and deployed all over the country by the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD). An elaborate system to select beneficiaries, another to monitor their compliance to program conditions, and still another system for grievance redress. An organizational structure that ensures all cash grants will go from DSWD’s head office straight to the beneficiaries’ special Land Bank accounts. All these, says the DSWD, are necessary precautions to shield the Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) Program from political interference.

These prerequisites might seem like an administrative nightmare, perhaps even a bit over-the-top, for just one program. And yet, all these measures still failed to keep a number of politicians from attempting to appropriate the CCT – also called Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps) – as their own.

This tendency by local politicians was particularly pronounced during the run-up to the May 10, 2010 national and local elections, says 4Ps public relations officer Pamela Caperina-Susara. There were candidates, she says, who tried to sway CCT beneficiaries to vote in their favor, citing removal from the program as a repercussion for unfavorable votes. Still other political wannabes reportedly used the program’s monthly seminars for CCT parents as a venue for campaign sorties. All these prompted DSWD to stop CCT-related activities at the time, says Susara.

In truth, this attitude is merely a reflection of the system of local patronage that the poor and local politicians have long been used to. “The beneficiaries, who are at the bottom 20 percent of the population, used to go to authorities to tide them over,” explains DSWD Secretary Corazon ‘Dinky’ Soliman. She says this system has kept the poor perennially indebted – literally and figuratively – to politicians.

With the introduction of the CCT (which give selected poorest residents in a municipality monthly cash subsidies of up to P1,400) the poorest voters can now cease being entirely dependent on politicians during lean periods and emergencies. In effect, the CCT could put an end to the system of local patronage. At least that’s what DSWD says. In any case, Soliman says that local politicians, who have suddenly found their source of power taken away from them, are now seeking other ways to have the program somehow attributed to them.

“In that sense,” says Soliman, “we’re very open to saying, ‘This is a national program, everyone is welcome to help.'”

Soliman herself deals with unwieldy local government officials or local chief executives. “It’s really patiently explaining why and what this program is about and assuring them that it’s to their interest to support this program,” she says.

That does not work all the time though. Soliman herself says that her agency had to pull out some of its staff from certain parts of Mindanao because they were receiving death threats from local bosses.

Meanwhile, interviews with mayors from different municipalities in Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao reveal different viewpoints of local chief executives on the CCT.

Video by Ojie Sarmiento

There are those like Maigo, Lanao del Norte Mayor Rafael C. Rizalda who enthusiastically welcome the program.

Others, however, consider the CCT a doleout, like Cabugao, Ilocos Sur Mayor Edgardo S. Cobangbang Jr. who would rather have livelihood programs than the CCT.

Magdiwang, Romblon Mayor Ibarra R. Manzala, meanwhile, has mixed feelings about the CCT. On the one hand, he says that the CCT is an important anti-poverty instrument if both the government and the beneficiaries would do their part. On the other hand, he says that the national government should not ask his local government unit – a fifth-class municipality – for any counterpart to keep the program running.

PCIJ also found similarly mixed views from mayors whose municipalities were not included in the CCT. Dolores, Eastern Samar Mayor Emiliana P. Vilcarillo and Santa Lucia, Ilocos Sur Mayor Estrella Hernandez both say they want their constituents to be included in the program. But for Garcia-Hernandez, Bohol Mayor Miguelito B. Galendez, universal Philhealth coverage for his constituents would be more beneficial than the “tiny” amounts that they will get from the CCT. – PCIJ, June 2011