The Battlecry for Competitive Engagement

Monday, 21 February 2011 06:52

Written by Aaron Benedict De Leon

“To achieve sustainable development, we must commit ourselves to competitive engagement.”

In a recent study by the Asian Institute of Management, the “Philippines ranked 39th among 58 countries—in the 2010 World Competitive Yearbook (WCY), but remained the least competitive of the 13 economies in the Asia-Pacific region that were included in the study.” We remain behind Singapore (1st), Hong Kong (2nd), Taiwan (8th), Malaysia (10th), China (18th), Thailand (26th), and Indonesia (35th).

Having presented these figures, I do not need to echo more on the numerous challenges and problems we are confronted with and I certainly will not express further negativity for the uncertain future that lies ahead. And I hope I am not just one in thinking that we must turn our attention towards focusing on what can be done in order to make our lives better off, rather than dwelling on things which have failed us for many years.

The youth cannot be dependent on the government or even in school to feed them with the solutions they will be inheriting in the future, because they themselves have failed with what had become of our country now.

This is a perfect time for all of us to circumspect and to reassess ourselves, the youth, as individuals and collectively as Filipinos.

The empirical data which shows the State of Competitiveness of our country, many would argue, perhaps is more of a government responsibility, but the problem with that argument is that, who makes them responsible, accountable to their actions? Shouldn’t it be the youth? Shouldn’t it be a characteristic of the youth to be vigilant, exercise more prudence, to be critical and to be idealistic about the state of our government and economy? Do we want to inherit and be eaten up by the system that we hate if we don’t think and act now?

Isn’t it that the youth is naturally demanding, demanding for a right to be heard at home, demanding to be heard and listened to by school officials, demanding to have all the available technology in his possession?

That very nature of ours is what should drive us to make the government competitive, because our very nature tells us that we should own everything that is owed to us. We demand excellence in service, thus we must channel that nature into something which can collectively benefit us all.

This is where engagement comes in, a little sacrifice is needed and a little time is required. Online journalism is a tool for all of us to be engaged, but it is not the end all of youth engagement in our country.

Our youth is made up of comparatively learned and creative people, and with adequate technology to our disposal, we cannot allow ourselves to be growth laggard, poor and remain content with our present situation.

In order to improve economic performance in the country, the youth must take the lead in ensuring that they will be ready to combat the challenges of the modern economy. We have to subject Congress, as an organized network of civil society entities, to provide the adequate resources needed for us to be competitive with our neighbors. We must pressure the CHED and the DepEd to organize a mechanism to reduce jobs mismatch and to foster public-private partnerships to avoid such incidence, to plan educational outcomes to support the need for an overall blueprint in education policy. This can only be achieved through an organized effort of all ideological movements/organizations and other non-government institutions.

In order to improve government efficiency, we must not only have the power to be vigilant, but to lobby measures that will enable and ennoble the lives of our public servants, to reduce corruption in government. Government service is a noble profession, and the youth must realize the value of putting in the necessary institutional changes so that when it is their turn to take the helms of office, the system is capable of influencing good behavior amongst its stakeholders. Measures like the Freedom of Information Bill should be supported, not just in hush tones, but in terms of generating mass support for it, through community information and awareness drives. People have to realize the value and the importance of these measures to their own, and the youth, widely considered as the most politically unadulterated sector of society, can lay claim to a clean and honest to goodness intention in helping our people.

In order to improve infrastructure and business efficiency, the youth must endeavor to make the government realize the need to ease the conditions for business here in the country, which includes measures to continuously develop inter-logistical systems, through land see and air and to improve the mobility of economic agents through ease in acquisition of necessary working permits (for both individuals and companies). Our youth must think in savvy terms, and must go beyond the thinking that the world will always babysit them with ideas and concepts. This can be achieved further once members of the youth sector have acquired the capability to run for public office, and re-engineer the systems of our bureaucracy.

We have demanded excellence for the early years of our life, and we must never be content in this mired situation we are currently in. We must submit all government stakeholders to political pressure, dialogue and unending lobbying in pursuit of the necessary reforms in governance.

We must show the older generation that we are ready to compete with their traditional views, and that we are capable of defending them, not to antagonize them, but rather to build consensus amongst all of us, that indeed, these reform measures are necessary for the country.

We cannot simply be confined by our limitations set by the older generation’s definition; we must remove the restrictions which hinder us from helping this country in larger context.

We cannot just sit back, relax and enjoy just like we are watching a national telenovela, but we must become actors, storytellers and producers of new ideas and of new thoughts.

We have to become part of the solution, have the ability to organize ourselves into groups, think and act strategically to ensure the best possible future for ourselves and our countrymen.

And most importantly, we need to preserve and sustain our competitive nature, not just for our generation and not just for ourselves, but as stewards of a stable government and economy for the forthcoming generation.

Indeed, the youth, by nature and by resolve, can be the drivers of Philippine Competitiveness, in years and decades to come.

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