A student paper's courageous stand versus the RH bill

The recent editorial of DMMAxim, the official Student Publication of DMMA College of Southern Philippines (source):

“The long-term solution”

Despite the condemnation of some religious sectors, the congress has been speeding up the passage of the“Reproductive Health Bill” or otherwise known as the “Responsible Parenthood Bill” as they stand on their objective to provide an immediate solution to the exploding population of our country which is pointed out to be the root cause of poverty.

Part of the content of the bill is the prevention of the widely spread sexually transmitted disease, information on sex and reproduction, unwanted pregnancy, and other reproductive health concerns through the use of modern contraceptive methods.

People might wonder, however, what the real drive of the bills.  As it has been observed, anyone today can freely purchase a condom and other forms of contraception whether in a pharmacy or in a convenience store. In fact, some parents have been using condoms and other forms of contraception in order to space the birth of their children. Also, some of the youth today who engaged in pre-marital sex are already knowledgeable about these. On the other hand, some religious sectors have already recommended an alternative way in controlling population which does not violate the tenets of the church, such as the existing family planning program which uses natural and scientific knowledge and methods.

Taking these into consideration would lead to the question: Is the population of our country really the root cause of poverty?

A huge part of our population belongs to the ranks of the Overseas Filipino Workers (OFW). In the year 2009, remittances from the OFW sector reached a record of US$ 16.4 Billion which is equivalent to 10 percent of the gross domestic product of our country that year. If these remittances were only used appropriately for the people, it would have been of great help, if not totally address, poverty.

What really happens in the Philippines is a grave unequal distribution of wealth. The rich gets richer, while the poor gets poorer and remain vulnerable, while the powerful politicians have a stranglehold control over the Philippine government. When they should be formulating resolutions to solve the poverty, they keep on grabbing the resources left from our treasury. At the end of the day, they fail to deliver what the people really need.

Indeed, RH bill cannot be placed as an address to our countless problems. The rising poverty rate cannot be blamed on the population, but on the corruption that takes place in the high offices of our government. What our lawmakers have been doing right now is formulating an instant solution to poverty without addressing the root cause of it. If our lawmakers are sincere enough in addressing this problem, then they must instead strengthen our laws on corruption cases to prevent some of our corrupt officials from dipping their dirty fingers into the nation’s coffers. Only by then can genuine change and long-term solutions come into existence.