New party eyes major reforms

MANILA, Philippines–A new political party formed by a concerned group of ordinary citizens is pushing for large-scale reforms aimed primarily at eradicating poverty in the country where more than 50 percent of the population consider themselves poor.

“Finding the solution to this long-term problem has now become very urgent. Poverty still remains unacceptably extensive,” Benjamin Punongbayan, chair of the new national party Buklod, noted. “It has now become necessary for ordinary citizens to become involved in national political affairs.”

Punongbayan, founder of the top auditing firm Punongbayan & Araullo, spearheaded Buklod’s formation due to the clear continuing failure of the past and present governments to uplift the economy, particularly their inability to reduce substantially the extensive spread of poverty.

Buklod aims to provide direct state intervention to deal with this problem in two major ways. One is to provide reasonable assurance that children of poor parents finish high school and thereby, break the cycle of poverty.

Buklod plans to do this by providing free meals and transportation to these children and using moral suasion on parents to keep their children in school using available means.

The other major thrust is to provide poor families a piece of land for free, where they can build a home a la Gawad Kalinga with government financial assistance.