Grim scenario

By Artchil B. Fernandez

One week to go before hell breaks loose. The modified enhanced community quarantine (MECQ) in NCR, Laguna, and Cebu will end on May 31, 2020 while areas under modified general community quarantine (MGCQ) will no longer be in quarantine (unless extended by the government). What awaits the nation under the new normal after being placed in one of the longest if not the longest lockdown in the world? Let us first look at what the government did in the last 75 days.

Du30 delayed action more than a month after the country had its first case of COVID-19.  He was initially dismissive of the problem declaring the virus will just fade away aside from threatening to slap the micro-organism. Forced to act when COVID-19 became a global pandemic, Du30’s immediate response is militarist, viewing the problem as a national security issue than a complex health-social-environmental problem.

Consistent with his fervent belief that force is the answer to all problems, Du30 put the nation under total lockdown, sugarcoating it as enhanced community quarantine. Former generals are in charge of the government task force to deal with the pandemic and the police and the military were mobilized to enforce the lockdown. Lack of guidelines and incoherent policy in the early imposition of the lockdown led to chaos and mass arrest of violators. Threats to shoot violators highlighted the militarist solution.

To concretize the militarist approach to pandemic, Du30 asked emergency power which Congress immediately granted, albeit wilted. Included in the emergency package is a budget of P275 billion to bolster the administration’s war chest against COVID-19.

Du30 also provided Filipinos with weekly midnight shows which he used as a platform for his frustrated stand-up comedian dream. While his performance is comical but wanting, it is neither entertaining nor amusing. He later transferred his show in the morning slot but failed to improve the ratings with his worsening performance.

So far the only notable action of the Du30 administration is the distribution of money to households under the Social Amelioration Program (SAP). But even this is riddled with numerous problems. Not all poor households were given the amount and those who did not qualify got the money. The target date (April 30) to complete the first tranche distribution was not met and until now with the lockdown about to end, the distribution is less than 90% done. The second tranche is not even on the horizon when the SAP money is supposed to be distributed during the lockdown to help the poor cope with the harsh quarantine. This illustrates the incompetence of the Du30 administration.

After more than two months, Du30 has nothing substantial to show to the Filipino people how to deal or handle the COVID-19 pandemic. There is no comprehensive and overarching strategy or plan or program in the fight against COVID-19 in the months and years ahead. Experts warned about the second and third waves which are deadlier as shown by the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic.

Aside from issuing the standard protocol – wear a mask, maintain physical distancing and hand washing, nothing of significance has been produced by the Du30 administration in the last two months and a half. It miserably failed in its target to test 8,000 people daily of the virus by the end of April and its recent claim that it achieved this is suspect.

Worst for the Filipino people, the Du30 administration abandoned its plan of mass testing and instead left it to the private sector to do the job. In effect, the Du30 administration has surrendered and given-up the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. Du30’s flight to Davao City from the plague-ravaged NCR best illustrates his administration’s abandonment of the Filipino people. Filipinos are now on their own.

To justify its laziness to do the job, the Du30 administration claimed no country in the world has done mass testing, equating it with testing the whole population. This is an absurd argument; a gross distortion of what mass testing is. Mass testing is testing people suspected of carrying the virus, testing frontliners, and testing people in the community affected by COVID-19. Trace, test, and treat, the standard approach to the pandemic is only possible when there is mass testing. It is this most important component of pandemic handling that the Du30 administration has discarded.

Instead of crafting a comprehensive plan to guide the nation in the post-lockdown setting, the Du30 administration is busy cracking down on dissent. Citizens posting critical comments against Du30 in social media were picked up by the NBI. Their basic legal and constitutional rights were disregarded by the arresting agents, again highlighting the militarist approach to the pandemic.

What awaits the nation after the lockdown is a grim scenario. The laziness, incompetence, and failure of the Du30 administration to make the necessary preparations after the lockdown is lifted are fatal to Filipinos. The only response of Du30 to the pandemic is intimidating people. Issuing threats is the official mantra of his administration.

Compounding the bleak situation is the inevitable economic crisis that will hit the nation in the coming months. The economy is expected to contract, 3 percent of the GDP. This is the worst shrinking of the economy since the eve of the downfall of the Marcos dictatorship. Economic hardship looms as the economy crash.

Given the Du30 administration’s inability to handle the COVID-19 pandemic due to lack of foresight and planning, gross incompetence, and plain inutility, its only recourse to deal with the deteriorating situation is force. Prior negligence will cripple the Du30 administration’s ability to deal with the surge of the pandemic in the coming months and will push it to resort to threat, intimidation, and violence.

Death, hunger, and repression, these are what await Filipinos in the post-lockdown Philippines.  It is a bleak, gloomy, and terrifying scenario.