He has yet to assume office on June 30, but presumptive President Rodrigo “Digong” Duterte is already butting heads with the Catholic church, the largest religious sect in the country.
On Monday, Duterte announced that he wants to limit the number of children per family.
In an article on GMA News, Duterte said he is ready to defy the belief of the Catholic Church. Here are the details taken from GMA’s article
“I’m a Christian, but I’m a realist so we have to do something with our overpopulation. I will defy the opinion or the belief of the Church,” the tough-talking Davao Mayor said.
A day earlier, Duterte had accused the Catholic Church of being one of the most “hypocritical institutions” in the county, calling corrupt church leaders “sons of whores”.
The policy, he told reporters, will be under the government’s family planning program, which Duterte also wishes to expand.
“I only want three children for every family,” Duterte also said.
But Duterte’s stand on family planning is not the only conflict he has with the Catholic Church. Duterte also wishes to reinstate the death penalty, and expand reproductive health services through the distribution of free contraception.
Meanwhile, Monsignor Oliver Mendoza, spokesperson for the Archdiocese of Lingayen, said the Church respects Duterte’s opinion, but would continue to oppose policies that are against church teachings.
RH law sees the light of dawn
Despite its enactment in 2012, the Reproductive Health Law or the Responsible Parenthood Act has not been implemented adequately, especially with the Php 1 B budget cut for RH services in 2015.
But the law has taken a great stride with the promise of support from the Duterte administration. and is said to be aggressively implemented once Duterte assumes the presidency.
According to a report in the Manila Bulletin, Ernesto Pernia, incoming Chief of the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA), said Duterte will implement the said law as part of his economic agenda.
“We are determined to speed up the implementation of the Reproductive Health Law, which is now the ninth component of the incoming administration’s economic agenda,” Pernia said, stressing that population management can help in poverty reduction.
Next: Duterte’s economic agenda
Economic policy
According to an article by Jess Diaz on the Philippine Star, incoming Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez,the new administration’s economic agenda will include, to:
• Continue and maintain the current macroeconomic policies of the Aquino government;
• Index income tax rates to inflation;
• Accelerate infrastructure spending by addressing bottlenecks in the public-private partnership program;
• Ensure attractiveness of the Philippines to foreign direct investments by addressing the restrictive economic provisions of the Constitution;
• Pursue genuine agriculture and rural development by providing support services to farmers;
• Address bottlenecks in land administration;
• Expand the conditional cash transfer program;
• Strengthen basic education and provide scholarships for college students.
Read: More than 3.28 million Filipino women are jobless or underemployed
Next: A vicious cycle of lack of RH services, hunger, and poverty
A vicious cycle of lack of RH services, hunger, and poverty
Based on data from the Commission on Population, contraceptive prevalence rate (CPR) rose from 39 percent in 2012 to 46 percent in 2014. However, the Department of Health says seven million Filipino women still have unmet needs for family planning services.
But aside from the inaccessibility of reproductive health services that limit the woman’s ability to control the number of children she has, Filipino women also have to contend with unstable jobs and low wages, making it even more difficult to feed her family.
Read: RH Panindigan! 7 million Filipinas have unmet family planning needs
According to the CWR, more than 1.03 million women remain unemployed, while 2.25 million are underemployed.
In addition, CWR revealed there are currently 15.29 million employed women, of which only 55% or 8.4 million are wage and salary workers. A big majority of female wage and salary workers are service workers (1.64 million). Laborers and unskilled workers account for 2.64 million.
Aside from unstable jobs, wages also remain low. In the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), the region with the highest poverty incidence, the daily minimum wage ranges from PhP222.00 to PhP250.00 only–hardly enough to feed a family of five.
While a recent Social Weather Stations survey showed that the 2015 average hunger rate was lowest in 2004 at 13.4 %, the World Food Program Survey on Food and Nutrition Security revealed that 67% of Filipinos in the provinces surveyed from August to September 2015 said they augment their daily food requirement through credit extended by the nearest sari-sari stores in their areas, and that their usual meal consists of bread or instant noodles. The study also revealed that one-fourth of those surveyed said they experienced hunger every month.
In 2015, the SWS noted that 36% of families in the country still feel hungry. The 8th National Nutrition Survey also showed that one out of ten Filipinos suffer from chronic energy deficiency, and 19.9% of children were underweight.
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