Good deeds and performance in office are investments that politicians must sow if one intends to stay in political power. People will always remember the good things that politicians deliver to them, especially those that redound to the improvement of their lives and their communities. Those who are serious in serving the people will keep working for every work counts as seeds that will be nurtured in the hearts and minds of a grateful electorate. Every good deed is a campaign statement that reminds the people to continue supporting the politician who works and delivers the needs of the constituents.

This explains why politicians would shamelessly plaster their faces and banner their names in grabbing credit for projects that are in truth funded by the money of the taxpayers. Having their names painted all over, particularly on signboards of government projects, are their way of investing credit for their political future. The gullible lot among our voters would believe that projects are truly given out of the efforts and kindness of their local politicians. These projects are readily cited and claimed as performance of politicians who are seeking reelection. The neophytes and aspiring pretenders to elective office also put investments by small projects that will introduce their good intentions to the people.

In some instances however, projects and performance do not create an imprint in the consciousness of the voters. The need to remind the voters of the good deeds and accomplishment is always a must if the politician wants to be voted into office. Those signboards and streamers had to last for a long period if only to serve as constant reminder about the politicians who shamelessly claim credit for it. Others resort into various gimmicks like displaying large banners and streamers for occasions like Christmas, New Year and Fiestas. The greetings are printed in fonts smaller that the portrait and name of the politician.

But the most effective investment is that sown on the electorate too close to harvest time. It is the seed that remains in the hearts and minds of the people until election time. The likelihood of converting the investment into votes is better when sown at a time too close to voting. That political investment which the wealthy and mighty politicians bank on for getting elected is money. It is the evil that makes politics a dirty game and elective office a certainty for the highest bidder. The seeds being sown near election time is the one that bears fruit ready for a good harvest in due time. Money causes people to be prostituted by giving up their sovereign will and giving in to the demands of the politicians.
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Considered a ‘breakthrough’ in the offing seems realistic – an idea patterned after what Israel proposed to the Philippine government “. . .to build solar irrigation with shallow wells payable within 15 years . . . on a government to government (G to G) basis to avoid corruption.”

As culled from the BIZLINKS column of Rey Gamboa’s communications with Mr. Oscar Violago, chairman of San Lorenzo Ruiz Builders and Developers Group. After reading Mr. Gamboa’s column on rice farming, Mr. Violago submitted a proposal to President Ferdinand Romualdez Marcos, Jr. The excerpt of his (Violago’s) idea “. . . is to build solar-powered irrigation systems utilizing shallow wells for at least one million hectares or more rice lands. He says that such an initiative would allow the production of 150 million metric tons of palay (unhusked rice) or 75 million cavans of rice, which would be equivalent to the 3.8 million metric tons of rice that the country imported last year.”

Further, “to irrigate at least one million hectares throughout the year, Violago proposes for the Philippine government to seriously consider a proposal by Israel to build solar irrigation wells payable within 15 years on a government to government basis . . .”

Accordingly, the proposal had been approved already by the National Economic Development Authority (NEDA) in 2020. Likewise. Senator Cynthia Villar, had endorsed the same proposal in her capacity as chair of Senate Committee on Agriculture, and for 3 years has been awaiting PBBM’s approval! The delayed action on the proposal has puzzled Violago.

MY COMMENT:
I could surmise that the apparent delayed action by Malacanang could either be bureaucratic? or political? in character to the dismay of the lowly farmers and the bigger segment of the marginalized citizens.

NEDA should be on top of the issue being the clearing house of the government’s economic and developmental programs, policies.
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CHRIST said it very clearly. “This is eternal life,” he said, “that they should know you, the only true God, and the one whom you sent, Jesus Christ.” (Jn 17,3) Of course, we have to clarify that knowing God and knowing Christ can only take place if also love God and love Christ.

With God, knowing and loving always go together. One cannot be without the other. This is what is involved when we say we believe in God. We have to know and love him. Both are needed for us to achieve that union and identification with him so that we can share that eternal life that only God can give and share with us.

As we have clarified before, the process of knowing makes the knower (us) have the known (God) in him. But in loving, the lover (us) is brought to the beloved (God). In both these processes, the union and identification are made complete.

This union and identification with God is necessary for us since we are his image and likeness, meant to share in the very life and nature of God. We are not mere copies of God that can exist on our own independently of God, the original. We are meant always to live our life intimately with God, the original from whom we are the image and likeness.

That is why we can also say that while all creatures of God have a certain connaturality with him since every creature shares something with God the Creator, our connaturality with him as his image and likeness enjoys the highest degree.

That’s because while all creatures come and belong to God, we of all creatures come and belong to him in the most intimate way, since we are supposed to share in God’s very own life and nature. The other creatures do not have this kind of dignity. In fact, they are there to serve us who in the end and always should love and serve God through Christ in the Holy Spirit.

This is a truth of our Christian faith that we need to understand very well so that we can act on it and live it as best that we can. It is obviously something that we consider incredible. We certainly feel awkward about it, if not skeptical.

But we just have to level up our understanding of who we really are and start to feel confident that we can live up to that dignity because insofar as God is concerned, he has given us everything that we need to achieve our real identity.

That God has to become man to save us from our self-inflicted alienation from him due to our sin, and that this God-man, Jesus Christ, has to offer his life as a ransom for our sins, can only mean we are so special to him. Thus, a psalm expresses that amazement by saying, “What is man that you are mindful of him, or the son of man that you care for him?” (Ps 8,4)

Besides, that Christ had to offer himself as Bread of Life to be eaten by us so we can achieve even in a material way our union with him while here on earth, can only show that we are truly meant to be united and identified with Christ.

That is why, saints and theologians have described us to be “another Christ” if not “Christ himself.” And since Christ lives in eternity, transcending the limitations of time and space, then we too, if we unite ourselves with him, can live in eternal life, even while we are still here on earth!