Aussie visitor takes closer look at Naga governance model 

MONDAY July 22, 2002 | A top official of the Australian Agency for International Development (AusAID) flew into town for a two-day working visit to afford him a better understanding of Naga City's initiatives in local governance.

Dr. Ross Worthington, Facility Director of the Philippine-Australia Governance Facility (PAGF) last July 17-18 met face-to-face and conducted one-on-one dialogues with various department heads of the city government, NGOs and people's organizations. They focused on the essential features of innovative programs that the city government has introduced and continues to implement along the parameters of a decentralized system of government.

Naga City, under the stewardship of Mayor Jesse M. Robredo has been cited internationally for its pioneering efforts in local governance. In particular, Naga City was among the first few cities in the country that successfully translated the spirit and intent of the Local Government Code passed in 1991, in the aftermath of the People Power Revolution that deposed the dictatorial regime of then Pres. Ferdinand Marcos. The Code calls for local government units to develop their own localities at their own pace, with their own resources, and at their own discretion.

To Mayor Robredo, however, local government "discretion" should take a more exacting definition: local governance must be operated on with maximum amount of transparency and accountability where government resources are honestly and prudently spent so that the people and stakeholders can take their government seriously. Such principle he further strengthened by encouraging active citizen participation and people empowerment with the passage of the city's People Empowerment Ordinance. As he had emphasized in his keynote address during the Fourth Asian Mayors Forum in Bangkok last July 8, 2002: "Without an empowered people to carry the message (e.g. people's demands and sentiments), most of the community's interests will have difficulty in gaining (government) attention and support. More often than not, it is the voice of the privileged that gets transmitted to power wielders in the absence of an active and empowered citizenry."

Political scientists, government officials and scholars from other cities in the country, and the Asian region as well, have noted the various innovations that Naga has initiated in such areas as urban development, housing access for the urban poor, job generation, health, sanitation, fiscal management, environment protection, and waste management.

The Australian government, too, has taken keen interest on how local governance in the Philippines work, as modeled by the Naga City Government. Given Naga's successful initiatives and its determined drive to reform governance, the PAGF selected Naga, particularly the Metro Naga Development Council (MNDC), as a pilot area to further improve the efficiency and effectiveness of Philippine government policies that emphasize improvements in poverty alleviation, equity and governance.

The MNDC is a cooperative effort between Naga City and the 14 towns adjoining it. It is aimed at "bolstering each other's individual resources and minimize the impact of decreasing fund allocation from the national government" vis-à-vis the increasing demands for basic infrastructure and services. It is a pioneering experiment in local governance where a "big brother extends his hands to help a little brother".

Naga as a more privileged urban center behooves upon itself a social and moral responsibility to look after its neighbors and discuss how, by joining their hands together, they can harness each other's growth potentials and capabilities and likewise equitably distribute the economic and social benefits that may be derived therefrom. Consequently, these member-towns by exploiting their own strengths become less dependent on the central government and therefore are transformed into productive units capable of satisfying their respective constituencies' targets and demands. By becoming self-reliant themselves, LGUs become less vulnerable to inadequacies of the national government, such as cutbacks in Internal Revenue Allotments (IRA). Naga, for example, has been threatened with cutbacks in its IRA share by as much as 25% from its regular allocation this year, yet it stands to meet its targets on basic services by wisely spending its local resources. It further strives to earn more profits from its city-run enterprises (i.e. public market, bus terminal, slaughterhouse) while strictly observing cost-effective measures down to the smallest administrative item without jeopardizing quality service delivery.

These and many other related things, Mr. Worthington came to learn about more closely during his brief stay here last week. He was impressed, he said, as were the 14 officials and scholars, which included a deputy-governor from Phnom Penh, Cambodia, who came earlier last June 3-6 for a similar engagement.