LUNA, Apayao – Gov. Elias C. Bulut, Jr. urged the Regional Development Council (RDC) in the Cordillera to prioritize development issues in the provinces comprising the Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR) to allow concerned government agencies and even the Office of the President to take appropriate actions on the issues to be raised through the region’s policy-making body.
Bulut pointed out there is a need for the RDC-CAR to include development issues in the different provinces as one of its priority agenda during its executive committee and quarterly meetings so that pressing development issues will be acted upon the soonest to compel concerned government agencies and Palace officials to also do their part to address the issues to be raised to help spur development in the countryside.
“Autonomy will always be there while the region has not yet achieved the constitutional mandate of being autonomous but there is a need to include in the discussions development issues that will propel rural development so that people in the rural villages will enjoy the fruits of development in the future,” Bulut stressed.
The governor underscored the importance of tapping the youth sector in the on-going information and education campaign on autonomy because they now comprise a bigger portion of the voting population so that there will be a greater chance of autonomy being approved once the proposed Organic Act will be submitted to the people for ratification during a plebiscite to be scheduled in the future.
He revealed today’s youth are not allegedly updated on the latest updates on the region’s renewed quest for self-governance that is why the RDC-CAR should refocus its information and education campaign strategies to the younger Cordillerans without sacrificing the information strategies for the older ones who are still not convinced of the advantages of converting the CAR, a special administrative and temporary region, to an autonomous region.
He agreed to the contention of autonomy advocates that achieving self-governance will not totally solve the problems being experienced by the region but it will provide a wider avenue of solutions for the current developmental issues being encountered by the region, particularly its low share from the internal revenue allotment because of the criteria of population and land area and the very low budgetary allocation from the concerned government agencies for specific projects.
According to him, he had been trying to get the sentiments of the youth in Apayao regarding the region’s renewed quest for regional autonomy but he was surprised to note that majority of them are not aware of the issue, thus, the need for autonomy advocates to adopt new strategies that will provide them with the needed information relative to self-governance to keep the youth abreast on the issue before the enactment of the law and the subsequent conduct of the required plebiscite to ensure that they will vote in favour of autonomy during the ratification of the autonomy law.
Apayao is the only province that voted for the ratification of the second autonomy law when it was submitted to the people for ratification during a plebiscite on March 7, 1998.
By HENT