[asia-apec 1427] PCAIG: BAYAN HITS IMF, US-ESTRADA REGIME ANEW

[BAYAN]

People's Campaign Against Imperialist Globalization and
Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (BAYAN, New Patriotic Alliance)
MEDIA RELEASE
April 15, 2000


For plans to raise taxes, sell state assets and privatize services
BAYAN HITS IMF, US-ESTRADA REGIME ANEW

The Bagong Alyansang Makabayan today said it will lead a rally Monday (April
17) at the Central Bank against what it described as “the US-Estrada regime
and
the International Monetary Bank-World Bank’s connivance to foist new taxes,
sell strategic state assets at bargain prices and to further sell out the
economy to big foreign interests.”

The rally will coincide with big protests in Washington, D.C. as the IMF
and WB
hold their Spring Meeting. Bayan is part of the People's Assembly Against
IMF-WB and, since 1996, the People's Campaign Against Imperialist
Globalization.

“It is no coincidence that while an IMF review team is currently in Manila,
several controversial measures like the Road User’s Tax, the Omnibus Power
Bill
and the New Securities Act were passed separately by Congress,” said Bayan
Secretary-General Teodoro Casiño while adding that “these have long been
demanded by the IMF.”

Casiño also took the US-Estrada to task for promising to the IMF team the
privatization of  the National Power Corporation, government shares in the
Philippine National Bank and eleven state hospitals .

“This time, President Estrada can no longer point his finger at others. The
government is consciously and lustily following all these IMF impositions to
the obvious detriment of the common folk,” Casiño said.

“This not only shows how good Estrada is in the role of ‘chief puppet’ but
also
the IMF-WB’s part as the ‘director’ of Philippine economic policies,” the
Bayan
leader said.

“What it has failed to do with Concord, it is doing bit by bit through
legislation. By passing these laws, the US-Estrada regime is enshrining into
law the evils of privatization, liberalization and deregulation,” Casiño
explained. 

He said that this further proves that “Estrada is selling the patrimony and
economy to big foreign interests at bargain basement prices.”

Casiño said that the Napocor privatization  wherein the government will assume
all its debts in favor of the new owners  is “like selling Petron all over
again, with the same script and the same promises.”

“In the end, the people will suffer the brunt of endless hikes in power rates
while the owners wallow in profit,” said Casiño.

 “Even the Manila Electric Company (Meralco) wishes to score brownie points
with the IMF-WB by announcing a 30-centavo hike in electric power rates,”
Casiño added. Meralco is the largest electric power distribution company in
the
Philippines.

According to Meralco, the hike is based on the 8 percent return on rate base
imposed by the World Bank and other multilateral lending institutions on
utilities to ensure viability and the ability to pay up its debts.

Casiño warned of more and bigger protests over the spate of new taxes, the
sellout of state assets and the privatization of basic services. 

Last month, transport group Piston launched transport strikes that debilitated
major parts of the country to protest the Road User’s Tax.

Instead, Casiño called for the immediate scrapping of the US-Estrada regime’s
deregulation, liberalization and privatization policies which he said has
worsened the economic conditions of the Philippines by keeping it agrarian,
backward and dependent on debt and imports. 

“We remain poor because of puppet regimes like Estrada’s and meddlesome
institutions like the IMF-WB,” he said. ###