RP's economy growing, security still a problem

RP's economy growing, security still a problem

By Cecil Morella

MANILA (AFP): Philippine President Fidel Ramos enters his third year in power with the economy showing signs of improvement, but security problems persist and kidnappings terrify the influential ethnic Chinese.

The retired general came into office on June 30, 1992 with a seemingly improbable vow that the country would join the ranks of its neighbors' tiger economies by the year 2000. Most experts agree the results have been mixed.

The 25-year-old Maoist insurgency has virtually ground to a halt, with demoralized guerrillas lying low in rural areas as leaders of its internal factions fight a verbal war.

In addition, rightist military rebels who nearly brought down the government in the late 1980s have been rendered largely impotent.

Ramos is trying to settle the law and order situation by speeding up peace talks on three fronts -- with communist insurgents, military coup plotters and largely dormant Moslem guerrillas who mounted a separatist war in the 1970s.

He has used the breathing-space resulting from the effort to salvage the region's economic basket case.

The first 18 months were difficult, as an energy crisis wore the economy down, but 12-hour daily outages are a thing of the past, following a frenetic power plant-building program involving the private sector.

The economy posted a surprising, investment-led 4.84 percent growth in the first quarter, and last weekend the International Monetary Fund approved a planned "exit program" to end more than a decade of stewardship of the economy.

A cooperative congress helped Ramos open up the economy, making it more attractive to foreign investors as banking, telecommunications and infrastructure were deregulated.

But despite these achievements, foreign remittances from the country's two million-strong overseas work force continue to outperform electronics -- the top merchandise export -- which earned three billion dollars last year.

Ramos himself admitted earlier this month that the general economic advance has yet to make a "direct impact on our population as a whole," but that with fundamentals in place, "we can now move on in high gear in addressing our social concerns."

High public deficits, inflation which hit double digits last month, and an appreciating currency cloud the otherwise rosy outlook, with some economists saying Manila is merely riding the crest of the old "boom and bust" cycle.

Ramos's economic success has yet to rub off on his foreign policy record.

He capitulated to Indonesian pressure this month when he tried in vain to ban an otherwise minor private conference on human rights in East Timor.

Relations with China have been especially difficult, as Manila embraces Taiwan in search of investments and export markets while affirming a "One China" policy officially recognizing Beijing alone.

The South China Sea has been transformed into a diplomatic quagmire as Beijing searches for oil in the area disputed by six countries, including China and the Philippines.

Short-tempered, Ramos picks fights with critics and blames the contentious and irreverent local press for focusing on the shortcomings of his policies.

However, what cannot be disputed is that there has been an upsurge in law and order-related problems in rural areas as well as the capital.

The country's south has erupted in random violence, topped by the massacre of 15 Christian civilians by militant Moslem gunmen earlier this month. The army had to use artillery and air power to crush the bandits.

In Manila, the small but economically influential ethnic Chinese community has been cowed by a wave of ransom kidnappings, many believed perpetrated by rogue soldiers and police, as well as renegade communist guerrillas.

Police have documented 13 kidnapping cases in the first four months of the year, compared to 30 for the whole of 1993.

But a community watchdog, the Citizens Action Against Crime, listed at least 27 cases since the start of the year, including four this month alone which it said involved "big amounts of ransom."