Power & poverty: an assessment of the National Anti-Poverty Commission (NAPC) under President B.S. Aquino

Abstract

Widespread economic poverty has long been a major problem in the Philippines. Due to this, various efforts and interventions were planned and implemented by the government to, at the very least, help alleviate poverty. One of which is the Aquino administration's flagship antipoverty program, the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps). However, despite this and the many anti-poverty programs that were created and implemented in the Philippines, poverty incidence remains high. An angle which can be looked at to know why this is so is the aspect of people's participation in the government's anti-poverty programs. Genuine people's participation in NAPC's anti-poverty programs is crucial in ensuring their effectiveness and relevance to the people's actual needs. Citizen participation from conceptualization to implementation and evaluation of anti-poverty programs and policies is essential for true change to happen. However, as it was found out in this research, the people's participation in these programs or even in the NAPC itself is tokenistic, at best. Thus, it can be said that for antipoverty efforts to succeed by being more effective or for them to be able to effect an actual change and improvement in the poor's lives, people's participation in these programs should be genuine. The people's participation should be in the levels of citizen power and not just tokenistic.