‘Richest province’

Don’t be fooled by the tag “richest province” and use it to assess the living condition of the people in Cebu province. Cebu has always been the country’s “richest province” because of its assets, which have remained intact through the years, and a bit for the revenue it is generating annually (on this, think about the competition, or the provinces it is being ranked with).

So Cebu has always been rich in assets and has big enough annual revenue, things that get noticed every time the Commission on Audit (COA) comes up with a list of the country’s riches provinces and cities. That should not be taken to mean, however, that it is the province’s people who are wealthy. Because no one would believe in the tag.

Having said that, it would be interesting to find out how the Cebu Provincial Government, which is the custodian of the assets and who holds the coffers where the annual revenues end up, is handling the wealth. It’s one thing to say the province is rich, it’s another thing to say its constituents feel they are rich.

That is precisely why COA reports like this one are met with a pervading sense of emptiness. It’s not like the constituents of the province feel they have won the lottery because their province is being tagged the richest. The reaction often is, “We are the richest, so what?”

The accumulation of wealth is never done for accumulation’s sake; rather, it is done to improve the living condition or maintain a lifestyle. It is only in works of fiction or should we say it is only rarely that the wealthy hoards his wealth and persists on living a poverty-stricken life because the purpose of accumulating wealth is defeated. So how is the Provincial Government living up to the tag?

If Cebu is tagged as the “richest province” in the country and is hard put in delivering basic services to its constituents or could not implement projects that would improve the living condition of its constituents, then Provincial Government officials should be ashamed of the tag.

A rich province should not have an economically struggling constituency deprived of the best public services riches can buy.