LGU, Inc.

By Marifi Jara

QUELIMANE, Mozambique–We can look at every town, city, and province as a corporation; imagine each local government unit as an “LGU, Inc.”, e.g. Alaminos, Inc., Lingayen, Inc., San Fabian, Inc. or Pangasinan, Inc.

The owners of the corporation would of course be the people.

The LGU leaders would then be their employees, hired for a job they voluntarily applied for through our democratic election process and given a salary using public funds. This may be difficult to envision sometimes because the power, privileges and adulation that go with a leadership title could easily obscure the concept of service which is at the core of every public position. An elected LGU leader is seen as the town “boss”, and when we say “boss” we automatically equate that with a kind of spoiled kingship. But really, while they are technically the “boss” in terms of being in a position of authority, it should be a kind of responsible stewardship.

Those who sold and bought votes (shame on you!) in the last election would be hard-pressed visualizing the LGU, Inc. concept because the vote-for-money exchange wipes out the employee-employer relationship between the public servant and the public. See, with vote-buying and selling, politicians who bought their way into their position will not feel beholden to the electorate while the people who sold their votes could not make their elected officials accountable to their community’s welfare. The buying politician will only feel responsible for him/herself and will not suffer any guilt feelings about corrupting public funds because he/she would think that getting back his/her campaign and election expenses is but fair game. Meanwhile, members of the selling public have already gotten a very cheap return for their valuable votes and that takes away their right to demand for more meaningful and long-term benefits from their elected leaders.

But for now let’s optimistically believe that this vote buy-and-sell business involved an insignificant few.

So back to the LGU, Inc. idea, the salary for an LGU boss is not huge, nowhere near and by no means can be weighed against private sector standards as for example the position of mayor or governor compared to a company CEO (chief executive officer). But the job description and work target is basically the same: to manage and steer the corporation towards productivity and profitability.

In the public sector, productivity would mean having an LGU that is alive. The administration must help improve existing local industries and develop new programs/projects that will expand economic opportunities. A dynamic, pro-active and politically-willful leadership is key here.

Profitability, on the other hand, means not just financial strength, but also social security in terms of education, health, infrastructure and cultural development, among other things. Profitability must translate to an improved and stable quality of life for everyone in the community.

The LGU bosses’ contracts are good for three years. That isn’t much time really in the scheme of long-term development, but it should be time enough to put in place some judicious policies, programs and projects — enough to show whether the boss deserves to have a contract renewal come the next election.

Work for the new, renewed and recycled LGU bosses begins July 1. Cheers to all of you! Do prove yourselves worthy of the job you have been hired by the people for.

As for the people, we must always remember that as owners of our town-corp., we are the main investors in the community, we have the biggest stake in its future and should therefore participate and cooperate in governance. Development is everybody’s business.

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