A Complicated Problem Necessitates a Complex Solution

The world is still too young to fix many general truths in politics.

~ David Hume

The occurring global pandemic is massively causing social phobia with governments imposing draconian measures and regulations to contain the dispersion of the highly infectious virus. The cases have already reached the million mark with thousands of fatalities each day on a global scale. Among the worst-hit countries are the USA, Italy, Spain, Germany, and China which account for over 50% of the world’s positive and death cases due to coronavirus related diseases.

The teeming elevation of statistics each day is tremulously causing mass hysteria. This sparked the notion of self-preservation and survival means to the citizens of every nation around the world. This crisis situates the government of every nation to be the fundamental institution the people can count on. In every decision, the people are all ears to any pronouncements, amelioration, and measures hoping that their domestic government would bring down the heavens for them.

In what seems to be merely a biological and/or existential threat, another imminent pitfall arises: the lack of good political discretion and regional penury. In countries that are greatly contrived with poverty, the biological threat is only subordinate to destituteness. Their primary concern is not any longer the dread of getting infected by the coronavirus but is rendered to the fear of the deprivation of substantial basic resources to outlast the longevity of rigorous isolation as economic operations are halted. Hence, another huge hurdle is blocking the ways of domestic governments worldwide in tackling this outbreak.

In India, home of 1.3 billion citizens with an astonishing 369 million poor people according to the United Nations’ 2019 Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI), near-starvation comes to the surface after Prime Minister Narendra Modi imposed a three-week lockdown in response to the coronavirus pandemic. The abrupt declaration of lockdown had caused a massive exodus of working poor on foot to their villages, which had caused at least 20 lives. The people of India are starting to question and criticize their government for inadequate measures after the latter had promised for food and cash support, yet after one week nothing meets its destination.

Relatively, here in the Philippines, the Filipino poor are experiencing the same horrendous problem. The national government has announced massive budget allocation to be spent on food and cash assistance for the people, yet until now, it manifests in no real world. It even resulted in a street brawl with the authorities after the people went outside amid the ongoing “enhanced community quarantine” to ask for local support. In a strongman reply, the president warned those who will put the authorities’ lives at risk to be shot dead and that the people must not challenge the government.

Even in dying times, traditional petty politics is surfacing on the ground. Rather than acclaiming a politician for being a genuine public servant, the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) procured a subpoena for a well-performing mayor and vice president. The cases were later dismissed and denied by the authorities after it received a heavy backlash from the netizens.

These international and domestic conflicts are a concatenation of the bio-politico-economic crisis, relative effects are dependent on the specific features of every nation. Cultural dimension even comes into the scene in some countries with Islam adherents such as Sri Lanka. Muslim activists and rights groups in Sri Lanka are condemning the government authorities for the forced cremation of two COVID-19 infected Muslim cadavers, which is against the Islamic burial tradition.

The aforementioned palpably depicts that if governments only limit their lenses to a specific dimension of the problem, it will procure another, if not worsen, abject consequences. When will our country, the Philippines, acknowledge the paramount importance of having sociologists, political scientists, psychologists, medical experts, data analysts, and so on, in one table devising a holistic stratagem to contain and eradicate this crisis?