Press Release
August 15, 2008

45th NDCP Anniversary, Alumni Homecoming and Convention

There is a need to promote the enhancement and development of the security and defense instruction, research and training in the country.

Senator Loren Legarda made the statement in reaction to the role being undertaken by the National Defense College of the Philippines (NDCP) in the nation's economic activity.

"There is no policy institute or think-tank better equipped to do a sensitive study on what acts of giving or philanthropic acts can best serve national economic goals than the NDCP," Legarda said before some 300 delegates to the NDCP's 45th Anniversary, Alumni Homecoming and Convention at the Kalayaan Hall in Club Filipino.

She also lauded the NDCP for its continuing participation to taking issues from a multi-dimensional viewpoint and from various angles like economic, socio-cultural, techno-scientific, political-legal and the imperative national security/military perspective.

"I am fully aware of how rigorous and scholarly the training at the NDCP is," added Legarda, herself a proud graduate of the NDCP.

The lady opposition senator also announced the bill she filed - Senate Bill No. 2152 - which she said seeks to build on the strength and potential of the NDCP to become instrumental in nation-building.

Legara also expressed elation over the NDCP's adherence to concentrate on areas of economic development, rather than on economic growth which she said are two different things.

Economic growth, she said, is nothing but cold figures - rise in the GDP/GNP, good credit rating from Standard and Poor, an appreciation of the country's fiscal and monetary discipline among others.

"Economic development, on the other hand, is about what the late Ka Pepe Diokno termed as jobs, food, freedoms. It is the type of growth that enhances the quality of life, that nurtures and protects the basic freedoms, that raises the sense of dignity of the individual," Legarda explained.

Legarda also said the role of the NDCP in undertaking sensitive and strategic studies for national development can be further expanded through capitalizing on a defense and security education that is holistic, integrated, comprehensive, and attuned to national security and defense requirements of the country.

Legarda was main guest of honor and speaker during the NDCP convention which was also graced also by Ambassador Kristie A. Kenney, General Alexander B. Yano of the AFP, Secretary Jose Concepcion III, Secretary Norberto B. Gonzales, Retired Commodore Carlos L. Agustin and Vice Mayor Herbert Bautista.

Legarda also took time to discuss the other paper she was asked to react to - The Economics of Giving: An Interface of Varying Perspectives - which she said was a timely one, for several reasons.

The thesis centered on the differing ways of how wealthy people like Bill Gates and his wife Melinda of the Microsoft Corporation, the financier George Soros, and CNN founder Ted Turner shell out part of their vast income for the uplift of human standings in the world.

"Regardless of motive and intent, my personal take on the paper is this: a paradigm shift is needed and the act of giving should move more and more into the direction of the initiatives of bill and Melinda Gates, Warren Buffet, Ted Turner and George Soros," Legarda said.

"The act of giving should be directed toward alleviating much of the fundamental and basic ills of the world. It should be life-altering,' she said.

Legarda said that if we could find philanthropists in the mold of Bill gates and Warren Buffet in the Philippines, she wanted P15 Billion worth of schoolrooms, P5 billion private fund for agricultural research, irrigation technologies and aquaculture, P5 billion fund for public hospitals in the provinces and municipalities, and P5 billion for computers for public schools.

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