Of course he’s not
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President Noynoy Aquino found himself again on the line of fire for his supposed laid-back working style which is really laziness, a more brutally frank word.
Noynoy is repeatedly being rumored as engaging himself in some form of worthless pursuit or another or rising up late in the day since he assumed office in June last year which many saw as signs of an ineffective presidency.
Recently, in a speech before an assembly of members of the Employers Confederation of the Philippines (Ecop), Noynoy lashed back at newspaper columnists who blamed his laid back attitude for the steep drops in his ratings on recent performance surveys.
Noynoy defended himself, saying that his working style as president may be different but it cannot be classified as laid back.
Not only columnists, but many Filipinos, several of whom voted him to power, have noticed his carefree style as opposed to his usual speeches about leading the country into a straight path, making many conclude that the straight path he frequently mentions is leading toward a deadend, mainly because he really doesn’t walk the talk.
Noynoy was particularly irritated at two columnists who had described him as either a “do-nothing Chief Executive” or that he was “not working hard enough to solve the country’s problems.”
To make his point, he said during his Ecop speech that on that day he woke up at 5:30 in the morning and boarded a plane by 6:30 a.m. to go to wakes in Cebu and in Samar. Big deal. That’s hardly presidential work. These are social activities that have nothing to do with governance, or even the so-called straight path slogan of his.
But his “hard-working spiel” does indicate his cluelessness over what constitutes real presidential work and what constitutes social activities.
He also mentioned two more appointments after the Ecop conference which was a staff meeting at 2:30 p.m. and a courtesy call by the Singapore Technologies Telemedia and ABS-CBN and Skycable at the Yellow Room in Malacañang. Big deal still.
One of his many spokesmen also defended Noynoy’s presidential style, saying that among his schedules in a usual busy day was to “take great pains” in studying papers on his desk.
One can indeed imagine the pain for a president reading documents while sipping a cup of coffee.
Noynoy’s style is being compared largely with his predecessor Gloria Arroyo, who, despite all the accusations of abuse of power was not labeled a lazy bone and was instead admired for her seeming endless energy throughout a day’s busy work schedule.
His House critics, for instance, have kept pounding on Noynoy to put substance on his oft-repeated discourse about “good governance and less corruption.”
Noy’s critics also blamed his inability to translate his fighting words into action on his lack of leadership capability that in turn was the result of his hang easy style.
Edcel Lagman, a chief critic, had noted the main thrust of Noynoy’s administration is churning out press releases to cover up his shortcoming which was the purpose of the Palace-proposed “good news Web site.”
Spokesman Edwin Lacierda had said the Internet page will seek “to reverse the President’s dwindling performance ratings will either be an empty page for the dearth of heart-warming stories.”
The Palace strategists of Noynoy are missing the point, however, on the criticisms on his failure to perform at the level of public expectations on him.
Even if the benefit of the doubt is given Noynoy in his claim of a different style of work that should not be mistaken for laziness, still the fact remains that his style had not been producing the expected results.
The conclusion then would be he is not plain lazy but a natural subpar.
That would be worse since such shortcoming leaves the guy without any more room for improvement.
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