Why DAP should be privatized

The Development Academy of the Philippines (DAP, www.dap.edu.ph) is one of those redundant government corporations whose functions are better left to the private sector and whose annual budget, along with many other government corporations, agencies, and state colleges/universities, are better not collected in the form of tax cut. Why do I say so?

One, fiscal burden.
DAP receives P70 million per year in 2005 and 2006, P168.7 million in 2004. If the budget of DAP is sourced mainly from ordinary office runners and janitors receiving salaries of P8,000/month on average, and those guys are taxed 15% on average of their annual income, or P15,600/year in personal income tax, then government will need to expropriate partly the incomes of 4,487 ordinary office employees, to get P70 million. For DAP's 2004 budget of P168.7, government would have expropriated part of the incomes of 10,814 ordinary employees.

Two, DAP is one of those redundant government "think tanks".
Among the other known government "think tanks" are the Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS), National Defense College of the Philippines (NDCP), the 100+ state universities and colleges (SUCs), certain departments like NEDA, the various in-house "think tanks" within other departments (ex., NTRC under the DOF). All of those government think tanks are researching for "national development, improve governance and fight corruption, fight poverty..." All of them, no exception, have those avowed missions.

Three, DAP is itself a money-making body on top of the subsidies it gets from the state annually.
Its conference center (DAPCC) in Tagaytay for instance, earns money from its hotel and cottages (around P5,000/night for the cottages), from its conference fees, etc. DAP should continue doing those things and charge even higher if it wants too -- as a private corporation, not as government corporation that continues to live off on taxes of other people.

Four, its administration is highly politicized.
Recently, selection of DAP president is through the influence of the President of the Republic. The search committee has narrowed down the choice to 8 candidates, but all the 7 candidates did not show up for the final interview, knowing fully well that President Gloria's annointed, Antonio Kalaw, currently DAP senior vice president and corporate secretary, would get the seat.

According to a PCIJ story, (http://pcij.org/stories/2006/dap.html), "Arroyo's interest in the DAP presidency, academy insiders say, may have to with her desire to get a "friendly" president who will vote to oust Civil Service Commission chief Karina David from the chairmanship of the Career Executive Service Board (CESB), which had earlier rebuked Malacañang for ignoring civil-service rules and in effect politicizing the bureaucracy."

And that "The problem is that Kalaw is not the most qualified among the contenders. He does not have a postgraduate degree while all the other candidates are PhD holders with strong local and international connections and a string of publications, researches and awards. Kalaw also ranked seventh among the eight candidates in the evaluation of the search committee designated by the DAP board only last March 31."

At least 5 of the contenders for DAP Presidency are former or current faculty members of UP Diliman. They are Segundo Romero, former DAP executive vice president; Francisco Magno, executive director the De la Salle University's Institute of Governance, Amado Mendoza Jr., a political science professor at UP, Grace Jamon, dean of the DAP Graduate School; and Josefina Navarro, sociology professor at UP.

Five, the DAP board almost mirrors membership of NEDA board.
The DAP board is composed of the following: a representative of the Office of the President, CSC chair, DAP president, secretaries of DOF, DepEd, DBM, DA, DENR, DOH, DAR, and NEDA. NEDA board, chaired by the President, is also composed of all of them (except the CSC chair and DAP President) plus other cabinet secretaries. And NEDA board is the highest policy-making body of the government in the Executive branch, getting inputs from all departments and their attached agencies.

Six, DAP cannot really claim to be an "independent government think tank".
To say an agency to be an "independent government think tank/corporation" is a contradiction in terms. Once you're a government body, you are dependent on the bureaucrats who comprise your board, you are dependent on the legislators who appropriate your annual budget, you are dependent on the President who appoint the officials who comprise your board.

With those reasons and arguments above, there is really no need to retain DAP as a government corporation. One of the candidates for DAP Pres., Dr. Francisco Magno, who is my occassional drinking buddy, says that if he was given the opportunity, he would reduce DAP's dependency on public subsidy. He says, DAP "assets like the prime real estate in Tagaytay as well as intangible assets like databases and human capital would be leveraged to generate resources and build programs that would be self-sustaining."

Yes, certainly! But reduced subsidy is inferior to privatization and full independence from the state. There is really no need to milk the taxpayers to finance another government body whose functions can still continue as a private corporation.