I will bring jobs in Pangasinan - Cojuangco

BOLINAO – Gubernatorial bet Mark O. Cojuangco told recently people here that he will use his knowledge and capacity to bring jobs in Pangasinan.

Former Congressman Mark Cojuangco

The province, according to the recent report of the Department of Social Welfare & Development, has been reeling into alarming unemployment rates and glaring number of most poor people in Region 1.

“Gusto ko pong patamisin sa mata ng namumuhanan ang ating probinsiya para dito po sila dumating, dito po sila mamumuhunan, magtayo ng negosyo, ng mga pabrika, ng mga industry para po sa ating probinsiya (I want to make Pangasinan attractive before the eyes of investors so they would come and put shops here),” he stressed.

Assistant Regional Director Marilyn Peralta of the DSWD told reporters here last month that out of the 199,000 beneficiaries of the 4Ps or the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps), a poverty reduction program of the government, 124,091 families or 62% of the 199,000 are in Pangasinan.

If each of the cited families has an average of five members then there would be a total of 620,455 individuals who are either unemployed or earning less than P200 a day in the huge province.  

Cojuangco, the scion of the patriarch of the mammoth San Miguel Corporation, said the influx of investors would bring better jobs and decent life for pangasinenses.

“Hinde na po kailangan lumayo pa at pumunta pa kung saan saan (You do not need to migrate to other places)”.

The yawning poverty and the alarming unemployment in the province have been blamed by critics to the initiative-less administration of Governor Amado T. Espino, Jr.

“Its indifference can be seen on the 2015 provincial budget where P1 million was  only allocated to social service while it scandalously appropriated P50.4 million and P25 million to public affairs or “deodorizer fund”  and repairs of the Capitol ground and park, respectively,” editorialized lately by this paper.

Cojuangco and his vice governorship tandem Calasiao Mayor Mark Roy Macanlalay were here to grace the meeting of the members of the group who were beneficiaries of a micro financing.

He exhorted them that in case he and Macanlalay would be given the chance to serve Pangasinan, he would efficiently serve the province as shown by his records when he was a three-term congressman of the 5^th District in Pangasinan.