The following piece by Naga City Vice-Mayor Gabriel H. Bordado appropriately serves as our editorial for this issue:
Despite the irony and the painful memories it stirred, the phrase “ the best president the country never had “ ( which was deftly coined by Bicolano law maker Rolando Andaya Jr.) could very well be a fitting accolade for the late Raul Sagarbarria Roco.

Consider the following:
• As a public servant and as a government worker, he was competence and integrity personified, breathing new life in a government structure long mired in profligacy, mediocrity and outright ineptitude. Through his actions and outputs, Roco succeeded in giving public service a sterling image, anchored as it were on transparency and the highest levels of excellence.

• He consistently worked for the empowerment and emancipation of the common people. As a legislator, Roco’s landmark legislative outputs are certainly making a difference in the lives of women, students, teachers, farmers, workers, artists and the ordinary denizens of the land, providing palpable dimension to the once amorphous, if not altogether confounding concept of “people power.”

In fact, Roco, by consistently coming up with people-empowering laws, virtually gave the Congress of the Philippines a reason for being immensely contributing to the enhancement of the not-so-flattering image of that institution.

• He fearlessly tackled other challenges in his bid to improve public service. As Education Secretary, Roco was given the unenviable-and herculean-task of cleaning a veritable Augean stable. The department then fitted the Augean stable tag to a T - truly a place saddled by a great accumulation of figurative filth and corruption. Indeed, at one point, it even eclipsed the traditional bulwarks of corruption (e.g. the Bureau of Internal Revenue and Department of Public works and Highways) in sheer notoriety. A succession of education secretaries tried but miserably failed to stem the tide and Roco inherited the department in shambles. As the Philippines Daily Inquirer puts it: “If there was anyone qualified to be DECS secretary, it is Roco. As a senator, Roco funded teachers’ cooperatives, pioneered the computerization program for schools and establishment scholarships for poor students who wanted to be teacher. He also abolished the national college entrance examination to give all high school graduates a fair share at going to college.”

• He sent a very clear signal to the world that all is not lost with the Philippine government. By reforming the DECS (now Deped),

Roco demonstrated that the saying that “ a public office is a public trust” has not been out of fashion ever since the demise of the well-loved President Magsaysay. Roco tackled his new job with characteristic resolve, dedication, grit and innovativeness without losing sight of the urgent need to emancipate the overworked and underappreciated teachers, protect the interests of the studentry, upgrade the educational system to make it at par with the rest of the world, and restore the Education department to its former status as the premier Philippine agency given the very nature of its task and mission. Within a very short span of time (less than six months), Roco did deliver. By the end of 2001, the Department of Education was considered as the most trusted agency of the Philippine government. Roco, on the other hand, had the highest approval rating among the department secretaries, according to the 2002 “Ulat ng Bayan” of Pulse Asia, Inc.

• He always upheld a set of “humanist principles”. In rendering public service, Roco was always guided by principles enabling him to consistently deliver public service of the highest quality in a career spanning more than three decades, to wit:

- “ People are more important than institutions
- “ Women and children must have first access to resources
- “ Every Filipino must enjoy the right to education
- “ Economic reforms must benefit all
- “ Ensure the equal application of the law for justice to prevail
- “Protect the environment for sustainable development, and
- “Inculcate the values of work, study and prayer.”

Raul Roco is now gone. But, as his provincemate Congressman Andaya aptly puts it , “ Roco had set the template for excellence and ethics in public service such that future aspirants for the presidency must demostrate proof that they are as good as him.”