Lawmakers promote social importance of reading, pose with their favorite books

As part of government efforts for the National Reading Month, lawmakers today from the House of Representatives, led by Kabataan Party-list Rep. Raymond “Mong” Palatino, urged the public especially the youth to revitalize reading as a social activity due to its importance in nurturing critical thinking, creativity, and even enjoyment.

Through the campaign iRead (Inspiring Reading for Action and Development), lawmakers gathered with their favorite books and promoted the vital role of reading for social development.

“In the age of information technology and mass media, the reading of books and informative materials has unfortunately declined. Especially since the Philippines is a developing country, there is a pressing need to revitalize reading among the people to foment social development and empowerment,” Palatino said.

Palatino said that poor reading and comprehension are contributing factors to the high functional illiteracy in the country, where an estimated 11 million Filipinos are considered to be functionally illiterate or cannot read or write well enough to deal with the everyday requirements for social advancement.

“The high functional illiteracy rate in the country goes to show that majority of Filipinos may be able to read and write, but many are still unable to go beyond this basic level. Reading and comprehension skills have to be honed regularly; otherwise, they get rusty to meet the demands of modern society. Reading regularly will prove useful in sharpening one’s critical cognition,” Palatino said.

Palatino also explained that insufficient government funding for education also contributes to “a regime of ignorance that makes people susceptible to various forms of oppression including poverty”

Palatino said that there is currently a 50.5 million gross shortage in textbooks which requires at least P1.7 billion to be eradicated.

“Lack of budget for education supplies and infrastructures like schools and libraries limits the capacity of Filipinos to hone their reading skills. Any reading campaign, to be worthy of its name, should be also active in pushing for a substantially higher education budget ” Palatino said.

The lawmakers who participated in the iRead campaign also took a photo of themselves with their favorite books which they said will be spread virally on different social networking sites.

Palatino called their photos “a different mug shot”, in clear allusion to the contested leaked mug shots of former President and now Pampanga Rep. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo who is facing charges for her alleged involvement in electoral fraud.

For his part, House Speaker Feliciano Belmonte, Jr., in statement expressing support, also invited Filipinos “to return to reading, and more importantly, to share its joys to their children and to an even wider audience.”

Palatino also expressed support for HB no. 3877, filed by Quezon City Rep. Jorge Banal, which declares November 27 as “Araw ng Pagbasa”.