Of government service and its continuous improvement

In the days when anyone who is applying for a new job, going abroad, applying permits or simply just applying for official identification, one can simply feel the nitty-gritty aspect of going to the government offices - local city hall institutions and all just to get that piece of paper evidence that you are cleared of any derogatory record.

I came with my partner today to see how much or what has change in terms of applying for NBI clearance, POLICE clearance & Barangay clearance, respectively. His purpose for getting these clearances are for local employment.

Sad to say, it's still the same long process as I see it. I take for example the NBI process. While NBI has made efforts of automating the application, that is not 100% automated because some of the people who cannot go online will still need to go through long lines, lots of additional payments (i.e you are ordered to buy Cedula at the city hall before you can pay the NBI and start application, or simply you are given a brown envelope for PHP 5.00 for the sake of having a placeholder for your little piece of paper-- all those I call as "money making machines" where one cannot really be certain where the proceeds go. I could only infer that those could be potential graft and corruption schemes if not something that aids in that century-long cancer of red tape and shit hole).

I think the Philippines is still at the edge of ancient practice and the system is not gonna change anytime soon. I just hope all the fees that any Juan Dela Cruz paid for while
Applying for NBI, Police or Brangay clearances will be used for the betterment of Filipino lives on a daily basis. Sad to say, that is not something we all could categorically say a reality.

Even the rich Filipinos would just opt to pay and contribute to the potential graft and corruption underlying those simple services offered in government institution just to make their individual purposes meet and closed.

There are other concerns as well on whether the records that NBI, Police or Barangay institution keep are accurate. I just can't help but wonder how they deter if one has a criminal offense record or not? Or was it all just really a piece of paper?!

If there's one thing I would commend in this last beat I had today, I can say that in the process of long lines and nitty-gritty, there are helpful Filipino government employee who would openly assist and provide instructions to easily make the process quicker in any way possible.