Opening StatementCommittee on Sustainable Development Goals, Innovation and Future Thinking, Wednesday, 20 August 2025, 10:00 AMSen. A.M. Tolentino Room(Right Wing), 2nd Floor, Senate Building

Good morning, Madam Chair, esteemed colleagues, and our resource persons.

At the core of our work in government is one simple but profound duty: that is to provide better lives for our people. The Sustainable Development Goals give us a set of international commitments, a guidepost and a set of targets to help measure how far we
have gone in fulfilling that duty.

But after more than two decades of experience in this Senate, I have seen a recurring challenge: agency reports often look good on paper, yet do not always reflect the reality that our people experience on the ground. This brings me to my concern on the SDGs—do these scores and numbers truly mirror the lives of Filipinos, or are they prepared merely to look favorable in international reporting? Are our national targets crafted with the people’s well-being at their heart, or simply to meet external benchmarks?

To address this, I have filed two measures: the Results-Based Governance Act and the Open Government Data Act. These bills seek to establish a national framework that ensures our data, monitoring, and evaluation are not just bureaucratic exercises, but genuine tools for accountability and people-centered governance.

I sincerely hope that these measures will be realized in this Congress, so that the data we gather and hold can finally tell the true story of the Filipino people.

Thank you, Madam Chair.