What is so wrong with our country? People don’t read

In “Why can’t our students read?” (Opinion, 3/30/19), Neni Sta. Romana-Cruz asked if Filipino teachers themselves are competent readers. This might as well have applied to the rest of the country.

Rank-and-file government employees typically show an aversion to reading, disdaining to even go through their office directory so s/he can tell you which is the correct number to call when, as all too often happens, the operator misroutes you — another common instance of faulty reading skills.

These petty bureaucrats won’t act like public servants by being of service, but tell you to call the operator again. They can’t be bothered to look at — or worse, their office doesn’t even have a copy of — their interoffice directory.

One poor sap in Quezon City Hall said his job was just to receive papers, and the only guy in their office who had the lone copy of their directory was at a graduation.

It should be basic for a public servant to be able to give information of a public nature, especially when it pertains to his own agency.

Then there was that power-tripping woman officer at the Department of Foreign Affairs satellite office in Ali Mall who made up her own rules on claiming passports, then refused to even give her name (she wasn’t wearing her government ID).

All this is so telling of so much that is wrong with our country. Knowledge is power, and too many of our public servants don’t care to learn, and want to keep us ignorant as well.

CARMEN SARMIENTO, menchusarmiento@gmail.com