Writer Butch Dalisay urges government to create Department of Culture

MANILA, Philippines – Veteran writer and professor Butch Dalisay has once again called on the government to create a Department of Culture to raise culture to a level of national importance and strengthen its impact on the country and the economy.

“I need to say that I’m not a big believer in more bureaucracy, and we know how bad bureaucracies get. However, I think it’s important to raise culture to that level,” Dalisay said, speaking at the Pandesal Forum’s World Poetry Day celebration on Tuesday, March 21. 

“Many other countries have ministries of culture,” he said, explaining that it’s about time the country had one department to integrate various culture-related agencies “so that it can come up with a roadmap or a development plan for culture.” 

According to Dalisay, agencies such as the Cultural Center of the Philippines, National Commission for Culture and the Arts, Film Development Council of the Philippines, and National Historical Commission of the Philippines would fall under the Department of Culture.

The department, he said, can provide incentives for artists, strengthen creative industries, and professionalize rates, among other things. 

He went on to say that culture should be seen as more than just entertainment, but rather something that can boost the economy.

“Yung problema kasi sa atin (our problem is), we still think of culture as an intermission number…. But we do not see it as a matter of national, even economic importance,” he said. He cited an article he read about how the long-running Broadway musical The Phantom of the Opera has generated billions of pounds in revenue throughout its 36-year run.

“That tells you, culture is revenue…. We need to raise it above that level,” he said.

Fifteen years ago, Dalisay and national artists Virgilio Almario and Ramon Santos worked together to draft a proposal for the creation of a Department of Culture, and they have been advocating for it since. 

In 2018, several bills were filed at the House of Representatives to establish the Department of Culture. The bills, collectively known as the “Department of Culture Act of 2017” sought to create an independent body that would protect and develop Philippine culture, creating disaster risk reduction and management plans for cultural properties, and ensure dissemination of artistic and cultural products in the Philippines and overseas.

At the time, the bills were met with opposition by then Buhay party-list representative Lito Atienza, who pushed instead that culture be placed under the Department of Education. – Rappler.com