Saving face

 

 

The Filipinos’ knack to poke fun at themselves is beyond belief. Self-ridicule seems almost a justification for all and everything, whether it’s for misery or bliss.

 

We indict ourselves for our inability to follow the “rule of law” as the rationale for where we are now as a society or a nation, perpetually struggling to move up as others have already left us in the dust. As one blogger wrote: “Filipinos cannot progress if they cannot follow even simple guidelines.”

 

Where is the truism in this?

 

Yet, traditional Filipino culture reflects an enduring and time-honoured reverence for family values such as respect for elders and people in authority, in the spirit of bayanihan (cooperation), and the fruits of hard work. The Christian faith has also taught Filipinos to be eternally hopeful and to show their faith not only in the observation of church rituals but also in helping and serving others in need.

Manila compared to "gates of hell" by American author, Dan Brown.

With respect to laws, Filipinos have always lived under a regime of a law of rules since time immemorial, whether in the larger and narrower sense of the law as it relates to limits and sanctions on social and individual behaviour. Whatever violations or aberrations exist either as often or once in a while, these are common occurrences that are not solely endemic to Filipinos. After all, the crime rate in the Philippines is still lower than in Chicago or Detroit, for example. Or the chances of getting killed by guns are higher in Iraq or Afghanistan or even in the U.S. than in the Philippines.

 

Filipinos, in general, are slow to anger and not too easy to be aroused to rebel against their government to seek redress for grievances even if these would be sufficient to stir a civil war or widespread rioting in other societies. That despite corruption in government and dishonesty of its elected officials, Filipinos have kept their trust in their political system and continued to go through the periodic rituals of national and local elections even though these have not benefited them directly through greater access to social services such as education and health or to opportunities for a better life.

 

Where else in the whole world could we find people who are as easygoing as Filipinos, as if their social problems don’t really matter? Or where the capital city is described by a foreign writer like the gates of hell and yet would accept it as a matter of fact, not pure fiction, and even make fun of it? Or where the incompetence of their politicians is vividly displayed on television in competition with regular soaps but even this would not raise hackles enough to jolt the entire country?

 

Or where could you find various forums or discussion groups, whether on Facebook and other forms of social media, which provide an enlightened free-wheeling exchange of opinions on what ails the nation – from lack of sanitation and sewage system to urban planning? Or where else could you find so many pundits and newspaper columnists who never run out of ideas on how to run the government or change society in general?

 

Our society as a whole seems to have been infected by the virus of intellectualism that every hub where people gather or chat can boast of a discussion group bursting with good ideas.

 

Our country is an oddity in itself, an abnormal exception to the rule. It is not because Filipinos cannot follow guidelines or subject themselves to the grand imperial reign of the rule of law. But perhaps, because we have so much of these rules already, that we have been paralyzed to suffer in silence and acquiescence. Or is it simply, we are just a people who love to talk, talk, talk.

 

Because we love to talk, we also love to denigrate ourselves. We enjoy exposing our frailties and shortcomings; we don’t mind if foreigners like the writer Dan Brown would paint an ugly picture of our capital city, or Hollywood actors such as Claire Danes could dismiss Manila as “just f--king smelled of cockroaches,” or in more graphic terms, “There's no sewage system in Manila, and people have nothing there. People with, like, no arms, no legs, no eyes, no teeth.... Rats were everywhere.”

 

Our martyr complex numbs us to embrace these condescending remarks as the harsh reality of our fair city and forget that such horrible characterizations could also apply to other cities of the world, not just to us. But while other societies are apt to revolt, Filipinos would just shrug their shoulders and accept their travails as ordinary humdrum occurrences. If Manila were the gates to hell, then everyone passes through its gates before entering the afterlife.

 

Kidding aside, our country has progressed since we deposed that dictator Ferdinand Marcos. That’s a fact, not fiction. But not very much, though. The martial law years put our country back in the throes of the dark ages and we have not fully recovered from our false attraction for a strong leader. Little did we know that a leader could only be as strong as the people like them to be.

 

In 1987, the country ratified an important piece of document, a body of rules we ought to follow as a nation, which we call our Constitution. In this document, safeguards against a dictatorship or a return to an oppressive system of government were installed which are popularly known as the democratic provisions of the Constitution.

 

If we want change, we don’t have to start big, in the hopes that if we are successful, the many little things that we nitpick and grumble about daily will disappear. Neither do we have to be too ambitious.

 

Let’s just start with the basics. With what we have right now. Yes, with these so-called democratic provisions and see how far we could go. After all, it’s been 26 years since the 1987 Constitution was ratified and none of these so-called democratic provisions ever saw the light of day in the form of practical pieces of legislation.

 

What are these democratic provisions of the 1987 Constitution?

 

The Constitution speaks of prohibition against political dynasties in Section 26, Article II. There has been no successful initiative in Congress to define and implement this prohibition against political dynasties so far but it has been a hot political topic every election year.

 

Article 5 of Article VI provides for a party-list representation, a mechanism of proportional representation in the election of representatives to the House of Representatives from marginalized or underrepresented sectors of society. Although this provision has been implemented as early as the May 14, 2001 elections, the party-list law is so murky and unclear that its implementation by Comelec is far from being adequate and effective or questionable if it truly serves the mandate under the Constitution.

 

A system of initiative and referendum is provided under Section 32, Article VI whereby the people can directly propose and enact laws or approve or reject any act or law passed by Congress. This provision apparently recognizes the effectiveness of referendum in advanced democracies, but so far, this remains untouched and has not been translated into law.

 

Another popular innovation in advanced democracies—a mechanism of recall—found its way in the 1987 Constitution, Section 3, Article X, but is only applicable to local government-elected officials. It is a positive step towards democratization of local politics but Congress has remained silent or simply uninterested in enacting an enabling law.

 

Lastly, and this has been controversial and has raised several questions before the Supreme Court, the 1987 Constitution in Section 2, Article XVII has allowed for amendments of the Constitution through a people’s initiative, in addition to calling a constitutional convention or holding a constituent assembly.

 

All these provisions are in the Constitution. They are there to recognize and uphold the bedrock democratic principle of government that sovereignty resides in the people and all government authority emanates from them, as declared under Section 1, Article II of the Constitution.

 

If President Noynoy Aquino is r-e-a-l-l-y serious about his presidency and historical legacy, he could direct his attention to these democratic provisions in the Constitution for the remainder of his term. The demand and public clamour already exists, but our leaders in Congress have remained deaf or intentionally playing dumb to listen.

Philippine President Noynoy Aquino ponders about the legacy
of his presidency.

It was during President Cory Aquino’s tenure that the 1987 Constitution was ratified, an important milestone in the country’s history. The country had just been liberated and was rising from the ashes of repression during the martial law years. President Noynoy Aquino, the son, could now complete the country’s ultimate return to democracy, if only he has the political will to do so. Completing his mother’s greatest legacy could be a crowning achievement of his presidency rather than the vacuous “daang matuwid” philosophy of government he’s been selling from day one.

 

If nothing of this sort happens, then the Filipino people should put President Aquino on notice, that they are seceding from the republic and forming a new government. The Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) is about to form their own Bangsamoro nation, thanks to President Aquino, so why can’t the people do just the same? If nothing happens, we might as well all head to the hills and join the rebels.

 

President Noynoy Aquino can still save his derrière by acting as a true leader now—meaning, TODAY.

The path of least resistance

 

 

If we are to construct a hierarchy of excuses for the dismal performance of those candidates whom we would have liked to win in the last May 13th elections, on top would be “the idiots” who voted for those not supposed to win.

 

These are the masses, the ordinary people who are not educated to vote according to Senator Miriam Defensor Santiago. Yet, these are the same people that traditional Filipino politicians woo (or buy in most cases) their votes every election time.

 

We always blame the poor masses, because it is easy to point out their inability to choose wisely and their vulnerability to material inducements. Candidates from political dynasties take advantage of their families’ fame and the legacy of those in their families who did well in politics, movies, business and sports. Particularly in the election of senators, popularity and money are all the candidates need in order to win.

Results of the 2013 Philippine elections showing the 12 winning senatorial candidates from the
major political parties and political dynasties.

It is not the masses who are at fault. Rather, it is the politicians and the oligarchic elite they represent who have made elections a meaningless popularity contest.

 

Why do we elect senators nationwide, in the first place? They don’t represent a basic constituency. Besides, only those with money, power and name recognition could win. The results have always been the same ever since senators were elected nationally.

 

No senator, for instance, has ever been elected on the basis of job competency and integrity, except for a very few like Jovito Salonga, Jose Diokno or Lorenzo Tañada.

 

The likes of Teddy Casiño, Risa Hontiveros or Ed Hagedorn have virtually zero chances of winning despite their impressive political credentials compared to Grace Poe, Nancy Binay, Cynthia Villar, JV Ejercito Estrada or Bam Aquino who all relied on the magic appeal of their family names.

 

In 1946, Luis Taruc, former Hukbalahap Supremo and five of his fellow candidates for the Democratic Alliance decided to run for Congress. They abandoned their armed insurgency against the government and chose to take the path of least resistance. But once elected, all six members of the Democratic Alliance were prevented from attending Congress to vote against an important legislation such as the Bell Trade Act and an amendment to the Philippine Constitution that would grant United States citizens equal economic rights with Filipinos, particularly in the exploitation of natural resources.

 

Many Filipino nationalists including those in the left like Taruc and his colleagues in the Democratic Alliance opposed giving parity rights to American citizens. But the US government stipulated in the Philippine Rehabilitation Act of 1946 that payment of war damages amounting to US$620 million was contingent on Philippine acceptance of the parity clause.

 

Taruc and his fellow elected Democratic Alliance representatives were denied their seats in Congress on cooked-up charges of fraud and violence during the election campaign, which left them with no other choice but to dig up their arms and resume the Huk rebellion. In a similar vein, President Noynoy Aquino this time wanted all his candidates for senators to win in the last elections to secure a docile majority in Congress so he could easily shove his pet project, the Bangsamoro Framework Agreement, without stiff opposition.

 

The next time militant candidates would venture in electoral politics was during the post EDSA-elections of 1987 through the hastily-organized Partido ng Bayan, which fielded a senatorial slate that included former New People’s Army chief Bernabe Buscayno (Kumander Dante), National Democratic Front chair Horacio “Boy” Morales, Kilusang Mayo Uno leader Rolando Olalia, labour leader Crispin Beltran, newsman and publisher Jose Burgos, peasant leader Jaime Tadeo, and beauty queen-turned-activist Nelia Sancho. Partido ng Bayan also fielded 36 candidates in the congressional race and supported allies in the local elections.

 

Those in the Left found themselves painfully dancing with their enemies in the latter’s domain and the ensuing result was a miserable failure with all its senatorial candidates losing in the elections. Partido ng Bayan would soon disband after their disastrous foray in the political arena.

 

The legal Left would rejoin parliamentary politics in 1998 using the party-list system in entering the elite-dominated Congress.

 

Under the banner of Bayan Muna, the Left won three seats for party-list organizations in 2000 that surprised even some hardcore members of the underground movement. In 2004, Bayan Muna expanded its electoral base with additional party-list seats for the peasant and worker-based Anakpawis and the women party-list Gabriela. It added another seat for the youth-based Kabataan in 2007.

 

To further expand its influence, Bayan Muna and other leftist party-list organizations formed a broad alliance called Makabayan. It entered into a tactical alliance with mainstream political parties that would help improve the chance of its prospective candidates at winning in national elections.

 

In 2010, Makabayan fielded Bayan’s Satur Ocampo and Gabriela’s Liza Maza, whose terms as party-list representatives were ending, as senatorial candidates in an uneasy coalition with presidential candidate Manny Villar of the Nationalista Party. Villar’s senatorial slate also included Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr., son of the late dictator and it meant that Ocampo and his Makabayan alliance would have to grudgingly campaign for the younger Marcos. Both Ocampo and Maza failed to win.

 

In last Monday’s May 13 elections, Makabayan fielded Teddy Casiño as its candidate for senator but Casiño failed miserably in joining the magic 12 by finishing in the 22nd spot. So with Risa Hontiveros, candidate of the social democratic party-list Akbayan, but at least she finished a notch higher than Casiño.

 

Why have the progressive and leftist groups not learned their lesson?

 

The biggest problem with Philippine electoral politics is that the system is rigged in favour of the candidates of the oligarchic elite.

 

Most, if not all, national and local positions are in the hands of powerful political families who also represent the interests of those who control the country’s economy. A combination of political and economic power is lethal. Traditional political parties or their coalitions can easily run roughshod over candidates fielded by the progressive and militant sectors of society. They have the machinery, the money, and their famous moniker.

 

To be successful in parliamentary politics, progressive organizations, including those in the Left, should not rely on elections alone. It’s probably their biggest mistake to aim at winning seats in the Philippine Senate which is anathema to real democratic representation. A better alternative is for civil organizations to return to the parliament of the streets by demanding the abolition of the Senate and the establishment of a unicameral legislature where its members will be elected by districts on the basis of proportional representation. This would be a long and protracted process, but it is still a better shot than fielding candidates for senators who have no realistic chances of winning.

 

Real and meaningful democratic reforms must start with the implementation of the democratic provisions in the 1987 Philippine Constitution such as the party-list system of proportional representation, prohibition against political dynasties, citizen initiative to amend the Constitution, people’s referendum to enact legislation, and the right of citizens to recall their representatives and elected officials who have failed to meet their expectations. This would entail a massive dose of political will by our elected leaders, but still attainable if civil organizations, the Left and other progressive groups, would mount continuing pressure on Congress to enact the necessary enabling law to implement these democratic provisions in the Constitution.

 

Many continue to clamour for the role of education in effecting social change as if education is the answer to everything. That the masses need to be more educated so that they should know who to vote in office, whether it be the president, member of Congress or city mayor. But that is short-sighted and places a heavy burden of responsibility on the masses when they are not to be blamed for our political malaise in the first place. For as long as the country’s mainstream political process continues to be wedded to a false ideology that democracy is all about elections, the oligarchic elite will always find it easy to dominate politics.

Ousted Philippine president Joseph "Erap" Estrada elected as mayor of Manila during the
May 13 elections. Photo by Associated Press. 

After almost twenty years of dictatorship under Ferdinand Marcos, the Filipino people have regained their democratic foothold by deposing the dictator and dismantling the institutions he had put in place to shore up his illegitimate government. The adoption of the 1987 Constitution augured the great promise of democratic renewal but successive leaders after Marcos forgot this potential to restore and rekindle democracy in the Philippines. Instead, the post-Marcos years until today restored and reinvigorated the old oligarchy and the results of every so-called democratic election confirm the re-entrenchment of the oligarchic elite and their families in the political system.

 

There is always a disruptive alternative to the path of least resistance when all options have been exhausted. But how much more would the ordinary Filipino people bear and persevere with a political system that has continued to deny their voice in the democratic process?

The no-debate debate

 

 

If anything, the last U.S. presidential debate last Wednesday is a clear sign that the next debates between President Barack Obama and challenger, former Governor Mitt Romney, will end up just the same.

 

No surprises, no clear winner, and the public not any more informed to make their intelligent choice upon Election Day.
 

Barack Obama and Mitt Romney will face off three times in person ahead of the 2012
U.S. presidential election on Nov. 6. Click link to view "Presidential Debate 2012: Obama
Warns Against Voucher Programs,"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=THry-9wN1_Q  



As one political observer noted, “America doesn’t really have presidential debates.” The candidates are just making joint appearances, as if agreed on beforehand, for them to regurgitate tired talking points and lies. Instead of the debates being enlightening or even transformational, they are “staged-managed to satisfy the demands of power brokers with money and connections rather than the needs of democracy.”

 

The ultimate result of these presidential debates has long been fixed by the so-called bipartisan Commission on Presidential elections. For over a quarter of a century, this commission which relies on big corporations for funding will ensure that the debates work best for the interest of the major parties and also for the networks to boost their ratings.

 

Since Ralph Nader started to run for U.S. President, he had fought hard to have a place in the debates as the Green Party candidate but the organizers never backed down in preserving the status quo. No third-party candidates had ever won a spot in the debates, a sign that the organizers are more concerned with the partisan interests of the two major candidates rather than with the democratic interests of the voting public.

 

The current U.S. presidential debates are under pressure from reformers who want to open the presidential debates to make them more interesting and relevant.

 

For example, there are suggestions to let activists ask questions based on their knowledge and experience. Or allow moderators to challenge the candidates by asking follow-up questions and to encourage candidates to go at each other.

 

But the format of the debates limits the questions to the same ones that have been asked and answered a million times. Naturally, the candidates are expected to respond as coached and prepped by their handlers. With most of the moderators belonging to the same old club of white-media stalwarts, they are not expected to rock the boat or stray outside of what is usually agreed as the sphere of legitimate controversy.

 

A New York Times editorial summed up last Wednesday’s debate as follows:

 

“The Mitt Romney who appeared on the stage at the University of Denver seemed to be fleeing from the one who won the Republican nomination on a hard-right platform of tax cuts, budget slashing and indifference to the suffering of those at the bottom of the economic ladder. And Mr. Obama’s competitive edge from 2008 clearly dulled, as he missed repeated opportunities to challenge Mr. Romney on his falsehoods and turnabouts."

 

“Virtually every time Mr. Romney spoke, he misrepresented the platform on which he and Paul Ryan are actually running. The most prominent example, taking up the first half-hour of the debate, was on taxes. Mr. Romney claimed, against considerable evidence, that he had no intention of cutting taxes on the rich or enacting a tax cut that would increase the deficit.”

 

Viewers of the debate were bombarded with the hollowness of Mitt Romney’s arguments and left baffled by Obama’s unwillingness to expose it when he has the facts on his side. This unfortunate scenario is made worse with the timidity of the moderator, Jim Lehrer of PBS, to jump in and challenge either candidate on the facts.

 

Do presidential debates really enrich the democratic process?

 

Hardly, says Scott Horton who calls this ritual of presidential debates “The Zero-Calorie Debate” in his article in Harper’s Magazine. He doesn’t see the candidates or the campaigns as the problem, but “the quality of questioning that came from the carefully-selected media questioners. The questions actually asked are remarkably predictable. By and large, the questioning operated to lower, not to raise, the caliber of the political debate.”

 

Last Wednesday’s debate shows how much disinterested Jim Lehrer was with his questioning. Instead of helping the viewers and the voters understand the candidates or their policies, Lehrer simply sat on helplessly while the candidates slugged it out with their recitation of tired talking points. No wonder many must have switched their television channel to a sports broadcast that was being aired at the same time following Detroit Tigers’ Miguel Cabrera in his quest for the triple crown in baseball.

 

There are many questions which should lie in the heart of political debates but have never been asked. An environment has been engendered in which scrutiny of presidential candidates has become superficial, and in which candidates can get away with so much lying and distortion of the facts. False or bogus claims are often made without shame or correction. Little actual debating is done on substantive issues that matter because the debates are packaged to resemble a television game show.

 

Poverty and pressing questions on energy and the environment aren’t the only subject candidates would likely gloss over in the debates.

 

Questions that are likely not to be asked during the debates are: “What will the candidates do to address the growing problem of more than 20 million people in America who have incomes below half the poverty line—less than about $9,000 for a family of three?” or “What will the candidate do as president about the growing hunger crisis in America—especially for young children?

 

As Scott Horton has observed: “Our political culture continues to avoid vital issues. Instead, we are treated to political tragicomedy.” These debates are impoverishing the entire political process, Horton adds.

 

In the Philippines, we have also held televised debates between presidential candidates in our attempt to copy almost everything American. But do these debates make Filipinos more informed about their choices? If the American experience is found to be distracting, how much more can seven or more candidates obfuscate the entire process by telling the viewers their version of lies and bogus claims?

 

Just to win, the biggest liar of them all usually takes the crown especially if the candidate is connected to powerful political clans and business corporations, or if he could bank on the political legacy of his parents, even if he has the reputation for doing nothing.