SEN. PING Lacson, who never ceases to amaze people for his continuing political relevance, has issued a warning to those who may cast a moist eye on the presidential election, barring unforeseen events, next year.
Who would want to be the next president, presumably after Duterte, he asked?
Well, he might have a more blunt question in mind, like ‘who needs a hole in the head?
Based on Lacson’s realistic view, the next president would have the toughest time in the country’s political history, citing at least seven major humps, excluding unforeseen bumps along the way.
His reality check-list is enough to make the faint-heart presidential dreamer think twice before throwing his hat, head and heart into the fray and faith of governance.
It’s like a tattered fabric of wish and to- do list that resembles the diagnostic results of a person’s health after submitting blood sample for testing. As it is, the values are skewed and abnormal, because what the list shows is the wear-and-tear that country has suffered through the years.
The pandemic, of course, is the latest and most devastating disaster that has been the multiplier of past and present woes in the country that, only a few years ago, has emerged from being dubbed as the banana republic of Asia, to a promising tiger economy in the region.
The tiger has shrunk to a smaller and sick version of itself as the pandemic almost brought the economy to a halt, shuttering and imploding businesses, especially the small and medium ones, that have been the economy’s more dynamic moving parts. Joblessness, poverty, hunger and despair have since marred the nation’s landscape. People think things will get worse before they get better. It’s a mindset that is further aggravated by the convoluted vaccination plan of the government that has eroded public confidence in the vaccine to stop the virus assault. The uncertainty is all over the place.
And then, there is China looming large, if not monstrous, on the horizon for its disputed claim over most of the territories – 85 per cent of them, experts say—in the South China Sea. Most of that is owned by the Philippines as certified by an international court.
China’s unbridled expansion – and exploratory navigations – in the areas can only mean two things: 1) Filipino fishermen can forget about their livelihood as Chinese patrols continue to intimidate them, especially with a new China law that allows them to shoot any foreign vessel in the area and 2) most importantly, Philippines’s ownership of vast oil and gas resources in its maritime territories is greatly at risk.
Over the long haul, the prospect and vision of anoil -and -gas sufficient nation – almost within reach – is dimmed by China’s threat.
The battering of our democratic institutions, which is not in Lacson’ list for obvious reason, is just as a serious concern for the nation. It’s not difficult to see where the country’s direction is going: southward of democracy as freedom of speech and the press and human rights are triangulated. The current hearings in the Supreme Court on the constitutionality of the Anti-Terror Law is now the high point in the public debate on how much more and how much farther this slippery slope will take us. We wait with bated breath.
“A leader is someone who steps back from the entire system and tries to build a more collaborative, more innovative system that will work over the long term,” according to Robert Reich, former US President Bill Clinton’s labor secretary.
With a little more than a year to go before he exits, President Duterte may not be able to do that anymore. With a full spectrum of crises that is weighing down the nation, both the ideal and the practical is to have a new president who can look from the outside and approach the presidency with a new paradigm, still hewing closely to our democratic and Christian values because these are foundational.
Besides, Duterte is already part of the system, if he is not the system. It’s snafu, for the most part.
It is said that a president is elected on the premise that he is supposed to solve his people’s problems. Lacson’s firing a red flare in the sky for prospective or promising candidates is fair warning. The legacy he will inherit from his predecessors — not just Duterte—will be like no other previous presidents had faced. The moral challenge has always been toleave the country better than when you found it. The job isn’t just performative.
Sadly, given Lacson’s portrayal of the republic’s wear and tear, so much needs to be done before another disaster hits us, like a mutated virus that no vaccine can stop. It’s a wake up call no less to every citizen.
