By the middle of 2015 it had become clear that there would at least be three candidates for the Presidency of the Philippines. Jejomar Binay had declared, on the day that he took his oath as Vice-President, that he would be a candidate for the Presidency in the 2016 election. Having given way to P-Noy Aquino in the 2010 election, it was virtually unthinkable that Secretary of the Interior and Local Government Mar Roxas would not receive the Presidential blessing as standard-bearer of the Liberal Party in 2016. And Grace Poe was bound to want to vie for the nation’s highest position in the wake of her No. 1 finish in the 2013 Senatorial election.
The number of candidates for the Presidency has now risen to five. Senator Miriam Santiago announced her candidacy after an apparently victorious battle against cancer, and the mayor of Davao City, Rodrigo Duterte, likewise, threw his hat into the ring thereafter.
The voters who will troop to the polling precincts less than four months from now can, essentially, be divided into two groups: the thinking and the unthinking. Among the unthinking are those who believe that Jejomar Binay will make a great Chief Executive because he dispenses goodies to the captains and residents of barangays and has so-called ‘boodle fights’ with them and also those who believe that Rodrigo Duterte will solve the nation’s numerous and multifarious ills with peace-and-order actions that mock the Constitution’s Bill of Rights and negate the concept that human beings have rights.
As the word suggests, thinking involves analysis, reflection, evaluation and judgment. The thinking element of the voter population takes a good look at the Presidential candidates, examines their track records, evaluates the things that they have done and have failed to do and monitors what they offer as solutions to the problems of Philippine society and governance. In the process questions arise in the thinking voters’ minds regarding the candidates’ capacity to maintain a viable campaign to reach the finish line, to cross the finish line first and, most important of all, to be a competent and decent President of the Philippines.
With barely four months to go before Election Day, the thinking voters—what percentage of the total voting population they represent, I don’t know—are wrestling with difficult questions as they decide whose name to place on the ballot space reserved for Presidential choice. My discussions with both acquaintances and strangers have led me to believe that the questions that continue to nag the thinking voters are the following.
One question relates to the Liberal Party standard-bearer’s continued poor showing in the opinion polls. Is Mar Roxas really unelectable, or is there an enormous disconnect between the survey numbers and Mar Roxas’s (and the Liberal Party’s) basic political strength? After all, the daang matuwid administration is not without significant economic and social achievements—indeed, it has many such achievements to show—and the Liberal Party has the No. 1 functioning political machinery in this country. And Mar Roxas, a rich individual, does not have to worry about not having financial support sufficient to carry him to the campaign finish line.
The big question that both the supporters and critics of Vice-President Binay are wrestling with is whether the continued fairly high opinion-poll numbers of Binay really represent a winning support level or whether between now and Election Day Binay’s steadfast refusal to face the music of the Senate Committee on Accountability of Public Officers and the Anti-Money Laundering Council will come home to roost and convince even the D and E income groups that the former Makati City mayor cannot be trusted with power and public funds.
Binay’s supporters are hanging tough and are hoping that nothing bad will happen to his candidacy between now and Election Day. Binay’s critics believe the D and E will eventually recognize his unwillingness to accept the concept of public accountability.
The big question that is troubling thinking voters about Grace Poe is not whether the Supreme Court will grant her candidacy its imprimatur—they believe that the High Court will find a judicial formula that will allow her to run—but what she will bring to the national table. They note that thus far Senator Poe has not said anything that has not sounded daang matuwid-ish, and they believe that her service as movie-censors board chief hardly qualifies her as an experienced administrator. They feel that Grace Poe will be a highly manipulable Chief Executive.
The thinking voters I have been speaking with have no issues with Senator Santiago’s capability to be a competent President of the Philippines. What they have an issue with is the credibility of the medical reports on the state of her health. Has she really been fully cured of her cancer? If not, is the remission likely to last for six years?
Admittedly, some thinking voters are attracted to San Beda-trained lawyer Duterte’s rough-and-tough approach to criminality, especially to the drug trade. More thinking voters will be attracted to Duterte if, between now and Election Day, he begins to—in the words of former President Ramos—sound and act Presidential. The thinking voters think that Rodrigo Duterte will be an excellent foil to Jejomar Binay and will draw many votes away from the Vice-President. Will the Supreme Court allow him to run also? The High Court will likely not be uninfluenced by continued high opinion-poll numbers for Duterte.
These are things that this country’s thinking voters have in mind four months before Election Day.
E-mail: rudyromero777@yahoo.com