Even those who had worked with him in the campaign were skeptical that he could deliver an inaugural address in five minutes. Or even 20. They had heard him go for as much as two hours standing on a platform before a huge crowd, effortlessly, untiringly perorating about every subject that entered his mind. Nothing read, nothing ghost-written, nothing rehearsed.
Thus, but for the few who had read his speech before delivery, his first address to the nation and the world as President of the Philippines came as a surprise. Yet ever playful, he chose to ad lib a few lines, about being ready to work for the nation. It was mercifully short and clipped, again a surprise for those who had expected the ad lib to be protracted.
One could imagine how the then president-elect, days before his rendezvous with destiny, poured out his thoughts to lawyer Melchor Quitain, his faithful city administrator of Davao, almost like dictation. Quitain, who perhaps aside from Bong Go, knows Duterte more than anybody else, simply arranged Duterte’s thoughts into a cohesively short speech. Even the quotations were apt, capturing the essential Duterte. That the President quoted Roosevelt, who led the New Deal that gave America’s poor hope after the Depression of 1929, is a reflection of his populist philosophy. That he, however, quoted the Great Emancipator’s lines cautioning against inciting class hatred—“you cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong, or help the poor by discouraging the rich”—is a reflection of his strong socio-economic beliefs, which he himself practiced in Davao City. This was about allowing business to prosper with ease, mindful only of their adherence to the law and proper regulations.
The American ambassador must have been comforted by Duterte’s quotations from their greatest statesmen. The Chinese ambassador must have hoped for a line from Confucius, or even Mao. Nonetheless, he seemed quite happy as he sat in rapt attention at the Ceremonial Hall of Malacañang.
The ending was again quintessential Duterte: “I have long adopted as my article of faith the following lines…I have no friends to serve, I have no enemies to harm.” No special favors; just the national interest. No vindictiveness, just upholding the rule of law.
Sometime in August last year, when the nation was yet anticipating whether or not the feisty mayor would run for president in May 2016, before an audience of bankers and business people, he used similar lines:
“First, I hold it as an article of faith that no progress can ever be achieved unless there is law and order”…
“My second article of faith is equally simple: A leader must always listen to his people…You learn from the rich as well as the poor, the schooled and the un-schooled”…
“Let business flourish by making it easy to do business, and let government be one of utmost transparency and accountability.”
Note how he stressed these principles in his first imperatives to his Cabinet and the entire bureaucracy: “I abhor secrecy and instead advocate transparency in all government contracts, projects and business transactions from submission of proposals…to consummation.”
And juxtaposing his thoughts back to when he addressed the business community in August of 2015, I refer to these lines: “It is from the poor that my third article of faith developed…that it is the responsibility of government…to use resources optimally so as to uplift the lives of the marginalized.”
The “metamorphosis” of Rodrigo Roa Duterte from folksy city mayor to presidential candidate who dramatically captured the anguish of the Filipino people in raw language, and now to the 16th President of the Republic of the Philippines, has indeed happened. We witnessed it last June 30.
From the simple elegance of the Ceremonial Hall to the simple finger foods served at the reception, to the brevity of his address, even to the symbolism of the Philippine flag embroidered on his almost barely laced barong Pilipino, the metamorphosis struck. But the essential Duterte was left unchanged.
The style may have become more refined, but the man remains unchanged.
The articles of faith, the bedrock principles he has always stood for, as prosecutor and mayor and now President, remain the same.
May God bless him as he strives to lead the meaningful change our people have long aspired for.
And may God give us all the wisdom and the fortitude to help arrest the “erosion of faith and trust in government” and “have the courage and the will to change ourselves.”
“Love of country, subordination of personal interests to the common good, concern and care for the helpless and the impoverished—these are among the lost and faded values that we seek to recover and revitalize as we commence our journey to a better Philippines.”
Indeed, let us all “together, shoulder to shoulder, take the first wobbly steps in this historic journey” with this man we elected our leader.