The State of the Nation Address of President Rodrigo Duterte was almost up-ended, eclipsed even, by what transpired in the process of changing leadership in the House of Representatives last Monday.
For an hour and a half, and despite seeing on the video wall that the President had arrived on time, we had to wait for God knows why, as the drama of the instant coup d’etat unfolded behind closed doors.
One perhaps salutary consequence of the delay of the President’s speech was that for the first time in three Sonas, he hewed closely to the prepared text. He must have realized that bladders could not endure an hour and a half or more of extemporaneity. Except for some ad libs, such as Pilipino translations of certain statements made for emphasis, the brevity and crispness of the speech was a very pleasant surprise.
But observers in the Batasang Pambansa’s cavernous hall, and even outside, must have wondered why transitions could not have been made with some degree of civility.
Never mind the requisites of statesmanship. In this day and age, the word might be an oxymoron.
The Senate had its own transfer of leadership recently. All the senators had to do was show their previous president a resolution signed by a majority that they had chosen another. Grace of acceptance followed.
But of course, one has to differentiate the more numerous House of 286 members. As usual, stealth precedes the political maneuvers involved in decapitations.
Even the deft adjournment of the morning session by the presiding deputy speaker which effectively, if temporarily denied the call for reorganization was no excuse to force the issue on the same day. Change could have happened the day after, unless of course, the tacticians were unsure of their hold on their precious numbers.
The least that could have been done was to respect the sitting President who was scheduled by law to speak at four that afternoon. That the Chief Executive had to referee an internal squabble in situ is something for the books.
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The delivered Sona was to the point, crisp and deliberate. It was a reassurance that the President was not about to cavil to populist pressure, as in the certification of the remaining packages of comprehensive tax reform and that of rice tarrification, which are not exactly popular with many sectors.
This President, we are assured, will do what is right even if right is not always popular.
And his asking Congress to finally pass a National Land Use Policy, a bill that has been pending in several refiled versions since the 1987 Constitution resurrected this legislature, alongside threats to oligarchs and greedy traders and those who continue to despoil the environment—all these fortify the determination, the political will that one admires most from Duterte.
Congress must realize that time is not an ally of the Filipino people in its march towards progress, or even, as the President keeps saying, “making the lives of our people more comfortable.”
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A sour note, and inexplicably too often, is an egregious spelling error in the Key Accomplishment Report for 2016-2018 released by Malacañang.
On its cover, yes, it’s cover, the title emblazoned is: The Duterte Administation: Year II. (ADMINISTATION, take note).
After Norwegia and Rogelio Golez, and countless other gaffes, even spelling of a word used all too often in government?
If there is a saboteur inside the PCOO, as once alleged, why hasn’t he been identified yet and exiled to the tender mercies of Bato de la Rosa? Or if it is sheer incompetence, why hasn’t he or she been fired?
Why continue to embarrass the presidency of the land? Onli in da Pilipins!