"Let’s keep hoping that Mr. Duterte makes the right choices."
There is no need for President Rodrigo Duterte to declare martial law. He has been practically an absolute ruler or dictator since he assumed the highest and most powerful public office.
Yet he did not employ or harness the military and the police to have his decisions followed and respected. And in the recent special session of Congress, he was given emergency powers which will be terrifying if misused or abused.
Since he took his oath as president, he has been running the country by himself.
He stripped Congress of its importance an equal and third branch of the government. He made the Senate and the House of Representatives mere satellites of the executive department.
Senators Koko Pimentel and Tito Sotto would not have been senate presidents without his blessings. When he put Senator Leila de Lima in jail, not even a whimper was heard from most of the senators.
When two of his allies in the House could not give way to each other for the speakership, the president split the term of the presiding officer because he could not disappoint either one of them. He made both beholden and subservient to him.
When Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez was thrown out of his chair in the last Congress, the President did not lift a finger to prevent his ouster. Former President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo could not have grabbed the speakership without the help of the President’s daughter, Davao City Mayor Sara Duerte, and Malacanang’s blessings.
President Duterte figuratively put the Supreme Court in his pocket. Most of the justices always upheld the President’s decisions every time they were challenged. He even had a chief justice kicked out for standing up to him.
The President’s relationship with Vice President Leni Robedo has been amusing were it not degrading to the woman who is first in line to succeed him. Twice, he gave the widowed VP positions in his administration; twice, she was unceremoniously dismissed.
He described a former senator who has been his most vocal critic as a nuisance. Senator Trillanes has not been heard or seen around for some time now.
He has made decisions which were clearly outrageous and exasperating but he simply ignored the brickbats and laughed off the indictments. Why should he be bothered? The opinion surveys show that he enjoys very high acceptance and performance ratings. This means that most of the people approve what he has been doing. They like him because he thinks, talks, and hurls insults and dirty jokes like most of them.
No one of national stature appears capable of challenging the leadership of the incumbent President. Keen observers of the political scene in the country share the prognosis that since he cannot seek another term, Duterte will decide who will succeed him. As yet, however, no one among those close to the President appears to enjoy a rarefied political ascendancy as to be beyond the reach of the others.
Whoever he chooses to step into his shoes will ascend to Malacanang, even if he lacks the credentials for the high office.
But now, President Rodrigo Duterte is confronted with an insidious and treacherous enemy which is toying with his wit and wisdom, and testing his courage and resilience. This enemy is fearless of his power and authority.
The pandemic is ravaging the nation with impunity. It has claimed the lives of hundreds of people and keeps spreading – no antidote has yet been found.
The president has to put threatened communities under quarantine or locked down. This has crippled the national economy and rendered millions immobile, jobless and destitute.
While the administration is racing against time in setting up much-needed medical facilities and attending to thousands of patients, efforts to address and cushion the economic impact of the crisis have bogged down, mainly for insufficiency in funds, inefficiency, mishandling and corruption in the distribution of good packages and cash dole.
Protests and complaints are coming out every day. Many are getting restless, desperate, hungry and angry.
If the social disorder becomes goes out of hand, the government will be confronted a far more serious crisis than the deadly virus infestation.
President Duterte can and should raise P200 billion to P300 billion to finance the cash amelioration program and complete the facilities needed to contain and eventually wipe out COVID-19.
Now is the time for President to exercise his emergency powers. He should ask and demand from the richest families that they lend him at least ten percent of their wealth. The 50 Filipinos listed in Forbes magazine’s roster of billionaires has a combined wealth of over $27 billion or Pl.6 trillion.
The loans will be paid from the sale of government properties, treasury bills and future revenues.
These wealthy citizens should emulate the president of San Miguel Brewery, Ramon S. Ang who has voluntarily extended billions worth of food assistance and paid the salaries of thousands of his employees.
The President can now show his authoritarian disposition by boldly exercising his emergency powers and authority. The wealthy Filipinos cannot refuse to lend him the money. He can confiscate their wealth if he is forced to do so. If before he can ride roughshod over anybody and get away with it, now he can be authoritarian and make himself a dictator and no one will dare howl.
Today, at this perilous and trying times, there is no one in the country to whom the people can look up to for salvation and succor than to the man who holds in his hands their lives and their souls.
President Rodrigo Roa Duterte, for all his braggadocio, high-handedness and shortcomings, has been given the privilege to be revered rather than loathed and the rare opportunity to be great and noble.
Let us pray he makes the right choice.
Mr. Ernesto G. Banawis is a student of government and history.
