With thousands expected to compete for 18,272 national and local posts up for grabs, who should we vote for in the coming midterm elections?
It’s not an easy task to choose who among candidates for senator, district and party-list representatives, and local officials from governors, vice-governors and provincial board members to city and municipal mayors, vice-mayors and city and municipal councilors are really qualified to run for public office.
It’s the Commission on Elections, of course, that will first approve the candidacies of aspirants based on a set of minimum criteria. The prospective candidates must be of a certain age and can read and write, are natural-born citizens, registered voters, and residents of the place where they seek public office, among other criteria.
It is up to the voters themselves, however, to determine for themselves whether their candidates deserve to hold public office based on track record, experience in government or the private sector, education and training, competence, and perhaps most important of all, integrity.
And there’s the rub. Voters will choose according to their own value judgments, with some opting for candidates who have helped them in the past, others preferring those who are popular or have name-recall, rather than solid credentials and proven competence as well as unblemished records. Still others will vote only for their friends or their relatives, instead of scrutinizing the capability of candidates to render genuine public service.
Voters should bear in mind that public office is a public trust, as our Constitution emphasizes very clearly, and “public officials and employees must at all times be accountable to the people, serve them with utmost responsibility, integrity, loyalty and efficiency, act with patriotism and justice, and lead modest lives.” Who among the prospective candidates can be expected to meet all these criteria?
Voters should be reminded as well that our fundamental law directs the State to guarantee equal opportunities for public service, and prohibit political dynasties as may be defined by law. But we know that political dynasties have managed to remain in public office throughout the country over the past decades simply because our lawmakers have been unwilling to pass an enabling law based on this particular constitutional fiat since this would diminish the power and privilege they wield from holding public office for as long as they can.
While at this, the electorate should be wary as well of party-list groups whose nominees hardly belong to underrepresented or marginalized groups such as labor, farmers, fisherfolk, youth, women, and indigenous people, no thanks to a Supreme Court ruling that opened the floodgates even for billionaires to hold public office.
The Commission on Elections has the mandate to hold free, orderly, honest, peaceful and credible elections in May next year. But will it be able to fulfill this mandate and strengthen our political system based on free and fair elections that are a hallmark of a robust democratic system?
