UNLIKE one Cabinet official who compared President Rodrigo Duterte to Jesus Christ, we prefer to take a somewhat more hard-nosed approach in assessing this administration’s progress after its first 100 days in office.
Much has already been said about the President’s bloody campaign against illegal drugs, in which about 3,000 suspected pushers and addicts have been killed since he took power. The campaign has drawn international condemnation over the summary execution of hundreds of suspects who have not had the benefit of a trial and the deaths of innocents—including children—who are caught in the crossfire.
The international backlash has, in turn, triggered a torrent of expletives and anti-Western rhetoric from the President, who threatened to downgrade the country’s alliance with the United States in favor of China, and who has dared international donors to cut off their aid to the Philippines if they are unhappy with the human rights situation here.
On the other hand, a large majority or 84 percent of Filipinos, according to the Sept. 24 to 27 Social Weather Stations survey, say they are satisfied with the government’s crackdown on illegal drugs. Law enforcement officials, however, ought to take note of another finding, that 71 percent of the 1,200 respondents in the nationwide survey, believed it was “very important” for drug suspects to be caught alive.
In any case, the sentiment of the majority, as of now, appears to be that some action, no matter how drastic, is better than none.
The same cannot be said for this administration’s feeble attempts to meet Duterte’s promise to fix the mess in public transportation, which now qualifies as a form of torture. After 100 days, the only thing the Transportation department has to show is pending legislation in Congress to grant the President emergency powers to deal with the problem, and a handful of promises.
And as far as promises go, these are pretty meager.
The Land Transportation Office, for example, has promised to issue drivers licenses that are good for five years, up from the current three—but says these will be in the form of paper receipts, not plastic cards, which it hopes to distribute by the second quarter.
But we do not put much stock in the promises of the LTO, an agency so corrupt and inefficient during the previous administration that it charged motorists and drivers for license plates and drivers licenses that they never released.
Under a new administration that promised change, the Transportation department has been an unacceptable laggard, doing precious little in the first 100 days to actually ease the travails of commuters and drivers stuck in soul-sapping traffic in Metro Manila, improve the operations of the MRT or address the injustice suffered by millions of drivers and vehicle owners who pay the LTO hard-earned money to get only a slip of paper and some vague promises in return.
Unlike the Cabinet member who said he followed Duterte like the fishermen of Galilee followed Jesus, we are more like the doubting Thomas—the apostle who insisted on examining Jesus’ crucifixion wounds before believing in his resurrection. Unlike Thomas, however, we have already seen the gaping wounds in public service; what this government needs to do is move faster to heal them.