Beware the candidates’ insiders

WHO do we blame for the Philippines still being poor, beset with so many socio-economic ills, including malnutrition, lack of access to affordable medical services, food insecurity, inadequate mass housing, criminality, and many others?

For this long and continuing national malady, we curse the presidents we’ve had for missed opportunities and outright mismanagement.

Marcos destroyed the Philippines’ institutions and the nation nearly ended in permanent perdition. Joseph Estrada has been the most clueless of all our chief executives. Gloria Macapagal had a golden opportunity to lead the country to progress in the post-Marcos era but inexplicably allowed corruption to flourish under her watch.

Today some people are still unhappy, but chiefly because the current administration’s critics have succeeded in devaluing its achievements.

Its critics from the Right don’t want to stay on the outside merely looking in. They’re working hard to gain power for themselves.

Those from the Left don’t want to become even more irrelevant to national politics. They keep hammering the government lest they lose their reason for existing, which is to criticize and make the government unpopular.

But even the most committed reformist government cannot eradicate all the problems of the present and those inherited from the past.

Still, we blame our misery on our presidents. But, if we think about it, these presidents would not have become president without the help and loyalty of the people around them, their inner circles as it were.

Marcos was aided by a large cast of otherwise bright people who were competent managers and technicians. The word “technocrat” entered the Philippine political lexicon during Marcos’ time when he brought into government eggheads who were good at crunching numbers and solving technical problems.

Unfortunately, Marcos also deployed people – men in uniform – who were good at crunching people who didn’t approve of Marcos’ strong-arm tactics.

Estrada wouldn’t have made it to Malacanang without the urgings of otherwise bright people who wanted a taste of power. Nobody in his or her right mind would ever choose Erap to be president because he simply didn’t have the intellectual capacity to lead a nation. But he believed his myrmidons who told him he could do it, to the utter detriment of the nation.

And then Arroyo helped depose Erap and took over the presidency. It still defies understanding today why, given a chance at glory, Arroyo allowed corruption to run wild in her government.

In all three cases, loyalists and insiders helped these presidents stay in power. Marcos die-hards up to this day pledge undying loyalty to their idol. The technocrats rationalize their support for Marcos by saying that things would have been worse had they abandoned the strongman, which is a lot of self-serving hogwash.

Perhaps the ones who deserve much blame are the whisperers to Erap who made him believe he could lead the nation. And as to Arroyo, her generals helped to prop her up as long as they were allowed access to the feeding trough.

The common denominator in all this has been loyalty, that exemplary personal trait that is most valued when used for the loftiest aims. But when used to promote and prolong wrongdoing and evil, it can be the most contemptuous vice.

So, in the coming elections, don’t just cast a skeptical eye on the candidates themselves. Look at the insiders too, the supporting cast who are very influential and can sway their principal’s mind. Because they’re hungry for power, they play blind to their master’s excesses and faults.

Beware of the loyal servants and selfish whisperers. They’re the ones who impose their unworthy clients upon us the common people.