Welcome to 2018
However some of our leaders tried, many of the crooked and nefarious practices of governance embedded by the dictatorship were never easy to uncover.
Imust admit that I was very glad to see the back of 2017, as the popular expression goes.
Fractious, divisive and disruptive. I can think of many other adjectives for the year that passed, but I don’t think I need any more. Our readers get it. Whichever side of the political fence they happen to be sitting on, it was not difficult to see that our nation and people have never been so at odds with each other. And so it is with great hope and anticipation that I look forward to 2018 as a time of coming together – not matter how little the progress – because given the gap that already exists between the opposing sides, any improvement at all is great relief.
To be completely honest, I have never been a big fan of this administration. Truth be told, I have never been a big fan of past administrations either, dating back to Marcos, the president I was born with, and grew up opposing until my early adult years. Power corrupts, as the saying goes, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Hence, our politicians have always been flawed characters of some sort or other, only varying in their degrees of dysfunction.
Although I spent a great deal of my time outside the country, I have always been an avid observer of the goings-on back here. And it wasn’t difficult to see that we were never really able to recover from the contagion of the Marcos dictatorship. For however some of our leaders tried, many of the crooked and nefarious practices of governance embedded by the dictatorship were never easy to uncover, much less uproot. Some post-Marcos leaders, it has to be said, tried harder than others. Even so, even the most well-intentioned still fell far short of the transparent and clean government they all pledged to deliver.
That’s why I completely understand why the nation took a different turn in 2016. After all, insanity – as they say – is doing the same things over and over again, and expecting a different outcome. And so, tired of being insane for so long, many Filipinos went for the unthinkable. Rather than elect a conventional presidential candidate into office, they opted for one who was a different cut from the rest. Never mind that he came with a lot of baggage, by way of rough manners, loose morals and questionable ability. He was a different breed, something new and untested in the national stage. Heck, why not? Everybody else had been tried, but found wanting. What harm can this one do, right?
Reasonable sentiments, indeed. And with good reason, at that.
And yet, even I was prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt. Never mind that his character, his manners and his overall demeanor I could not countenance. Never mind that his constant attacks on my faith and beliefs put me off. Never mind that his skills in governance were limited to ruling over a local city for generations, and his diplomatic acumen was close to zero. As people often said in the time of Marcos, even a dog would be a better alternative. And so it was that in 2016, the same hopeless euphemism would resurface. Not that the current president is a dog by any means. What I am saying is that whilst he is hardly hewn from the fine timber of presidents, many people dared rather gamble on him, than on the other same-old, same-old presidentiables.
But a year hence, are we any better off, really?
I want to say that we are, but I can’t be honest with myself while saying that. Because in truth, we are not. More to the point, in many respects, we are quite possibly worse off than we were prior to this administration.
But ever the optimist, I want to say that this time around next year, I am hoping to be proven otherwise. There is still plenty of time. The period for huffing and puffing has now passed. Bluster and braggadocio must now give way to the real tasks of governance, however hard this may be. And the sooner this leader and his government start doing less of the grandstanding and more of the governing, the bigger the chance that 2018 will be much, much better than the year we just left behind.