Why did the "bad eggs" also win?

Well, that is how the cookie crumbles. Not all winners are the good or decent ones. Many unworthy bets won over the more deserving. Let us remember that a barangay election, or any election, for that matter, is not really a contest where the most brilliant and brightest win. Being the best and most qualified is just a small add-on to the entire package. This is a matter of popularity, not credentials or qualifications, but of being a star. In the Philippines, a boxer may beat a lawyer, and a basketball player may win over a topnotch surgeon. It's not about who is more competent, but about who shall get more votes.

And so, yesterday, traditional politics was the big winner. Money, machinery, organization, influence, a bit of terrorism, and some cheating and trickery. This is not a game of the good, decent, and honest ones. This is the game of the street-smart, the astute with cunning and chicanery. The least that a candidate for barangay captain spent was half a million pesos for a constituency of just 2,500 voters. They really do not take Comelec limitations seriously. What can P5 for every voter afford? Banana cue and softdrinks? Voters are not cheap. They have to be fetched, ferried, and fed. Others must have money to spend after voting.

The bad eggs won because voters have to be spoiled. We do not know how to solve this chicken-andegg puzzle: Are there corrupt politicians because the people are corrupt, or are the people corrupt because of corrupt politicians? Who is corrupting whom? Whatever it is, it takes two to tango. A corrupt electorate will most probably vote into power corrupt politicians. Candidates resort to graft because they need to recover the money spent in vote-buying, feeding, and ferrying voters. Voters have to be bribed because they feel they are only remembered during elections. Thus, demanding money, food, and transportation are their way of making "bawi" because for the next three years they will be ignored, forgotten, and neglected.

Many bad eggs won yesterday because they have more money than the decent candidates who refused to buy votes. Many undeserving winners won because they were endorsed by the mayor, congressman, or the party in power. Some dirty candidates won because of money from drugs, illegal gambling, and cybersex operations. Many unworthy winners come from wellentrenched family dynasties. They have the whole clan working for their bet. They campaign relentlessly, spend a lot of money and exert pressure on people who owed them favors in the past.

The winners yesterday were not all deserving to lead. But then again they were chosen. And if they turn out to be real bad ones, those who voted them have no one else to blame but themselves.