The toughest job
It occurred to me while listening to candidates during Tuesday’s proclamation rallies that blared through the airwaves – and the deafening sound of applause and laughter that greeted their opening salvos – of how unnerving the next 80 days or so will be.
Sure, there were inspiring speeches, words that give hope, songs that ignite love and dreams, and detailed plans, but the ones with the loudest and most thunderous applause reeked of rhetoric and empty promises. Oh, here we go again. How we Filipinos love to listen to the same campaign promises again and again, told and retold like runes. We just can’t resist the self-deprecating dramas, the endless patronizing, the below-thebelt jokes and jabs that thrive on schadenfreude.
But it shouldn’t be surprising, really.
After all, we are a nation that grew up listening to radio soap operas, endless stories centered on villains and underdogs; on forbidden love and fervent hopes. For decades, taxi drivers were hooked on these dramas while stuck in traffic, so were helpers as they folded heaps of clothes.
We grew up watching teleseryes with the same forlorn themes, pitting the cruel rich against the poorest of the poor, or those with mythical superheroes out to save the day.
When we’re not crying over the twists and turns in these dramas, we’re laughing our hearts out over endless slapstick sitcoms that are usually nothing, but an insult to the very essence of what comedies should be – to hold a mirror up to society to reflect its follies in the hope that they will, as a result, be mended.
And then there are the noontime shows. The longest running noontime show in the country is Eat Bulaga, 43 years and counting, spreading its brand of humor and at times misogynist jokes nationwide – mula Aparri hanggang Jolo. Quite literally, Tito Sotto, a strong vice-presidential candidate, laughed his way to the political arena.
These indeed are the opioids that have been shaping our ballots all this time – endearing voters to the underdogs, to those who portray themselves as folk heroes; to those who promised to destroy the elites, but who in reality actually belong to the very class they criticize.
It’s one of the reasons movie stars turn to politics when the klieg lights of showbiz go dark on them. It’s the reason Joseph Estrada won in the 1998 presidential election and the reason the late Fernando Poe Jr. almost won the 2004 polls, losing only by a million votes to Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.
Indeed, choose a theme from the usual teleseryes and you’re sure to find it in the campaign trail.
Take Filipinos’ love for the underdog, for instance. It’s one of the reasons that Ferdinand Marcos Jr. is so popular. The more criticisms he gets, the more his ratings climb.
Isko Moreno and Manny Pacquiao like to highlight the poor versus the rich plot, as President Duterte did.
Riding on this theme, but taking it a bit further, Leody De Guzman goes for the populist, but economically impossible approach, as most socialist leaders do – from taxing the wealthy to putting government affairs in the hands of the people.
Panfilo Lacson and Leni Robredo have laid down detailed plans for the economy, but it’s not so clear how well they’re getting their message across.
Real life
At the end of the day, this electoral process is no fiction; our country isn’t a teleserye. We can’t be enamoured by empty promises or jokes like the one delivered by the burly Jinggoy Estrada – who is facing a plunder case – nor should we be deceived by candidates who promise us the moon and the stars, but don’t even follow the laws of the land.
The country’s problems are so serious and the next president for sure will have the toughest job.
He or she needs to fix a COVID-19-damaged economy -joblessness, a pile of debt, supply chain problems, business closures, inflation, and so on.
The health situation remains a problem, too, because the virus is still very much around. The next president needs to strengthen healthcare, focus on long-term research on drugs and vaccines, etc.
Education is equally important so that succeeding generations will know what happened in the past, and at the same time nurture dreams for a better tomorrow not just for themselves, but also for our country.
The fundamental problems must also be addressed – patronage politics and shameless graft and corruption.
The poorest of the poor
The biggest responsibility of the next president though is to actually see the helpless and the hopeless; the downtrodden who are desperately struggling to survive in this nation of 110 million, the poorest of the poor who can’t even get a shot at life.
It’s really how to make Filipinos dream again for a better tomorrow and know in our hearts of hearts, the government will help us achieve our dreams; to be able to have faith in the government again, and not be broken hearted in the end.
It’s going to be a tough job for sure, and I hope we all realize this isn’t some teleserye, or Pinoy Big Brother or Eat Bulaga. This is real life. This is a real country. This is a true story. The pandemic has shown us what can happen if we choose incompetent leaders. You see, incompetence can’t even recognize incompetence.
And the biggest lesson the past two years is this – we’re only as good as the leaders we choose.
Iris Gonzales’ email address is eyesgonzales@gmail.com. Follow her on Twitter @eyesgonzales. Column archives
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