All that really matters to the political and economic elite is that they continue to be the political and economic elite for as long as possible.
The Philippine Constitution (pick any of one of them), the government (it doesn’t matter what form), the legislature, the court system, and all other institutions are there precisely to maintain and protect the status quo.
The biggest lie Filipinos are living is that they have a democratic government because they vote every three years and because they supposedly have ‘free speech’.
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What most of them still don’t realize is that there is hardly anything different among the politicians that campaign for various positions. They don’t represent choices at all because they’re really the same except for their names and the way they word the array of promises that they use to curry favor with the electorate. In fact, if you review the platforms of government that Presidential candidates were circulated, you’d note that they seemed to covered the same areas with the same promises and emphasized the same things in different ways.
Of course, I’m looking at things from a voter’s point of view and not from the point of the country’s political and economic elite.
In the article, Blanche David-Gallardo recounts a conversation she had with Kris Aquino while they were on the same airplane flight from Hongkong to Manila. Blanche, who introduces herself in the article as a retired journalist, asks Kris about why she chose to endorse VP Jejomar Binay as her candidate for the 2016 elections.
And here’s the meat of the article…
“What is it about him that makes you think he can step into your brother’s shoes?” I persisted, like a dog worrying a bone. Perhaps, I was looking to be convinced. Maybe there is something in the man that I am missing, failing to see.
“I like him. It’s a personal choice!” she said.
“But why?” I insisted, and as she started to answer, I thought to further qualify my question: “Is Binay really your honest idea of the person best able to take over and carry on your brother’s daang matuwid legacy?”
“I was in the process of replying, and you interrupted me,” she threw back at me, apparently irked.
“Sorry. My mistake, carry on.”
“I like him. We like him. He’s helped us a lot. He is always there for us,” she said.
End of conversation.
What? That’s it? Is that really all there is to it? A matter of preference because of present/past favors? A matter of personal gratitude? With Butz Aquino’s announcing his and the other Aquino/Cojuangco clan members’ support, what could be more dismaying for the Filipino public?
The country as fiefdom to be awarded to the most accommodating vassal! And I thought we were living in a more enlightened age, and feudalism is a thing of the past.
But of course, feudal lords will always be on the side of their fellow feudal lords… Kris of Hacienda Luisita and Jojo Binay with his 500 hectare farm in Batangas!
Not stated in the article are the two main reasons why the political elite will support a candidate… One is whether the Presidential candidate has a strong chance of winning and two is whether they derive some benefit from the Presidential candidate.
Winnability was actually emphasized in a conversation on Facebook I had with Inquirer Columnist and Gawad Kalinga advocate Jose Ma. Montelibano.
I engaged Montelibano in a Facebook post of his where he put up a link to an article showing that Vice President Binay was leading in one survey or another. I asked Montelibano about whether the survey indicated if the people who responded to the survey gave any indication that they were making their choice with a full understanding of what a President is supposed to do and what national issues the country was facing. As expected, Montelibano said yes but couldn’t really say for sure how he knows that the people were responding to the survey based on an understanding of the Presidency, full information about the personalities involved, and on accurate information about the issues the country was facing.
If I have to spell it out, surveys are really just measures of popularity. And for most Filipinos, popularity is a virtue.
Anyway, in the Facebook conversation, what was apparent was that all that mattered to Montelibano and presumably Gawad Kalinga is that Binay was winnable and that they had strong connections with him.
When I asked Montelibano about whether it bothered him that there were a lot of allegations of corruption against Binay, he merely brushed it off as if none of it mattered and there’s pretty much an argument going around in GRP that corruption as an electoral issue take the backseat to actual competence. (To say that Binay represents competence because he was a mayor of Makati is another whole ball of yarn that needs to be unraveled and one starts that by asking if it was Binay or the Ayala’s the put up the Makati Business District.)
To put it bluntly, the supposed advocate of “servant leadership” modeled after Jesus Christ’s example turns a blind eye to a question and a rather lengthy article written by Miriam Grace Go… Can Binay explain his wealth?
Though certainly not an exhaustive list, one meme keeps circulating asking how Binay acquired the following properties…
400 hectares Binay FARM-Rosario Batangas
40 hectares Binay FARM-Bauwan Batangas
10 hectares Mango Orchard
2 Condominium units in Rockwell woth P30 Million each
1 Three Storey Mansion in Banuyo Street, San Antonio Village
Rest house in Tagaytay Highlands
Rest house in Alfonso Cavite
Rest house in Zambales
Rest house in Pangasinan
Houses in Paranaque, Pasig, Mandaluyong, and Muntinlupa
And yet another question that keeps nagging at me is this…
Why is ABS-CBN allowing Kris Aquino to virtually campaign for VP Jojo Binay through her shows in the TV station? Why hasn’t ABS-CBN come up with an investigative report on Binay’s hidden wealth?
Writer.
Jojo Binay
Notices the name Jojo….
GOODBYE, JOJO~!
“The Philippine Constitution (pick any of one of them), the government (it doesn’t matter what form), the legislature, the court system, and all other institutions are there precisely to maintain and protect the status quo.
“The biggest lie Filipinos are living is that they have a democratic government because they vote every three years and because they supposedly have ‘free speech’.”
It isn’t the Constitution per se but the political establishment that colludes with an entrenched oligarchy to arrogate privileges to themselves. They selectively enforce and manipulate the law in order to transmit those advantages to their descendants over time to maintain their hegemony. With the exception of certain sloppy provisions such as those governing property and business ownership that are blatantly racist (and which should really be amended), the Constitution aspires to egalitarian ideals. The slapdash manner in which we treat the rule of law is another matter.
@ (WOW) JOHNNY SAINT impressive vocabulary (NOT !), but basically bullshit that translates into ‘they are just crooks that look out for each other’, yeah yeah yeah! per se ! LOL !
Philippine Democracy = Kleptocracy
W-W-W-WHAT?
Johnny Saint’s vocabulary has the advantage of being able to CLEARLY distinguish between various ideas and mindsets. Your’s is prone to vague generalizations.
As Johnny Saint alluded to in his comment; they are not “just crooks”; but something much more deeply entrenched. They are a cancer on the body politik of the nation that threatens the very life of our democracy.
@ Seabee, its clear that you are confused and delusional as well. You THINK you live in democracy !
WAKE UP, the guy is right, you live in a KLEPTOCRACY DUH !!!!! the guy was much clearer in expressing the true nature of the the Philippines political climate….and did so in fewer and clearer words.
The country is sooo corrupted that it is impossible to not know.Top to bottom, inside out, upside down and round and round…CORRUPT ! Morally bankrupt politicians stealing everything that is not nailed down
=KLEPTORACY !
What is it w/you and Saint? that you get so butt-hurt about? The guy is an ASS-HAT (Shithead) that is full of himself. one word says it all, dress up a pig in lip-stick and a dress…its still a pig !
He perfectly describes our democracy, what’s your problem with that?
Rest house in Tali Beach
Rest house in Puerto Azul
Rest house in Tagaytay Highlands
Rest house in Alfonso Cavite
Rest house in Zambales
Rest house in Pangasinan
That family sure “rests” a lot!
In Hacienda politics, crooks ally with fellow crooks who could best protect their loots.
If VP Binay becomes P, then Kris and her clan is sure of having another 6 years to enjoy their loots.
When landlords talk, everybody listen. But, Lady Kris needs to nag now, to make Don Jojo of Coconut Palace to move to Malacanang come 2016.
For me, opulence or high social status should not be the measure of being elite (like the elite forces in the military) but one’s expertise – his skills, talents, intelligence, revolutionary or profound contribution in the society. People who could only brag of what they own or who they are instead of what they’ve done (actually there’s no need to boast a notable accomplishment. It will leak on its own), they are only as good as the garbage they show off. Some of today’s elite could be equated to rubbishes.
I have yet to come to terms with being a vassal or serf.
You are proned to be abused and suffeted if you are a serf, but if you are a vassal, you have a chance to save money so you could buy the land and be landlord yourself.
hahaha
Binay is a crook…Aquino is a crook…so they have to perpetuate their crookedness…
I had wirtten earlier, that I cannot understand why Filipinos keep voting for crooks…
Somebody replied: “Because everybody in the Ballot is a Crook…”
We have no choice…whoever you choose is a crook; or will become one.
@ T H ,yes…THEY ARE ALL CROOKS.
(Could you )Remind SAINT/JEFFERSON and that other idiot DOMO !
Letting these people run the country has gone on long enough? Binay, ze little monkey pussed le tarte will have his butt licked by Krissy so her brother doesn’t have to go to the Airport named after his ‘Rolling-in-his-grave-Father’ in a wheel-chair. Like all the rest of the criminals running the estafa that is the Filippine gov’t., BSA3 will be set upon by a tooth-less le tigre that will no doubt growl like a big cat but will treat BSA3 like a pussy-cat treats her Man.
Maybe he’ll have to ‘go to Hospital’ like GMA but he will come and go as he pleases, just like GMA does, until the dumb as rocks Filipino’s just forget about him or the Catholic church says, solemnly, ‘we must treat our leaders with compassion.’, HA!
Get out the rope!
The Philippines is a fiefdom of the Tsinoys while the Filipino people is at the mercy of these Tsinoys who treat and view Filipinos as dirt.
Unless a revolution occurs, nothing will happen in this country.
I agree. I hope it’s gonna happen.
The trouble with filipino politics is that their is no center. You have no equivalent for the American Democratic Party. No one to represent the middle class and working poor. All you have is the Oligarch Celebrities or the Communists.
Correct! The multi-party system can form weak and too much compromised democracy.
The American Democratic party, LOL ! You are living in 1975?
There is no hope for you, none ! This last comment says a lot about how clue-less you really are.
Good luck to you, your gonna need that, by the truckload ! WOW!
Sea Bee,
The funny thing is that both the Democratic Party and the Republican Party would both place to the right of the political spectrum, with the latter placing farther to the right.
European politics is a better example of balance and pluralism than US politics, wherein there are more or less proportionate representation from either true left-wing or right-wing political parties.
The problem with Philippine politics is that it is characterized more by personality and patronage, with little developed sense of ideology or platform. It has more in common with feudalism and oligarchy than modern representative republicanism.
You stated that you are a amateur grass grower.
Sir Paul Farol may I ask, WHAT KIND OF GRASS DO YOU FUCKING GROW
Thanks. Great article btw.
The real issue about VP Binay is “MORALITY”. Binay was appointed OIC of Makati by the Late Cory Aquino because of Joker Arroyo. He became Mayor of Makati for a long time, passed to her wife and son. Binay or Jojo Binay ang his family became very wealthy or Billionaire. Do you think Cory Aquino, the Aquino and Cojuangco family did not know about the doings of Jojo Binay? They should have reprimand him? being a closed ally and family fried like Kris Aquino has been boasting. Imagine Cory Aquino always said in many occasions that Jojo Binay is his “FAVORITE MAYOR”, and boasted by Jojo Binay during the wake of Cory Aquino. Now, do the Aquino and Cojuangco has morality too? How if Jojo Binay will be lected President in 2016? Another victory of 6 years for the Aquino and Cojuanco family. Another 6 hard years, full of corruption for the millions of filipino people. Oh my God Help our country.