The popularity argument is being worn thin by the Duterte camp. It is devilishly difficult to gauge public sentiment more so considering there is a multitude of competing “survey” firms that claim to be “scientific” and “unbiased” in their methods of getting a reading on public opinion.
It seems political and “thought” leaders as well as pedestrian observers have not learnt much from the sketchy reliability of displays of popularity in the past. The catastrophic defeat of Leni Robredo in the 2022 elections is one case in point. Displays of solidarity in massive rallies backed by the chi chi clique of the private school set and their Catholic schools together with the amplification services of mainstream media all failed to deliver her that “important” presidency. Donald Trump’s ascent to the presidency of the United States is the most recent example of a similarly incompetent appraisal of public sentiment by inbred liberal thinking.
Perhaps then it is worth considering that supporters of embattled former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte could be barking up the wrong tree. Images of sporadic mass protests in his support bubbling up in the Philippines and abroad being shared across social media may lead one to believe that there could be a pathway to Duterte’s getting out of the bind he is in. However, this all seems akin to the same situation in the South China Sea where Filipinos too had dropped the ball. Once you’ve been tricked into ceding territory to the enemy, it is very difficult to get it back. The government of current President Bongbong Marcos was very clinical in its (practically literal) execution throwing out a pain-in-the-ass political rival over the fence and into the hands of a foreign “court” hungry for validation.
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Duterte may not come back alive but his coming back dead could be that silver lining his “die-hard” (DDS) supporters are scrounging around for. One must not discount the power of necropolitics. This is, after all, a country with a state religion that uses a dead man hanging off a cross as its rallying icon.
We have, after all, no less than almost half a century of contemporary Philippine history to look back to for lessons — from the time the bloodied body of the late former senator Ninoy Aquino was paraded through Manila’s streets for political gain, the rise of the Second Aquino presidency on the back of Cory nostalgia, to the body of the late “dictator” kept in cryo over the course of his journey to a hero’s burial. That’s not to mention the National Hero himself Jose Rizal who was written into Philippine history books on the back of his “martyrdom” in the hands of Filipinos’ then colonial masters.
At this stage, now that his camp have all but dropped the ball, former President Rodrigo Duterte is more valuable dead. While alive, his political capital and that of his camp will progressively be eroded as the trial in The Hague drags on and more of the details of his alleged “genocide” is used as fodder by the Yellowtard-Communist Axis and their European chums.
benign0 is the Webmaster of GetRealPhilippines.com.