Mabini Hall - Access to Justice

In more than one conversation, we hear the emphatic statement that Filipinos are a creative lot and hardworking too. “Magaling” in the colloquial. The Filipino worker is held up as a model employee. Why, even Filipino nannies are the preferred choice anywhere in the world. If only we are provided with the right incentive or the proper environment. The repeated examples are performing as executives in regional companies or following traffic rules in foreign countries.

Another common refrain is only if we had discipline or had a benevolent dictator to lead us, the world is ours for the taking. Then we dive into a litany of the woes of our politicians as leaders and the failure of governance in every nook and cranny. We formulate our own save-the-country philosophy and proclaim our cause without thinking if this is not a consequence of our own folly.

We may be that good and more but truly di nga ba bobo ang Pinoy?

Election after election since we ‘won’ our independence, we manage to elect a mix group of leaders who manifest their best intentions to do their best for us. Surely there have been a few good ones but the sad part of our story is the slew of bad ones and some of them can get really, really bad. The challenge is again upon us this May elections and in a sense it marks a watershed year – the year when we collectively decide to exercise our common sense or let our bobo-ness prevail once again.

This bobo-ness consists of voting into office candidates based on their popularity. What does a Best Actor reward have to do with passing meaningful laws? How come delivering a knock-out punch is considered deliverance into public office? Why does a media personality deserve pork barrel? Already and specially this time, we see a more discerning electorate in the surveys and in outbursts among the man on the street. There is a growing awareness that just because one is popular or is seen on television does not equate to a good politician. Note the oxymoron but I digress. Politicians always look for the limelight.

I said previously that certainly any patriotic Filipino has the right to stand for office. However, it would be a brainless for any senator to jump into a boxing ring simply because he ranked first. It is stupid for a congressman to start aspiring for an Oscar because he won 80% of the popular vote. The converse is true.

What is most important in this discussion of bobo-ness is this: without using the standard of name-recall, how do we really know whom we should cast our precious vote for? For the educated ones, we ourselves cannot tell evil from good. All the candidates spew rhetoric that warm the hearts were it not for our cynicism. All of them promise heaven and more heaven if only they were in power or returned to power. We don’t believe them and yet, what choice do we have? From among the contestants, how do we judge aside from our surface information and what we little we know of issues aside from gathered anecdotes.

Alas, the flaw in our democratic system is that it is governance by perception. Those who can either portray themselves favorably to all or manipulate the system for their benefit. Is the antidote simply to vote for people we haven’t heard about on election date? Surely, the poorer and lesser known candidates will be more sincere and truthful. But horrors of horrors with a little inspection, is this not a bigger sell-out akin to the dumb vote? There is just no structure to guide us or mechanism to enlighten us. Even the lights in the church can only come up with general statements. “Bobo nga ba ang Pinoy?” is a question which definitely requires an intelligent answer and we need it fast.