Some are already celebrating, some are not. But one thing is clear: many people are baffled by the rise of Duterte. It is incredible that a mayor from Mindanao can make it to the national scene.  

To make it more incomprehensible, his support base is phenomenal and broad. He enjoys overwhelming loyalty from NCR, Visayas, and Mindanao and attracts tremendous backing from all socioeconomic classes.  

But his rise is not unprecedented. Not too long ago, Poe was where Duterte is now. She was at the top of the game, enjoying significant support across classes and in the different regions of Broader Luzon, the Visayas, and NCR ).  

What makes it different now?  

Duterte has arrived at the national scene at the right time with the right political maneuvering that keeps him a staple of conversations at the dining table.

The Alternative

Duterte has effectively become the more credible alternative to the original alternative.  

Although a neophyte, Poe's decision to run was a welcome turn of events to challenge what then felt as Binay's unstoppable rise.  Binay's popularity declined and Poe was hounded with one issue after another.  Her citizenship, while affirmed by the Supreme Court, has created ripples of doubt about her loyalty to the Philippines, a country whose sense of nationalism remains parochial.  

Poe, the alternative, needed to have another alternative.  Perfect timing for the arrival of the one who curses, speaks Bisaya, and has promised to turn things around in three to six months.  

Like it or not, Duterte is charming not because of his figure but because of his narrative.  He says he is not smart, but vows to make things happen and is willing to hunt down criminals.  As his guarantee, he has also pledged to resign if he fails to deliver on his promises.  

It is this narrative of the feisty oppressed that sets him apart from the loving Poe, that Makati boy, and if I may include him, too, the highly educated man from Cubao.  

When he decided to run for President, he made an unprecedented statement: "Because I have to solve so many problems, stop fucking me….If you want me to do it, then I’ll do it but in my way." 

Resonating with people's longings

Mayor Duterte's brashness does not inspire me but I do recognize that his message is one that resonates with many people's longings. Contrast him to the others and his narrative becomes understandably convincing.

Mar Roxas is a technocrat and speaks the inaccessible language of policy elites. Grace Poe wants to offer her love but her sincerity is now in question. Binay, of course, can't be Binay without his dynastic family and the recurring allegations of corruption. Miriam Santiago is perhaps the other feisty candidate who could effectively challenge Duterte. But this is no longer 1992. Her vigor has become regrettably episodic.  

Mayor Duterte's narrative is the very authenticity that his supporters had been looking for in a long while now.  

He is not afraid of offending people and makes promises based on his accomplishments in Davao. On several occasions he has also dressed down the administration's bet. Forget the fact that his statements are not all factual, like the one he gave on Philhealth.  

The point is that he gives voice to what many people, especially in Mindanao, feel.  Among many other issues during last Sunday's presidential debate, he was spot on when he reminded the crowd of the historical injustices committed in Mindanao.  

Authenticity accompanies his message of understanding oppression, the willingness to confront even the elite, and above all, his ordinariness.

In the final analysis, Duterte's authenticity is what gives him that enviable appeal. But it is also the weapon his supporters are willing to use.  

This explains why many have gone on social media to assist him in this war.  In a statement that evokes recent images of violence and pain, a student I met in Mindanao has this to say on Facebook: 

"You know what, you cannot understand us. You cannot understand poor people because you're elite. You cannot understand...why we keep on bashing Mar and LP and Binay. Hey, it's all we can do.  We don't have any weapon against your money or guns that's why we resort to cyberbullying.  Para kahit papaano, makabawi kami.  Because we know that if we ever do it properly, you will send your fire trucks and bombard us with your water cannons." 

I am certain that many others still wish that Duterte's mouth - or his supporters' fervor - would be his downfall. But that has not happened at all. In fact, he has not backed down.  His recent controversial statements have brought a fresh wave of support for him, perhaps even galvanizing the loyalty of his new followers.

However, it is precisely Duterte's authenticity that repels many others as well.   

For Duterte's hopeful loyalists, May 9 is D-day for which celebrations have already begun.  But for many others, May 9 is a day of fearful reckoning.  

The man from Mindanao, if he were truly the one to turn things around, now has to start reimagining himself as the leader of a divided nation.    

With all due respect, Mayor Duterte and his committed supporters need to get this right. – Rappler.com     

Jayeel Serrano Cornelio, PhD is a sociologist and the Director of the Development Studies Program at the Ateneo de Manila University.  He is also one of the investigators on Vote of the Poor 2016, an ongoing study funded by the Institute of Philippine Culture.  Follow him on Twitter @jayeel_cornelio.

In 2014,the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), released the State of World Population report, The Power of 1.8 Billion: Adolescents, Youth and the Transformation of the Future, which discussed the potential economic gains that countries with large working age population can enjoy through a “demographic dividend.”

The Philippines, which has more than 100 million people with one-third comprising of young people aged 10-24 years old, stands a good chance to benefit from this demographic dividend should it happen. That is the good news.

Unfortunately, realizing the demographic dividend is not automatic. According to the State of World Population report, countries can benefit from the demographic dividend when its working age population is larger than the population that is dependent and younger. 

But to realize the demographic dividend, countries must be able to ensure that the young working-age populations are equipped to become educated, healthy, and productive members of the society. 

(READ: UNDP: Invest in people to sustain growth in Asia-Pacific)

Demographic Sweet Spot and Dividend in the Philippines: The Window of Opportunity is Closing Fast, a study undertaken by UP School of Statistics Dean Dennis Mapa for UNFPA and the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA), says that “the Philippines faces a demographic window of opportunity – a rare opportunity – to benefit from its relatively young population.”

The study shows that this window of opportunity, however, is facing two major challenges: the slow reduction in fertility rate (the average number of children among Filipino women), particularly those from the poorest households, and the high unemployment and underemployment rates among young workers.

So what do we need to take advantage of the demographic window of opportunity? The study points out that putting in place policies and programmes that will: a.) address the unmet needs for family planning; b.) ensure that young people (especially girls) get proper education; and, c.) provide opportunities for productive employment, are critical during this period to prepare young people as they enter the working age phase of their life.

Globally, governments are paying more attention to their youth population through public policy initiatives. However, young people in general still encounter many challenges that hinder their smooth transition into adulthood and entry into the workforce.

The Philippines’ Responsible Parenthood and Reproductive Health Law, or the RPRH Law, attempts to address the problem of high fertility among the poor by making family planning more accessible. However, the law has a unique approach when it comes to Filipinos under the age of 18. It restricts access of minors to modern contraceptives in government health facilities unless they do so with parental consent.

This, despite the fact that teen pregnancy in the Philippines has been increasing over the years. A study released recently by UNFPA on the sexual and reproductive health of young people in Asia-Pacific shows that teen pregnancies in countries in the region have slowed down except in the Philippines where it continues to rise. Young Filipinos' lack of access to reproductive health information and services is the main reason for this.

For most girls, especially the poor, getting pregnant at a young age is a total game changer. They drop out of school for fear of stigma and discrimination. The responsibility of being a young parent also pushes them to take on menial jobs in exchange for an income that is often not enough to make ends meet. That is, if they even survive the many risks posed by pregnancy and childbirth on their young bodies.

Reproductive health and rights are pivotal to young people’s realization of their full potential. Investing in young people by ensuring that they stay in school and have access to comprehensive health care that encompasses sexual and reproductive health, is investing in a bright future for them and the Philippines.

With their education and reproductive health safeguarded, young people will be better prepared to become and remain part of the workforce and contribute to sustainable development.

The Sustainable Development Goals cannot be realized without the youth – today’s SDG Generation, or Generation S. Addressing their concerns and needs are integral to ending poverty. Reaping the fruits of a demographic dividend is not too late for the Philippines, but it will not happen without investing in and involving the youth. - Rappler.com

Klaus Beck is the Philippine Country Representative of the United Nations Population Fund. 

YouthVote Philippines and Young Public Servants are hosting “The Filipino Youth Agenda on SDGs and the 2016 Elections,” a public forum for congressional candidates on Saturday, April 30, at the Samsung Hall in SM Aura, Bonifacio Global City, Taguig. The event is in partnership with UNFPA, the Philippine Legislative Committee on Population and Development, the SDG Youth National Convergence, and Rappler.com. To participate in the forum, register at http://tinyurl.com/YVPForum2016. For more information, visit UNFPA Philippines’ Facebook page.  

With the increasing demand for urban services and infrastructure, heritage sites and structures are often neglected.

Southeast Asia’s so-called ‘ancient cities’ are quite unique in the sense that each has its own identity. For instance, Manila’s heritage areas feature Spanish architecture and US urban design influences, while in the former French colonies of Indochina – Cambodia, Lao PDR and Vietnam – has heritage vestiges dissecting between traditional and colonial monuments. The French left behind a cluster of structures and streetscapes inspired by prominent sites in Paris such as the Notre Dame Cathedral, the Opera House, and the Champs Elyseés. These colonial vestiges still exist alongside traditional structures such as palaces, pagodas, temples and houses and Soviet-era buildings from the 1960s in Ha Noi, Phnom Penh, and Vientiane.

If cities in Europe like Paris, Prague, The Hague and Florence, and in Asia like Kyoto have managed to preserve their centuries-old structures in modern urban development plans, shouldn’t Southeast Asia try to do the same?

Most urban planners in the region prefer modern architecture, which in their view makes a city appealing. This is true especially if they are thinking of attracting the new working class and foreign investors, who seek convenience above all else. City managers in Southeast Asia find it hard to appreciate the value that heritage sites and structures add to the urban fabric. In addition to giving a city its own character, heritage preservation and restoration also impacts land valuation and opens local economic opportunities through tourism services such as restaurants, small museums, and boutique hotels. Restoring blighted areas back to their past glory also rejuvenates inner core areas, and helps reduce crime with well-lit streets and improved accessibility.

Uncooperative private owners are one of the toughest obstacles. In Southeast Asia, people tend to feel emotionally attached to properties they have inherited from their parents or ancestors, and this is a socio-cultural barrier that is difficult to break. Either they don’t like the idea of tourists and visitors invading their private space, or they will only cooperate at a cost which often times is unreasonable.

Even with cooperative owners, restoring an old building is often more expensive than tearing it down and building a new one. Other problems are finding the same materials that were used 50, 100 or 300 years ago, and hiring workers familiar with ancient construction styles. For example, restoring an old Buddhist temple requires the right lacquer painting materials and techniques, not to mention the numerous carvings and sculptures. This is both costly and labor-intensive, and skilled craftsmen are in short supply.

Despite the challenges, there are success stories in Bangkok in Thailand, Siem Reap in Cambodia, or Hue in Viet Nam. Still hanging in the balance are cities like Iloilo in the Philippines, where heritage areas coexist with modern developments, and in Vientiane, where urban planners enforce low skylines to harmonize aesthetically with the city’s old structures.

So do cities in the region have to choose between economic development and heritage preservation? Maybe it’s not whether, but how heritage preservation can become part of a city’s economic development strategy as an investment. This is an urban development perspective that needs to be embraced by city managers generally in developing Asia so the ‘old’ areas can become assets for the local economy and build an identity, instead of being neglected and preserved only in memories or photos. – Rappler.com

Aldrin Plaza is an Urban Development Officer at the Sustainable Development and Climate Change Department of the ADB. This post was first published in the ADB blog.

A specter is hunting the democratic world – the specter of autocratic nostalgia.

With interest groups and oligarchs coopting democratic institutions, average citizens are desperate for a secular savior, who will put an end to the dysfunction and insensitivity of everyday politics. Thus, the illusion of "autocratic miracle" – the misplaced belief that a strong, decisive leader can singleheandly save a whole nation – has gained ground across the world’s oldest democracies such as America and largest democracy, India.  

In fledgling democracies such as Indonesia and Peru, which have experienced rapid economic growth in recent years, “strongman” figures and offspring of former dictators have, quite counter-intuitively, come eerily close to power. In Indonesia, Joko Widodo (“Jokowi”), whose progressive brand of governance catapulted him to the heart of Indonesian politics, came dangerously close to losing the 2014 presidential elections to Prabowo Subianto, a notorious Suharto-era holdover. 

In Peru, Keiko Fujimori is broadly expected to win the presidency, with her father still languishing in jail. Here in the Philippines, Ferdinand “Bong Bong” Marcos Jr is just one step away from claiming the vice-presidency in the Philippines, which suffered three decades of disastrous dictatorship under his father.

Davao’s tough talking mayor, Rodrigo Duterte, who has been dubbed by Filipino sociologist Randy David as a "political outsider" par excellence, is in an even more dominant position in the Philippines’ presidential race. Both Marcos and Duterte, in their own ways, have promised decisive, single-minded leadership to address the Philippines’ greatest challenges. 

Endemic corruption, lack of inclusive growth, and policy paralysis has certainly contributed to the gathering storm of “grievance politics”, which is undermining both new and established democracies. But one can’t deny that the myth of autocratic miracle is also responsible for the contagion of strongman syndrome across democracies, especially in the developing world. 

The question, however, is: Are autocracies superior models of governance, especially in the 21st century? Do countries like the Philippines need to revert back to autocracy to address fundamental challenges such as poverty and (lack of) law and order? Or, alternatively, what is instead needed is a new “Progressive Era” of systematic reform towards establishment of a genuine democracy and robust state institutions, which can cope with the vicissitudes of globalization and complex 21st century governance challenges? 

The Confucian ethic  

A significant section of the voters across all troubled democracies have (mistakenly) come to believe that the solution to their national problems is electing strongman rulers who could shake up the system. Showered in (fact-proof) nostalgia, a growing number of voters have come to fondly remember the autocratic past when Fujimori, Suharto, and Marcos were in power – overlooking the dictators’ manifold failures. To be fair, however, there were economically successful autocratic leaders. 

But most Third World autocrats were no visionaries like Park Chung-Hee, who turned poverty-stricken South Korea into an industrial giant, nor were they an obsessive micro-manager like Lee Kuan Yew (LKY), who turned a middling city-state into a global logistics hub. As leading Filipino economists such as Ronald Mendoza have shown, the Marcos regime, in particular, was largely an indubitable economic disaster. 

To put things into perspective: In the 1960s, the Philippines was a leading Southeast Asian economy, but that was, as correctly put by LKY, mainly because “America had been generous in rehabilitating the country after the war.” By the time Ferdinand Marcos – who promised to make the nation “great again” – captured the presidency, and later declared "marital law", the Philippines’ import-substitution-based economy was on the downhill.

Two decades later, far from becoming “great again”, the Philippines was mired in widespread poverty and insurmountable debt. The country is still paying the price of the disastrous economic legacy of the dictatorship era, eloquently captured by the authoritative works of leading Filipino sociologist, Walden Bello. No less than LKY, the philosopher-king of Singapore, was among Marcos’ harshest critics, openly criticizing the scandalous decadence and chronic corruption that afflicted the Marcos regime.

While lay observers focus on personalities, and myths of great statesmanship, social scientists look at quality of institutions. A more careful look at the "success" stories among (former and current) autocratic nations reveals a much more nuanced explanation for the economic miracles across former autocratic regimes such Japan, South Korea and Taiwan and current autocratic regimes such as Singapore, China, and Vietnam.

In his magisterial work, Origins of Political Order, Francis Fukuyama (2012: 116) argues that the modern state was first established in China. “Modern state institutions were gradually implemented all over China in the later years of the Zhou dynasty [1200-220 B.C], but nowhere more so than in the western state of Qin,” he explained. 

Competent and empowered bureaucracy – reflected in effective tax-collection and war-making capacity – combined with visionary and (often) ethical leadership represented the core elements of powerful Chinese dynasties, which established one of the most enduring civilizations on earth. Over 2,000 years, the Chinese bureaucratic culture would spread across the Sino-sphere, influencing the trajectory of state development in Greater China, the Korean Peninsula, Vietnam, and Japan. Today, practically all of Asia’s economic bright stars belong to the Confucian sphere.

Strong state v. strongman  

In the 1960s, the Philippines and South Korea were almost on the same level of economic development. The visionary Park Chung-hee, albeit ruthless and undemocratic, used his autocrat grip on the Korean bureaucracy to discipline the oligarchs, institute comprehensive land reform, regulate financial markets, and establish the foundations of a modern economy by astutely combining strategic protectionism with export-oriented industrialization.

In certain ways, he was a classic Confucian-Legalist leader blessed with a relatively competent and coherent bureaucratic apparatus. Park, a former member of the Japanese Imperial Army, drew lessons from Tokyo’s Meiji Restoration, which (itself drawing on the experience of late-developing countries like Germany/Prussia) turned an agricultural backwater into an industrial powerhouse.

In Taiwan, Chiang Kai-shek and the Koumintang Party also followed key elements of Japanese and Korean economic strategy, ranging from land reform to development of infant industries and an export-oriented manufacturing sector. In the case of Singapore, LKY built on the British-era bureaucracy, augmenting its elements of meritocracy and toughening measures against corruption. Within few decades, he turned a city-state into a global entrepôt, attracting large-scale capital and great minds from across the world. 

In contrast, Marcos, who oversaw a hollowed American-style bureaucracy, ended up relying on greedy cronies, who only cared about their own interests, as well as misguided economists, who uncritically followed neo-classical economics without any appreciation of the special needs of late-developing countries. A lawyer with minimal understanding of development economics, and drenched in decadence and corruption, Marcos was no Park – and neither a LKY nor Chiang Kai-shek, for that matter – when it came to economic development. 

Under Marcos, the Philippines, in terms of per capita income, went from almost twice richer than South Korea to 11 times poorer (Studwell 2013). Towards the end of the Marcos era, Deng Xiaoping drew on the success stories in fellow Confucian states, eventually turning China into a global economic powerhouse. Vietnam – under the “Dổi Mới” policy, a local twist to Beijing’s “socialism with Chinese characterizes” – followed a similar course after the end of Cold War with considerable success. 

Meanwhile, South Korea and Taiwan – similar to Japan in the mid-20th century – transitioned towards democracy, not long after the Philippines’ 1986 "People Power" Revolution against Marcos. Blessed with competent bureaucracy that oversaw appropriate economic policies, South Korea and Taiwan maintained their economic vigor and managed to become advanced post-industrial societies. In fact, Japan’s most impressive economic gains were made right after its transition to democracy in the mid-20th century. 

These countries’ success wasn’t a function of their regime typology, but instead the quality of their state institutions, their Confucian culture of ethical leadership, and their optimal usage of what Joseph Stiglitz calls "development policy space" during the Cold War years. Without competent bureaucracy, however, none of these countries would have been able to implement, on a sustained and effective basis, necessary reforms for national development.

Non-Confucian autocrats like Malaysia’s Mahathir were certainly more benign and less disastrous than Marcos. A careful look, however, reveals that (oil-rich) Malaysia, which has a relatively small population compared to most of its neighbors, purchased short-term growth under the stewardship of Mahathir (1981-2003) at the expense of long-term institutional decay, economic imbalances, and political instability.

As University of Chicago’s Dan Slater aptly puts it, “The current mess in Malaysian politics is the making of his greatest nemesis, Mahathir”, who oversaw his office as “a haven of autocracy” where “[e]thnic tensions had been reopened to political manipulation,” while the “economy was worrisomely indebted” and “capable leaders” were purged, paving the way for the country’s “sad national decline”, which has reached its zenith in recent years.

The current Malaysian government is grappling with a billion-dollar corruption scandal, with Malaysian politics turning more polarized than ever. In Breakout Nations, Ruchir Sharma eloquently underlines (post-Mahathir) Malaysia’s weakening economic fundamentals and stunted development potentials, which are largely a product of its extractive-exclusive institutions.

The way forward 

Junta-ruled Thailand, which not long ago was a rowdy but economically-vibrant democracy, is now the slowest growing economy in the region. In contrast, a democratizing Myanmar has morphed into one of the brightest economic stories of our times. As authoritative studies show, democracies on average perform better than autocracies, which lack internal checks and balances and are prone to abuse by decadent leaders (Przeworski et al. 2000).

From Argentina to Libya, autocratic regimes have been largely a catastrophe, and, as David Dollar of Brookings institute explains, tend to fall into the "middle income trap" even if, by chance, they managed to make gains at lower stages of development.

Democracies, in contrast, nurture institutions and place constraints on abusive practices. Astute observers like Moises Naim (2013: 2) have pointed out how the physics of power has transformed – making it “easier to get, harder to use – and easier to lose” – to a point that 20th century-style autocratic rule is almost impossible in today’s world. No wonder then, prominent scholars such as Harvard Professor Stephen Walt have called for abandonment of futile and often catastrophic pursuit for "great leaders". 

The Philippines, in particular, has experienced its worst economic record during the years of dictatorship, while its stellar macroeconomic performance in recent years has gone hand in hand with media freedom, good governance initiatives, and heightened scrutiny of public officials and state policies. In short, democratic deepening has gone hand in hand with economic boom.

The problem, however, is that the Philippines is largely an oligarchy-disguised-as-democracy. What it needs is to become a genuine “deepened” democracy – not relapsing into autocratic rule.

The countries’ elected offices are dominated by political dynasties, which control 73 out of 80 provinces in the country. As many as 70% of Filipino legislators hail from political dynasties. The economic landscape is equally oligarchic: the 40 richest families gobbled up to 76% of newly created growth in recent years. Recent growth has barely ameliorated double-digit poverty and unemployment rates.

Aside from civil liberties, which are innate to human nature, ordinary citizens should also enjoy basic economic rights and have an actual say in the decisions of the state.

Instead of flirting with autocracy, which is prone to cronyism and megalomaniac leadership, the Philippines needs to focus on reform-oriented leaders, who are committed to establishing a competent and empowered bureaucracy, fight against special interest and oligarchic co-optation, and adopt the right kind of policies that create inclusive, sustainable growth. 

Like America in the late-19th century, which saw major reforms that made the country both more democratic and economically vibrant, the Philippines also needs its own Progressive Era.

As Fukuyama explains in Political Order and Political Decay, it was the enlightened members of the middle class – who collectively fought against corruption and empowered the bureaucracy – that turned Jacksonian America into an industrialized and vibrant polity, which soon became the world’s most powerful state – and an indispensable nation.

Asia’s most successful economies have gone through both democratic and autocratic phases, but what made them successful was mainly their strong bureaucratic institutions combined with development policy acumen. Enlightened leaders simply built on pre-existing institutional assets. What the Philippines needs more than ever is a strong state, not a strongman.– Rappler.com

Two years ago, Islamist militant group Boko Haram tore through the Nigerian town of Chibok, torching buildings, killingvillagers and snatching almost 300 school girls from their dormitory beds. The brutality of the attack and the mass abduction sparked outrage in the international community with an online campaign that screamed #BringBackOurGirls.

Many of those girls had not been heard from until a few weeks ago when CNN reported that it had obtained a video of some of the "Chibok Girls". The proof of life video was reportedly sent to negotiators by their captors and has been viewed by negotiators, some lawmakers and some of the girls’ mothers.

A stolen life

Dr Jennifer Brahman is president of the Intensive Rescue Foundation, an NGO based in Nigeria that  provides reproductive and health care services to girls and children. Brahman remembers the Boko Haram attack when the school girls were stolen from their beds and Boko Haram’s continuing reign of terror. 

“In 2014, they (Boko Haram) kidnapped over 200 girls from the second school in Chibok, Baron State. Aside from the over 200 girls they kidnapped, they have been grabbing and snatching girls and women and boys and children from homes overall the state. The people that they do not kidnap they kill on the spot – husbands, sons, and grandfathers,” Brahman told me.

Some of the girls manage to escape, some of the men and boys, too. Some are rescued. Many find that they are no longer welcome in their villages.

“Most of the girls have contracted sexually transmitted infections as a result of multiple rapes, some are infected with HIV, and still others are pregnant and do not know who the father is,” explained Brahman.

“These women are used as sex slaves. They are used to make males (babies). They are used as suicide bombers. They come back malnourished, they come back traumatized.” 

They also have to deal with the stigma and shame of being pregnant. Some of the girls are viewed with suspicion, as someone who has possibly been brainwashed by the Boko Haram, their unborn child is thought of as a spawn of evil. They are shunned by their families and treated as outcasts. 

The girls are as young as 5 years old and generally range from 12 to 18 years old.

NGOs like the IRF and international aid organizations help ease the return of the girls and boys by offering medical assistance. They are immediately tested for sexually transmitted infections and treated. If they test positive for HIV, they are put on anti-retroviral therapy. Psychologists offer support and counselling.

The girls who are pregnant are given the option to put the baby up for adoption or have an abortion – even if abortion is illegal in Nigeria.

Brahman explained that there are many cultural barriers, religious barriers but NGOs whose mandate is to “provide free and affordable reproductive health care services, including abortion and comprehensive abortion care” give them the choice of having an abortion. 

The girls usually opt for abortion. But a few of them don’t.

“One particular incident comes to (mind). Last year, she (one girl) decided she must have a baby. It’s not the baby’s fault. As I speak to you, that girl has been stigmatized, ostracized. Even her own mother doesn’t want to see her, irrespective of the trauma that she’d been through. Just by making the decision to keep that baby, she had been ostracized,” recalled Brahman.

Stolen. Forced into being a sex slave or suicide bomber. Made pregnant by unknown men. A future  of contempt and humiliation.

Terminating a pregnancy becomes a humane solution to end the suffering. – Rappler.com 

Are we so callous as to disregard the pervasive human rights violations of the Marcos dictatorship? Is it the aversion of Filipinos to remembering the pain of fellow Filipinos? Is it our way to make us forget the endless troubles besetting our country that make us turn our backs on the human rights abuses during the dark Marcos era?

The fact that Bongbong Marcos topped the surveys the past weeks is a serious cause for alarm for those who persevere and refuse to accept the possibility that the son of a dictator can become vice president of this country.

One may ask, “What is wrong with having a dictator’s son as a vice president?”

Many.

It means we have failed as a nation to imbibe in our youth that we, as a nation, should never again suffer such human rights violations. 

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We treasure our freedom, our free speech, and free assembly, and yet many of those who fought for these freedoms died and were tortured and raped during the Marcos dictatorship. Yet we have not learned our lesson. We continually elect people who plunder our wealth and stifle dissent.

When I was in Warsaw several years ago, I vividly recall a group of people apparently reenacting the killings of the Polish people. I thought to myself, "Why re-enact hatred and dwell on the past?"

Now, I understand. By recalling history, we teach our youth the horrors of the past Marcos dictatorship and define ourselves as a nation that stands up against human rights violations and corruption.

It is disconcerting too that, in one presidential debate, no presidential candidate expressed support for divorce and no vice presidential candidate has expressed support for marriage equality except for one who supports civil unions, which still falls short of true equality. (READ: Presidential bets on RH, divorce, and LGBT rights)

Marriage is not a monopoly of one religion, other religions allow marriage equality as other religions, faiths, and beliefs allow divorce. We need government officials who are courageous and will uphold the constitutional guarantee of non-establishment of religion.

Double standards?

It is appalling that one presidential candidate can make a joke about a woman who was raped and murdered and still have the bravado to simply dispel the hard admission of his daughter that she was a rape victim. 

We, as a nation, should raise the standards of discourse in elections and governance to human rights related to women and lesbians, gays, bisexuals, transgenders, and intersex (LGBTIs).  

While many candidates and government officials have expressed disgust on the rape comment of one candidate, the entire country falls short of addressing the issue of rape in the Philippines.

Philippine National Police (PNP) statistics in 2014 show that at least one Filipino woman was raped every hour. Rape-slays in our country are persistently being reported and many cases filed by rape victims are still dismissed by the prosecutors and judges, denying justice to the women and girls. Rape victims must be given credence. (READ: The streets that haunt Filipino women)

While over 130 countries have registered emergency contraceptive pills (ECPs) that can prevent pregnancy resulting from rape, the Philippines has no registered ECPs. Many health care providers, social workers, police officers, and lawyers are not aware that rape victims can use different methods of emergency contraception such as the Yuzpe method using the combined oral contraceptives.

Even the current language of the RH Law restricts the access of rape victims to ECPs by disallowing national government hospitals from purchasing ECPs thereby leaving only the local government hospitals to purchase and dispense ECPs. 

Many government HIV testing and counseling centers are not aware that rape victims can prevent HIV transmission by availing of post-exposure prophylaxis within 3 days from the rape with the 28-day regimen of anti-retrovirals. 

Our country also has one of the most restrictive abortion laws around the world that does not even allow access to safe and legal abortion for rape victims. 

While rape incidence throughout the country is high, we only have one PNP DNA laboratory and one NBI DNA laboratory for the whole country. We have very few PNP medico-legal officers and very few psychiatrists and psychologists who offer psychiatric/psychological counseling for rape victims.

It is even very common for female rape victims to wait 3 months before they receive any form of psychosocial counseling.  While Republic Act 8505 requires rape crisis centers to be set up in every province and city, many provinces and cities have not established their rape crisis centers.

Sexual education

It is hoped that the sexuality education that is required under the RH Law can somehow prevent rape incidence by tackling gender-based violence and women’s human rights, but the Department of Education is still in the process of drafting its sexuality education modules.

This becomes extremely problematic with the implementation of the K-12 program, because you have 16 to 18 year old girls and boys who are still in senior high school who may be sexually active or may soon engage in risky sexual behavior but are not receiving effective sexuality education. 

How about the payment of compensation for rape victims such as Karen Vertido that was recommended by the CEDAW Committee in 2010?  Why has the government not paid compensation until now?  How about the reports of wives being killed by their abusive husbands? What are the plans of government officials or future government officials to address these killings and prosecute the perpetrators? 

There are many other issues such as the DOH budget cut on contraceptives, lack of access to life-saving drugs during childbirth in places where there are no birthing homes or no access to electricity, the absence of an anti-discrimination law for LGBTIs and absence of a gender recognition law for transgenders, among others.    

We must be circumspect with our voting powers and we must persist with our vigilance including in judicial and executive appointees. The less the president has a hand in such judicial and executive appointees, the better. – Rappler.com

Claire Rita Padilla is the founder and executive director of EnGendeRights. She has proposed language for draft bills and ordinances that have been passed into law including the Anti-Sexual Harassment Act, the RH Law, the Expanded Anti-Trafficking Law, the Quezon City ordinance establishing the QC Protection Center for Victims of Gender-based Violence, the QC Gender-Fair City ordinance prohibiting discrimination based on SOGIE and providing affirmative acts, among others.

She holds a Juris Doctor degree from the Ateneo de Manila University and has been practicing law for over 22 years working in the field of gender, gender-based violence, sexual and reproductive health and rights, and sexual orientation, gender identity and expression. 

The Asia-Pacific region’s successful achievement of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development needs to be driven by broad-based productivity gains and rebalancing of economies towards domestic and regional demand.

This is the main message of the Economic and Social Survey of Asia and the Pacific 2016, published on April 28 by the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP). Such a strategy will not only underpin the revival of robust and resilient economic growth, but also improve the quality of growth by making it more inclusive and sustainable.

How should Asia-Pacific policymakers go about implementing such a strategy? Approaches by developing Asia-Pacific economies that are tilted more towards reliance on export-led economic recovery will be ineffective under the current circumstances.

Despite extraordinary measures, global aggregate demand remains weak and China’s economic expansion is moderating. The impact of further loosening of monetary policy is also likely to remain muted, and is not advisable.

The key reason is a confluence of macroeconomic risks that are clouding the economic outlook, such as low commodity prices affecting resource-dependent economies, volatility in exchange rates, as well as growing private household and corporate debt, the impact of which is likely to be complicated by the ambiguous path of interest rate increases to be pursued by the United States.  

The contribution of export-led economic growth to overall development of economies, supported by low interest rates and rising private debt, seems to have plateaued, with economic growth in developing Asia-Pacific economies in 2016 and 2017 forecast to marginally increase to 4.8% and 5%, respectively, from an estimated 4.6% in 2015. This is considerably below the average of 9.4% in the pre-crisis period of 2005-2007.

Along with the economic slowdown, progress in poverty reduction is slowing, inequalities are rising and prospects of decent employment are weakening. At the same time, rapid urbanization and a rising middle class are posing complex economic, social, and environmental and governance challenges.

Such conditions can undermine the significant development successes of the region in recent decades, making it more difficult to deal with the unfinished development agenda, such as lifting 639 million people out of poverty. Had inequality not increased, approximately 200 million more people could have been lifted out of poverty in the 3 most populous countries of the region alone.

To overcome these challenges, revive the region’s economic dynamism and effectively pursue the 2030 Agenda, policymakers are advised to use all available policy levers, including countercyclical fiscal policy and supportive social protection measures, which critically calls for raising domestic resources.

Such interventions would not only support domestic demand but also strengthen the foundations for future productivity-led growth by targeting areas such as: labor quality, including knowledge, skills, and health of the workforce; innovation through trade, investment and R&D; adequate infrastructure in transport, energy and ICT; and access to finance, especially by SMEs.

Fiscal measures, underpinning such initiatives, should be accompanied by sustained reforms towards efficient and fair tax systems which deliver the necessary revenues for the required investment in sustainable development

Sustained increases in domestic demand will also require steady growth in real wages. This requires linking labor productivity more closely to wage levels. Strengthening the enabling environment for collective bargaining is one necessary component in the policy arsenal of governments, with the enforcement of minimum wages as another important policy tool.

After increasing significantly over the last few decades, productivity growth has declined in recent years. This is worrying not only because wage growth has lagged behind productivity growth, but also because wage growth ultimately depends on productivity growth.

Specifically, compared to the period 2000-2007, annual growth of total factor productivity has declined by more than 65% in developing countries of the region, averaging only 0.96% per year between 2008 and 2014; labor productivity growth has declined by 30%, reaching just 3.9% in 2013.

The recently-adopted Sustainable Development Goals provide an entry point to strengthen productivity. For instance, raising agricultural productivity and thus lifting rural households income must be the center of the focus to end poverty (Goal 1), to end hunger and achieve food security (Goal 2). This is because agriculture accounts for one in 4 workers in the region and more than half of the region’s people live in rural areas. Efforts to eradicate poverty and increase agricultural productivity would also foster development of the rural sector and encourage industrialization (Goal 9).

Higher levels of productivity in agriculture will also free-up labor, which would be available to work in the non-agricultural sector. It is therefore imperative to consider a broader development strategy that moves towards full and productive employment (Goal 8) to accommodate the “agricultural push” of labor.

This will require mechanisms to provide, particularly those with low skills, access to quality education and lifelong learning (Goal 4).The need to provide quality education cannot be overemphasized in view of the skills bias of modern technology, which reduces the pace of absorption of unskilled labor released from the agricultural sector.

Thus, whereas the goals will contribute to strengthening productivity, importantly, strengthening productivity will also contribute to the success of a number of the goals, creating a virtuous cycle between sustainable development, productivity and economic growth.– Rappler.com

Shamshad Akhtar is an Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations and Executive Secretary of ESCAP. She has been the UN’s Sherpa for the G20 and previously served as Governor of the Central Bank of Pakistan and Vice President of the MENA Region of the World Bank.

DAVAO CITY, Philippines – Rodrigo Duterte, the candidate I cover for elections, mentions this drug rehabilitation center so often in his speeches that I decided to take a look at it for myself.

The Davao City Treatment and Rehabilitation Center for Drug Dependents (DCTRCDD) is a 1.2-hectare compound in Barangay Bago Oshiro, around 17 kilometers away from the city center.

A mango tree laden with fruit greets me and my companions as our vehicle passes through the gates. Beside the parking area stands the cream-colored administration building. Patches of garden surround covered walkways, gazebos, one-story dormitories, a medical section, dirty kitchen area, basketball court, and a chapel.

The day I visit, the male patients are in the garden listening to a lecture by psychology students. The patients, all in blue t-shirts, are sitting in a half-circle, facing a blackboard and two students in white uniforms. 

Notnot Gabato, a nurse in the facility, shows me the “medical section,” where some doctors, mostly psychologists, are at their desks. Charts, inspirational messages, and lists of rules dominate the walls.

We drop by the womens’ dormitory where some patients are hanging out by the lobby, not too shy to say hello.

Their bedroom is one long room with a single row of metal double-deckers, topped by thin mattresses. The walls and ceilings show the building is old but the residents have kept it clean and orderly. A large brown poster hangs above the sink bearing a hand-written outline of the “General House Rules and Regulations.” 

Originally a DSWD project

The 88 patients of the rehab center are mostly shabu and marijuana addicts, says Gabato. But a number would also get high on vulkasil (elastomeric sealan) or rugby (contact cement). Only a few are here for injected drugs.

The center didn’t actually start as Duterte’s project. It was put up in 1985, 3 years before he first became mayor. It was run by the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) then.

But in 2001, the DSWD turned over the facility to the Davao City government. Duterte was already serving his 4th term as mayor when he devoted P12 million of LGU funds to repairing the center, says Center Manager Gene Gulanes.

Today, the city government covers all the costs for patients.

“As of the present, free of charge ‘yung lahat ng rehab, stay nila sa center (the rehab, their stay at the center is free of charge). Based on our calculation, the government is spending almost P17,000 to P20,000 per patient per month,” says Gulanes.

That’s at least P1.5 million per month just for patient care which includes social services, health and medical, education, psychiatric and psychological services, and nutrition.

They admit an average of 100 patients per year, adds Gulanes, and release an average of 100 patients annually as well. But even after release, the center still conducts “aftercare” and follow-ups to check on how the patient is adapting to his or her old surroundings.

'Bahay Pag-asa'

Gabato says there are other drug rehab centers in Davao City, but many poor families opt to admit their loved ones here because there is no charge. Private rehab facilities can be very pricey.

There are around 40 drug rehab centers, government- and NGO-run, that are accredited by the Department of Health.

Gabato says she knows of only one other center that provides free services and stay – the Quezon City Drug Treatment and Rehabilitation Center. 

Next stop for me was a rehab center for “children in conflict with the law” or CICL. 

Davao City’s “Bahay Pag-asa Children’s Village” is in the same barangay as the drug rehab center and looks pretty much the same – a compound of low buildings and gardens dotted with trees, lined by walkways.

It’s one of 13 such centers in the Philippines that are fully operational, according to a June 2015 Philippine Star article quoting DSWD data.

Davao City's Bahay Pag-asa began operations in 2014, two years after the passage of the Amended Juvenile Justice Welfare Act (Republic Act No 10630) which asks all LGUs to put up their own such facility.

A Bahay Pag-asa is a 24-hour institution that offers short-term residential care for offenders aged 13 to 17. 

Angela Librado-Trinidad, a barangay captain and former city councilor, said Duterte had the facility built on his 7th (current) term as mayor, even if he disagrees with the amended juvenile justice law.

Duterte has always maintained that 16 and 17-year-olds should be held criminally-liable whereas the amended version of the law holds that those below 18 years old are exempt from criminal liability.

Matt, a 14-year-old resident, says he was brought to the facility 9 months ago after he was found to have raped his sister.

“Hindi ko alam ginagawa ko kasi sabog pa ako sa droga (I didn’t know what I was doing because I was high on drugs),” he said about his days as a rugby addict.

Asked what good the center has done for him, he said he has learned housekeeping and respect for elders.

Nineteen-year-old John has stayed in the center the longest. He was brought in when he was 15. He was caught stealing, along with his friends.

Now, he holds a TESDA certificate for welding which he obtained while in the center. 

He likes being in the center where he is charge of the kitchen. He cooks every day.

“Mas komportable dito kasi safety ka. Sa labas, maraming away, lahat mayroon, kasi freedom. Ngayon, hindi na freedom. Inutos ng panginoon kaya nandito ako,” he told me. 

(It’s more comfortable here because you’re safe. Outside, there are a lot of fights, there is everything, because you are free. Now, no more freedom. God commanded that I be here.) – Rappler.com

I write this with 10 days to go before Election Day. These are the 10 reasons why Grace Poe is my president and why you should choose her too.

1. Grace Poe has a clear vision and solid platform of government that builds and improves on “Daang Matuwid (Straight Path)."

Senator Poe has a vision for the country: one where no one is left behind. To achieve that, government must be compassionate. “Sa gobyernong may puso, walang maiiwan (No one will be left behind under a compassionate government)” captures the two pillars of the senator’s vision. A Poe presidency will focus on poverty alleviation coupled with inclusive, sustainable, and resilient growth. The objective is to attain global competitiveness driven by a culture of excellence achieved through open, accountable, and competent governance, free of corruption, which operates under the rule of law and upholds human rights.

On her first day, she has promised to promulgate an executive order institutionalizing freedom of information in the executive branch, among others. She will also order the preparation of a comprehensive feeding program for public schools as one of her first acts. Agriculture, public health and easing the transportation crisis will be priorities in the first 6 months.

A Poe government will build on the good governance gains of President Aquino’s Daang Matuwid administration but it will depart radically from the latter in being solutions-oriented, inclusive, and compassionate. A Poe administration will also be different from the Aquino government in its emphasis on human rights and social justice. She will be more committed to labor rights and not just ending contractual labor. Her support for OFWs is also stronger. We will see a lot more empathy in a Poe administration, especially for children and families.

Personally, I am attracted most to the environmental, climate change, energy and transportation programs of Senator Poe. She has the most progressive positions on issues like the implementation of the Paris Agreement, capping coal power, promoting renewable energy, judicious management of the country’s minerals, agriculture, and fisheries, and marine and aquatic resources. She understands that traffic is not about cars but about mobility and is willing to implement and scale up innovative programs for pedestrians, cyclists, and commuters.

I am also sure that a President Poe will appoint the most qualified justices to the Supreme Court. Because of her direct experience of the legal system, Poe knows the importance of competent, independent and ethical justices and judges. I am so excited about her plans to completely support the Chief Justice’s judicial reform programs.

It’s not a perfect platform. It has some gaps, for sure. But it is the best that is being offered.

2. Grace Poe is organized disciplined, diligent, and hard working.

In the few months I have worked with and advised her on a range of issues, I have personally seen Grace Poe’s work ethic. The Senator is tireless. She is always prepared for our meetings. She takes time to read voluminous briefing papers prepared for her. She reaches out to experts whenever necessary.

Poe’s personal discipline is exemplary. She usually comes to meetings on time and when she is delayed, she respects us enough to let us know. The discipline extends to her staff. She manages them strictly while always treating them respectfully. Clearly, Senator Poe is a performance and outcomes oriented leader.

As President, she will set time-bound strategic goals and will hold herself and her team accountable to achieving them. Being a good manager and an excellent organization person, she will not tolerate division in her team and will make sure everyone act as one. There will be no factionalism in a Poe administration because she will not allow it.

3. Grace Poe is a woman, mother, wife, and daughter.

It is clear that many in our society continue to look down on women as the weaker sex, to be joked about, and to be ignored. Double standards that marginalize women and favor men prevail in all areas of our society – in politics, in economics, in our culture. It would be so good to have a woman lead the effort to change that.

In a Poe presidency, many women will be appointed to the cabinet and to all government positions and the judiciary. My hope is that more than half of the cabinet will be women and that by the time her term is over, more than half of the Supreme Court will be women. That would be so great.

That Grace Poe is a wife, mother and a daughter is one of the things that attracts me very much. She is fully engaged with her family, attending recollections and graduations even at the height of the campaign. In fact, regardless of where she is in a given day, Poe almost always flies home to be with her children and husband. She looks up to her husband and honors her mother.  A Poe presidency will be good for families because she understands what we are all about.

4. Grace Poe is a foundling and will always prioritize children and the human rights of all.

Her life story is one of the most compelling reasons why people are drawn to her. My friend, children’s rights advocate Eric Mallonga describes why her presidency would be so good for children:

This is a selfless, generous, kind, caring woman, who equally cares about children other than her own.  Having a president who would introduce free lunches, even other meals, at schools and day care centers for children is the best thing that could happen to this society.  Parents would be able to work and not worry about bringing home enough money for the food of their children because those children would not be hungry.  The Grace Poe administration would have already guaranteed their daily nourishment. Filipino children would be well nourished and thus, properly educated because they would not be starving as they learn their daily lessons.  

Having a president, who would prioritize that every child would have a suitable family environment, whether their own biological family or an alternative foster, guardian or adoptive family to properly nurture their children, will be one excellent president for this nation.  Having a president who would care for the children and provide proper schools for them, regardless of whether they live in the hinterlands or metropolis, whether they are Muslims, Igorots, Lumads, or Christians, regardless of their ethnicity or religion, is one president who can unify our people because of the commonality of causes in raising their families and seeking the best for their children.

Having a president who aspires to build not just schools but proper habitats and shelters for every family so that they could properly attend to their children’s needs is the best thing in bridging the great continental divide between the oppressive wealthy and the disenfranchised people and finally resolving the polarization that continues to threaten the stability of our nation.

I look forward to a president whose number one priority is children because she herself experienced very directly the precariousness of being alone as a child. Because she has a direct experience also of the importance of human rights, a President Poe will be a strong advocate of the human rights of all, including the mothers of disappeared political activists or OFWs who are imprisoned or sentenced to death in foreign lands.

5. Grace Poe ran an ethical and effective campaign; she will also be an effective and ethical president.

When the campaign started, I wrote an article for the Ateneo de Manila alumni magazine Fabilioh and proposed that in addition to the candidates’ record of service, it is important to look at how they are handling themselves in the campaign. I observed: “Presidential campaigns are grueling and challenging, beset by crisis. The behavior of the candidates – their fortitude, determination, discipline, ability to communicate, etc –  is a good way of assessing their effectiveness as leaders.”

I would add that presidential campaigns also reveal the moral fiber of the candidates. On this, I am sure, Grace Poe has run an ethical campaign. She has refused to do personal attacks and go dirty. There have been moments, of course, when she has flared up and lost her temper, when the attacks against her and her family become abusive, but these have been far and few in between. Most of the time, she has been calm and serene and has had the same effect on those who work with her.

I have never seen Senator Poe panic even in the face of crises and what seem to be overwhelming challenges. I saw only a grounded and recollected Poe when it seemed she would lose her disqualification cases. That’s what I see in her now, a time when she is trying to catch up in the polls.

6.  Grace Poe will be a listening president. She brings a fresh perspective and new ideas to the presidency.

In all my dealings with Senator Poe, I have seen how she is a good listener. She has internalized core values of good governance – personal integrity, inclusiveness in designing policies and programs, transparency and public participation in decision-making, the need for social accountability, and a preference for the poor and marginalized. But outside these values, Poe is open to new ideas and inclusive social innovation. A big pleasure in helping draft her platform and preparing her for debates is that nothing is off the table. Every idea can be considered and weighed. I like that in a president.

I am definitely not worried that Grace Poe has the least number of years in government experience among the candidates. Because she knows how to listen and because she is an adherent to complete staff work and the highest standards of excellence, the decisions she will make will be well considered.

Poe will be a listening President, not only on policy and governance matters, but also on an interpersonal basis. She has what we call in Jesuit parlance cura personalis. The country saw this in action in the last presidential debate when she was the only one who addressed and later approached the child Jhesa and her mother, telling them she understood her situation being a mother herself.

Grace Poe will be a president who will be equally comfortable listening to a business magnate, policy expert, farmer, worker, and a young child and her mother.

7. Grace Poe is capable of making tough decisions.

I understand that there are concerns that a President Poe would be unduly influenced by her funders. I am aware that could happen, and I respect those who have privately and publicly warned me about this, but I do not believe that will be the case.

Personally, I have seen how she deals with conflicting opinions and advice, that she weighs everything, asks the right questions, and proceeds to make a decision based on her core values. She also values complete staff work and reaching out to a range of views before making decisions. Moreover, all major decisions will be characterized by transparency and inclusiveness. Given that, I am confident that there are enough safeguards to ensure that governance decisions will be made on the merits and not because of access.

Her stint in the Senate shows this tenacity and firmness. Her friendships with the Estradas and Binays did not stop her from supporting the PDAF investigations. Her handling of the Mamasapano probe was masterful, balancing different interests, making the President accountable but doing it with respect for the office. She was able to get all senators to sign the committee report. She was able to steer the Senate to approve the FOI Act speedily and without dissent.

8. Grace Poe will be a servant leader president who will inspire all of us to serve our county.

Watching her speeches in her campaign sorties is always a joy. One, of course, must have an open mind and generous heart to appreciate that and not rely on biases and prejudgments. Her rhetoric is good, soaring even, and she means it. She really believes that we are a good people, that there is hope for this country, and the future belongs to us. Government is only there to help us be a happy country.

There are many of us who are helping in the Poe campaign. Some are very prominent and senior in business, governance, and politics. But a big majority are young people, fresh out of college or still in school. She has inspired all of us to be with her in this campaign. If she wins, Poe will bring all of us and more into the government. I am confident that she will have the best cabinet ever, retaining the best in the Aquino government but tapping also new talents.

Personally, I prefer to retire from active work in governance and politics to just focus on teaching and writing. But without doubt, if Senator Poe asks me to join a Poe administration, I will say yes.

9. Grace Poe will be a unifying president.

Senator Poe has been attacked from all fronts. Her very identity as a Filipino, as a child, as a daughter, wife, and mother, has been attacked. Her family has not been spared; her husband and children has been viciously made a butt of jokes and mean, unfounded charges. But that has not destroyed her and her family. And not only that, she has not taken them personally. Instead, she has been extra generous to her critics, dismissing their attacks as essentially political. I have never heard her say disparaging things about them.

A Poe administration will not be vindictive. It will uphold the rule of law in all cases but in a compassionate manner. Whether it is the release of GMA, the PDAF cases that involves political allies, or the Marcos burial, hard and tough decisions will be made. They will be the right decisions, legally and ethically, but they will be done with generosity and charity.

I want that in a president – someone who can unify us, not make us a cacophony of dissonant voices, always fighting for both petty and serious reasons. I would like a president that inspires us to be better than we are now, to rise above our quarrels and share a common vision of a prosperous, peaceful and just Philippines.

10. With Grace Poe as our president, we will have a better, kinder, united, and happier Philippines.

We can choose the country we want on May 9, 2016.

I choose a country that is better – less poverty, reduced crime, more social justice, where human rights are fully respected. I choose a country that is kinder – to children and women especially, to people with disabilities, to the less unfortunate. I choose a country where we are united and where no one feels inferior and disadvantaged.  I choose a country that is happier – not afraid – and full of hope.

A better, kinder, united, and happier Philippines. Grace Poe can bring us there. – Rappler.com

Dean Antonio G.M. La Viña is former dean of the Ateneo School of Government. He is an adviser to presidential candidate Grace Poe.

For the first time in Philippine electoral history, labor contractualization is a pivotal campaign issue.  Also for the first time, Presidential candidates are declaring their commitment to end contractualization. In the third and last presidential debate on April 24, all  5 candidates categorically vowed to put an end to the practice of contractualization.    

This common declaration of presidential candidates suggests that no matter who wins, contractualization will be ended. It is safe to assume that workers and labor unions must be jubilant over such declaration. But is there really cause for celebration? 

Moreover, employers have not come out openly against the candidates' declaration and have claimed that they too are against "abusive" contractualization. A big retail company even came out in public to deny allegations that it was a violator of contractualization laws and that in fact, it had  "no contractual workers.” 

Is there really a national consensus to "end" contractualization? And can the next president really end contractualization?  

Questions to ask candidates

We examine this particular political moment and ask some questions that may seem simple but actually entail quite complex answers:  What is the contractualization issue about?  Why has it been difficult to end contractualization?  What can the next president do? 

We leave the question of "which presidential candidate can do it" to the readers/voters.   We suggest, however, that voters challenge their candidates to answer the following questions to prove their sincerity and political will to end contractualization.

For candidates with family businesses:

• Do their family businesses hire contractual workers? If yes, did they do anything to stop contractualization in these businesses? 
• If elected president, will they oppose their own families over contractualization?

For candidates who were mayors:

• During their terms, did their LGUs employ contractual workers?  If yes, why did they not stop such contractualization?  

For candidates who were legislators:

• Did they support the Security of Tenure bill which sought to regulate contractualization further?  If no, why not? 

For all candidates:

• Have they ever supported labor unions that have been at the forefront of the advocacy to end contractualization?  If no, why not? 
• If elected president, are they willing to go against all employers who violate contractualization laws including those who contributed large sums of money to their electoral campaigns? 

What is the contractualization issue about? 

The contractualization issue relates to the right of workers to be secure in their jobs. Contractualization is a business practice that violates this right because it denies the existence of an employer-employee relationship and/or avoids the regularization of workers. 

Article XIII, Section 3 of the 1987 Philippine Constitution guarantees "that the state shall afford full protection to labor" and workers "shall be entitled to security of tenure, humane conditions of work, and a living."  This constitutional right is elaborated by the Philippine Labor Code and several Department Orders of the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) particularly DO-18 A, Series of 2011.   

Philippine laws do not prohibit lawful subcontracting or contractualization per se. They only define what practices are allowed and what practices are unlawful. They also define the rights of contractual workers.  

Business entities are allowed by law to hire the services of a subcontractor provided that the latter is a "legitimate" contractor and not a "labor-only" contractor.

In legitimate contracting or subcontracting under DO 18-A, Series of 2011, “the contractor must carry a distinct and independent business and undertakes to perform the job, work or service on its own responsibility, according to its manner and method, and free from control and direction of the principal in alll matters connected with the performance of the work except as to the results thereof.”  

This is actually the most crucial requirement, the other two in the same provision being quite easy to comply with: 1) That the contractor has substantial capital and/or investment; and 2) There is a service agreement between the principal and the subcontractor that ensures compliance with all the rights and benefits under Labor Laws (DO 18-A, Series of 2011, Section 4).

Incidentally, DO 18-A stipulates that a contractor must have a capitalization of at least 3 million pesos.  

DO 18-A also states that the workers that the contractor is supplying must NOT be "performing activities which are directly related to the principal business of the employer." This is in keeping with the Labor Code provision (Article 280) that workers who perform work that is "necessary and desirable" to the company must be considered as regular workers. Said workers may be allowed to go through a probationary period of 6 months but they should be given regular status if they are allowed to work after that period. 

If their work is not necessary and desirable, they could be treated legally as casual employees, except that “any employee who has rendered at least one year of service, whether such service is continuous or broken, shall be considered a regular employee with respect to the activity in which he is employed and his employment shall continue while such activity exists.” 

It is thus illegal to classify a worker who has been working in a company for several years as "casual" or "contractual" just because her/his employment has not been continuous.  

Circumventing laws

The fundamental problem is that many businesses circumvent these labor laws.  

Almost all of the contractualization practiced at the moment, where employees are considered to have ended their contracts before they have worked for 6 months (hence the term "ENDO"), are illegal.  No less than the DOLE concedes that DO 18-A was crafted "to protect the workers by prohibiting the repeated hiring of employees for a five-month duration, known as 5-5-5 and ENDO."

Typically, a new hire's probationary period is 6 months, so the employer argues that, regardless of the nature of work, it commits no violation if the worker is dismissed a day prior to the 6th month of employment. However, the Supreme Court has ruled that if the employee's work is necessary and desirable to the business, under Article 280, said employee should be considered as regular, even if he or she signed a contract providing for a fixed period of less than 6 months.

Prior to the expiration of such period, an employee can be dismissed if he or she really fails to meet the standards made known to her/him at the time of hiring. The standards, however, must be reasonable. 

Under a lawful contracting or subcontracting agreement, the principal employer can enter into a contract with a legitimate subcontractor who will then deploy the subcontractor’s contractual workers to the principal employer. But these workers should be given the same rights as regular workers, as in fact they are regular workers, albeit of the legitimate subcontractor.  Example:  Big Manufacturing Inc wants to landscape its premises so it hires Landscaping Inc to do the job for two months. Landscaping Inc deploys its regular workers to work on the premises of BMI.   

DO 18-A, Series of 2011 states that contractual workers such as "reliever, seasonal, week-ender, temporary, or promo jobber" shall be accorded "all rights and priviliges as provided in the Labor Code.

These are safe and healthful working conditions; labor standards such as service incentive leave, rest days, overtime pay, holiday pay, 13th month pay; separation pay as may be provided in the Service Agreement of under the Labor Code; setirement benefits under the SSS, or retirement plans of the contractor,  if any; social security and welfare benefits; self-organization, collective bargaining and peaceful concerted activities; and security of tenure.

While it correctly protects the rights of workers to minimum labor standards, this section is actually misleading because it gives the impression that since the worker needed by the principal employer is “only” a reliever, seasonal, week-ender, temporary, or promo jobber, the principal employer can recruit the workers through a labor contractor, with the latter as the purported “employer” and the principal a mere “client” of the labor contractor. 

Employers often use this specific provision to justify their labor-only contracting practices that are actually unambiguously illegal.  (READ: Why contractualization should stop)

According to Rene Ofreneo, former Dean of UPSOLAIR, contractualization represents "vulnerable employment" because it refers to "the increasing informalization and casualization of the formal economy."  

Ofreneo posits that contractualization has caused labor unions to weaken because unionized jobs are being replaced with contractual jobs.  He cites two examples:  the PLDT union whose membership dipped from 10,000 to 2,000 because of contractualization and the Philippine Airlines Employees Union (PALEA) "that had a bitter fight with management regarding the outsourcing of 2,600 jobs occupied by unionized regular workers.” 

Needless to say, many labor unions share Ofreneo's view that contractualization is detrimental to workers.  

The Kilusang Mayo Uno or KMU-led  Alliance Against Contractualization and Towards Significant Wage Increase Now (ACT2WIN) has been calling for "the junking of contractualization." Another labor alliance, NAGKAISA of which the PALEA union is a part of, has been pushing for a security of tenure law.  There is also the UPAC (Union Presidents Against Conractualization).

Contractualization is a huge social problem because it creates an "underclass" within the working class. It condemns a huge section of the workforce into being perpetual minimum wage earners and perpetually exempt from the payment of income tax.   Thus, businesses are subsidized by the workers through cheap labor and by the state in the form of foregone income tax revenue.   

The contractualization issue is about the abuse of our workers. It is indeed high time we end this abuse. 

Why has it been difficult to end contractualization? 

Global process

The contractualization that we see today is part of the global process of labor market deregulation that started in the 1980s. It entailed a shift from a Fordist model of production to a "new economy" type of production. 

In the latter type, the demography of both the employers and employees changed drastically. Instead of business owners and managers that workers interacted with in their workplaces, employers became "manpower agencies" that merely supplied labor to "principals."  Instead of regular workers, the working population was broken into "core" workers employed by the principals and "periphery" workers hired by manpower agencies. Keeping a core-periphery workforce rather than a rigid, regular workforce was deemed necessary to "compete globally." Enterprises allegedly could not compete if they were burdened with very high costs of labor and very rigid rules on sustaining labor.   

Contractualization has proliferated because it has been buttressed by economic arguments that are considered by many as more important than all other arguments. When businesses declare that they have to hire contractuals because "it is in the nature of their industry to do so" or "demand is just seasonal" or "we are already suffering from the global financial crisis," governments often believe them and bend over to accommodate their concerns.  Workers too have come to believe that "contractual jobs are better than no jobs at all."  

Contractualization has not been stopped because people have been conditioned to believe that it is a solution rather than a problem. Moreover, there is very strong lobby from business.

Business groups argue that the right of workers to security of tenure must not undermine management prerogative in hiring and firing workers. In its 2010 "Omnibus Position Paper on the House Bills on Security of Tenure," the Employers Confederation of the Philippines (ECOP) claimed that the constitutional right to security of tenure does not mean "perpetual employment" and that both employees and employers "have an equality of right guaranteed by the Constitution."  

According to ECOP, compelling an employee to work for an employer against his/her will is "servitude" but in the same manner, compelling an employer to hire an employee against his or her (the employer's) will is "oppression."

This particular argument, however, is a "false" argument because in truth,  our laws do not compel employers to hire workers on a "perpetual" basis.  Employers, in fact,  can hire and fire workers freely – they only have to follow public policies relating to labor rights.  Under the Labor Code, dismissal must be for a just or authorized cause. 

The working population, meanwhile, including the unions that seek to represent them, have very weak bargaining power vis-a-vis employers.  Union membership and power have steadily declined.  In 1980, union density or the proportion of workers in the total workforce joining unions was 27%.  Today, it is only 8.5%.   

The right to unionize is a constitutional right so technically, contractual workers can join unions.  Many workers, however, opt not to exercise this right, because they fear that once they do, they will lose their jobs.  Furthermore, collective bargaining agreements often stipulate that the bargaining unit consists only of regular workers leaving out any possibility for contractual workers – who, in most cases, constitute the majority of the workforce – to participate in unions or partake of benefits gained from collective bargaining.

Challenge for next leader

What can the next president do?

To stop contractualization, the next [resident can and should strengthen the institutions that have organizational mandates to protect workers:  the DOLE and labor unions.  

The next president should appoint a competent, pro-labor DOLE secretary. If the president chooses someone known to be anti-labor and anti-union, this is a sure sign that his or her anti-contractualization stance is merely lip service. 

The DOLE secretary must have the political will to insist on labor law compliance and to mobilize the DOLE bureaucracy towards this end. DOLE must insist, for example, that businesses cannot use economic arguments to circumvent the law.  A business entity cannot use these arguments in the same way that it cannot use economic arguments to tell BIR Commissioner Kim Henares that it be taxed only 15% since 30% is too high. Similarly, an employee cannot justify stealing by explaining that his/her salary is not enough.

The next president must also guarantee and enhance the participation of unions in policy making and implementation by expanding spaces for union representation in tripartite mechanisms.  The next president, through DOLE, can also initiate discussions on the possibility of industry-wide bargaining that could give workers and unions more bargaining leverage than enterprise-level bargaining (i.e  since enterprise level unions are easier to bust).   

Strengthening unions will not be easy because some employers are quite vocal in their opposition to unions.  The ECOP, for example, opposes the provision in DO 18-A that "requires the employer to consult the union in a CBA before it can contract out" since for them, such is "unreasonable, restrictive, and potentially disruptive."

Pushing for the participation of labor unions in ending contractualization thus requires political will on the part of the next president. 

The next president will also have to generate support from the legislative branch to pass the Security of Tenure law which will:

• Make the violation of contracting laws an "unfair labor practice"
• Penalize said violation by a fine of not less than P50,000.00, on top of the payment of wages and benefits due workers wrongly classified as contractuals
• Limit valid subcontractiving from anywhere between 10% to 20% of a firm's workforce

Needless to say, the next president will have to address the broader 'jobs crisis."  Decent work –  jobs that pay well and make workers feel well and secure – must be the aim of the next president.  

In this connection, the next president can build on the industrial policy that the Department of Trade and Industry has been working on but this has to be combined with appropriate labor policies.  Moreover, the idea of giving businesses incentives so they can keep their workforces must be studied carefully because as mentioned earlier,  the state, in fact, is already subsidizing businesses through cheap labor and contractualization. The state must assist and give incentives to small and fledgling businesses but it should stop subsidizing established and huge corporations.  

No president has stopped contractualization.  Can the next president do it?    Yes, but the question is: Will she or he do it? 

Let's talk again in 2022. – Rappler.com

Carmel Abao is a faculty member of the Department of Political Science of the Ateneo de Manila University while Tony Salvador is a lawyer who works with various NGOs and unions on economic rights issues. 

This is the second piece of a 3-part collaborative series by the authors to explore the US and Philippine elections side-by-side. The first piece focused on the countries’ respective electoral systems. (READ: Philippine and US electoral systems on the line)

This piece will dive into specific voters’ demographics that could influence the outcome of these elections.  With the upcoming elections in both countries, will voting blocs make a winner?

Who will come out to vote?

A recent conversation with a neighbor of one of the authors in the US highlighted the effect of a highly contested election, with tough issues and “outsider” candidates who are disrupting the field, which is higher political engagement. The neighbor noticed how in a previous state caucus, there was hardly anyone in the room. However this year, the caucus was so packed that it was hard to even get in the door! 

If social media platforms such as Facebook are to be any indication of public engagement, the exhortations of each friend asking you to vote for their candidate and often heated posts following after could reflect an increase in engagement.  However, will political expression convert into actual votes on Election Day?  Who will come out to vote?

The same phenomenon is happening in the Philippines. Mayor Rody Duterte, in particular, has generated a lot of buzz in social media and is leading in the polls. But are his supporters all registered voters? Will they come out to vote?

The millennials

Several articles have been written about the “millennials” who, depending on who you are reading, are those born between 1980/81 and 2000. Bloomberg View reported the US Census Bureau number of US millennials as 88 million (3 out of 10 voting-age Americans).  This is expected to be the “first presidential election in which...millennials – make up the same proportion of the US voting-age population as the Baby Boomers,” as declared by Derek Thompson in The Atlantic. 

What’s also interesting is how 15% of these young adults are not born in the US and one in 4 speaks a language other than English at home (Bloomberg View).  Democratic candidate Bernie Sanders, seems to have established a tight hold on his party’s millennial voters as seen in primaries in Iowa, New Hampshire, and Wisconsin.  Even in exit polls where Hillary Clinton took the lead, such as in North Carolina and Arkansas, Sanders still received most of the support from those between 18-29 years of age.  

It’s not surprising that the more liberal young voters are supporting an outsider as disenchantment with “the establishment” rises.  While educated, these voters face rising student loans and low wages entering the labor force at the same time that corporate profits seem to be at a high.  According to data from the Chicago Council on Global Affairs (cited by Bloomberg View), millennials are of the mind that the US should “stay out of world affairs.”  In the Republican race, even with Donald Trump taking the lead in the polls, CNN exit polls show young voters are favoring his opponents.  

However, in a piece written by Russell Dalton in the Washington Post based on an essay he did with Sidney Verba on the 2014 US General Social Survey (GSS), “only 5% of millennials said they vote regularly in local elections.”

While young voters have expanded their political participation through volunteerism and protests, it is not certain whether they will show up in the polls.  CNN primary exit polls also seem to show a lower percentage of younger respondents. This begs the question, is the millennial vote in the US a force to be reckoned with?

The millennial vote in the Philippines could also be formidable. Of the approximately 56 million registered voters, 20 million or 37% of registered voters in the Philippines are young people aged 18 to 35. In the 2013 elections, 38% of voters were high school graduates and 27% elementary graduates while only 18% reached college level and another 15% graduated from college.

Originally, Filipino millennials were accused of having no sense of history for being supportive of Bongbong Marcos for vice president. It turned out this is not true as the main support of Marcos comes from the generation that actually lived through martial law, the baby boomer generation and older.

The millennials in the Philippines are more likely to vote than their American counterparts. It is not clear whether the young voters supporting Sanders will come out in the same numbers for Clinton.  A Trump candidacy could bring out those millennials to vote for the Democratic candidate.

Women’s vote

Hillary Clinton has a confident lead in the polls in the Democratic women’s vote, regardless of race and particularly from older women. Bernie Sanders still has the ability though to attract the votes of younger women voters.  In an NPR interview, commentator Asma Khalid says that Clinton “has a safety net, and it’s essentially a web of women.”  In the Republican field, an NBC News/Wall Street Journal March 2016 survey has around half of the female Republican voters saying that they “could not imagine themselves voting for Trump.”  This could pose a dilemma for the GOP in the national polls.  

Women made up 53% of the voters in the 2012 US elections. Security, health, the gender pay gap and economic stability are important issues for women.  According to Rebecca Traister (in a PBS NewsHour discussion on what the women’s vote means) two-thirds of minimum wage workers are women and they have economic concerns on their minds.

In the Philippines, according to a GMA News Report, for the last 3 presidential elections, women outnumber men. In the 1998 elections, female voters (14,992,697) outnumbered males (14,481,612). In 2004, the former numbered 17,014,643 while the latter saw 16,495,449 voters. In the last presidential elections in 2010, there were also more women voters, totaling 18,921,744 against lame voters numbering 18,028,326.

Up to last month, there was a gender gap with more women favoring Grace Poe over other candidates but, in the recent polls, that seems to have disappeared. It remains to be seen whether that gap can come back with the rape joke of Duterte and the emphasis Poe has been making in her sorties on her being a woman leader.

Race in America, regionalism in the Philippines

The Democrats undoubtedly have the lead in gaining the support of the non-white electorate.  Clinton received 86% of the black vote in South Carolina and 85% of the black vote in Georgia. Collier Meyerson in her New Yorker article on Clinton, Sanders and the Myth of a Monolithic “Black Vote” says that Sanders may be closing the gap with Democratic African American voters and that other variables, such as age and geography, could disrupt the narrative on the black vote. According to the US Census Bureau, 17.8 million African American/Black voters went to the polls in 2012.  

A poll conducted by Bendizen & Amandi International and the Tarrance Group cited by Univision, showed that 73% of Hispanic voters are going for Clinton but the Latin Post has the Latino vote almost evenly tied for Clinton and Sanders. More than 13.1 million Latinos are expected to cast their ballots in the US elections (Latin Post).  Trump’s rhetoric on immigration and border security does not help the GOP case for Hispanic support.      

There are other voting demographics that can influence the outcome of the US elections.  In the Atlantic Survey released on April 7, Sanders is winning the support of Democratic-leaning independents (those who do not affiliate themselves with any party) and those not affiliated with any religion. Clinton is consistently leading among 45+ voters.  Ted Cruz seems to be getting more support from religious groups, though the tide could be changing towards Trump.

In the Philippines, it is not race that matters but regionalism (closely linked to cultural and linguistic affiliation) which plays a role in voters’ choices. The numbers (borrowed from MindaNews report of Comelec data) are interesting in this respect.

The biggest voting area is described by pollsters as Balance of Luzon, with around 45% of total voters casting their ballots in regions that constitute this area. There are more than 30 million voters in Central Luzon, Southern Tagalog, Bicol, Ilocos, Cordillera, and Cagayan regions. While the biggest numbers are the first two regions, the Ilocos (also called Solid North) and Bicol regions can be influential because voters in these regions tend to vote as a bloc.

Poe is leading in Balance of Luzon with Vice President Jejomar Binay close behind. Duterte seems to be competitive in Central Luzon and Southern Tagalog.

Metro Manila or the National Capital Region, where Duterte is currently leading by a big margin,  has more than 6 million registered voters which constitutes 11.50% of the voters nationwide. A big protest vote against the Aquino administration is looming in this region.

Finally, Central Philippines or the Visayas has around 21% of the voters or around 11 and a half million voters. Southern Philippines or Mindanao has a few more voters than the Visayas with more than 12 and a half million voters or around 23% voters. Mar Roxas is leading in the Visayas but Duterte is catching up, especially in Cebuano-speaking provinces while Grace Poe is also strong in Illonggo-speaking areas.

Hands down, Mindanao will deliver a landslide victory for Duterte. Right now, he is polling at nearly 60% and that could still increase. In his home city of Davao, he is polling at almost 90% of voter support according to a survey done by Ateneo de Davao University.

With less than two weeks to go before the Philippine elections and the end of the primary season in the United States, we will see soon enough which voting blocs influenced the results of these processes the most.

The final article of the series will look at the candidates in both countries, contrasting the choices citizens in each country are facing. – Rappler.com

Dean Antonio G.M. La Viña is former dean of the Ateneo School of Government. He is an adviser to presidential candidate Grace Poe. His co-writer Denni Jayme Cawley is a Filipina ​based in Salt Lake City, U​tah, USA. Her main passion is being a wife and mother but she is ​​also an avid observer of public and international policy developments.

In the wake of bumblings by the Commission on Elections (Comelec) – the massive data leak and doubts on ballot replacement – public confidence in our poll body is sagging.

The Comelec has assured us that the sensitive data of at least 54.4 million voters which have been compromised cannot be used in cheating : they have printed a list of voters that shows the voters' photos and election inspectors will personally verify the voters’ identities.

While we want things to work out on election day, anxieties remain. After all, this is the first time that such a huge leak has happened in the country’s election history.

The other new factor that we have to contend with is the rule on ballot replacement. It is not comforting that the Comelec was not unanimous  in its approval.

While the intention seems fair – that ballots which are rejected by the machine through no fault of the voters will be replaced – it could open up opportunities for discretion. The rule has to be iron-clad and election inspectors have to be unbending in following it.

Moreover, if the ballots run out, voters can be disenfranchised. 

Comelec says that only one replacement will be allowed and there are enough ballots to go around. We will take the word of the Comelec.

But it needs to redeem itself on May 9 and beyond. In a race as tight as this, the credibility of the elections will be the final arbiter.

The political environment is charged enough, and the least the voters deserve is a poll body that will buckle under pressure or political noise.

There should be the least doubt about fraud; the least confusion over voter disenfranchisement; and the least disorder about voters’ receipts.

There should be least doubt about the Comelec's independence and its officials' loyalty to the public above vested interests. And there is no better proof of this than their actions before, during and immediately after May 9.

In this momentous undertaking, an addition to the annals of Philippine elections, we call for effective leadership by the Comelec, a strong sense of duty of all the troops—teachers, watchers, inspectors—and the eternal vigilance of the election watchdogs, media, and citizens. 

We cannot afford to fail. – Rappler.com

Film director Yam Laranas expects to be unFollowed over this. He expects to be trolled with more than the usual vitriol. UnFriended and cast out of the "Twitter-verse". Stabbed multiple times and labeled a traitor like Jon Snow. 

All for confessing how much he cares about local Philippine politics. Which is, well, in two words: “Not much.”

He says, “No, it’s not Apathy. Never that.” 

Yam has done his due diligence and will vote. He has directed a commercial promoting local tourism. He is outraged by corruption. Lauds Filipino values. Prays for rain. Hopes for growth. He is equal parts proud and pissed off by his country, alternately declaring: "Someone's head needs to roll." And "We're one of the happiest countries in the world.” 

He says, “This is home!"

It's just that somehow sometime long ago, he had mentally migrated – his mind spending more and more time abroad. These past years, he says, he virtually lives there – a sort-of citizen of the world.

It happened over time and in perfect pace with technology.

When Yam was about 10 years old, he became addicted to Shortwave Radio Stations.

Every day after school, he scoured the airwaves for stations that spoke only foreign languages. Each time he listened to those alien voices, he imagined: "Who is this voice? Where is it coming from? Am I the only one listening?" 

“It’s as if I had made contact with an alien race. I wanted to see their world.”

In the 1980s, his mom finally installed a landline telephone in his home in Davao City. The telephone had International Direct Dialing or IDD. 

It would unleash his inner Kraken. His tentacles would span the globe. 

“I couldn’t wait to use it. On Christmas Eve, I picked up a phone book and some old magazines. I cold-called phone numbers from the USA, UK, Canada, and France – just to say Merry Christmas! I just wanted to hear that foreign voice say something.

When the phone bill came after Christmas, my mother nearly fainted. I got a major scolding and was forced to pay the bill. I spent the next months working my butt off in a dance school teaching little kids how to breakdance. This humiliation would not end my telephone travels.”

Audacity

Around 1996, Yam was watching the News when he saw the CNN live program CNN: Q&A With Riz Khan. The discussion was about the Afghan civil war. The Taliban had just taken Kabul and imposed a strict form of Sharia, forbidding Afghan girls over 10 years old to go to school. 

By then, he was a young advertising and film director in Manila – living on his own in his gadget-filled apartment. A proud owner of a telephone that came with all the bells and whistles: Call Waiting, Caller ID, and (of course!) I.D.D.

When CNN anchor Riz Khan opened the telephone lines for Live questions, Yam did not hesitate to call and let it rip: "Education is important to everyone and not just boys. Girls have the right to go to school, too. Why is the world not outraged by this?!!!"

“I was a big admirer of the anti-Taliban Ahmad Shah Massoud. He's the leader of the mujaheddin, the Lion of Afghanistan. He had fought for Afghan freedom and something I strongly believed in: the equality of men and women.” 

His friends were bowled over by his audacity/overconfidence/presumptuous pluck. That casual way he had picked up the phone, called CNN, and asked to talk to Riz Khan (Live! On world TV!) about a war that did not directly concern him. 

“But the thing is, that war did concern me.” As it would later concern everyone.

Massoud was assassinated in Afghanistan on September 9, 2001. Two days later, the two towers fell in 9-11. 

More people became "citizens of the world" right there and then. 

Later they would fly the flags of tsunami-flooded Japan, earthquake-shaken Nepal, terrorist-hit France and Belgium.   

When Super Typhoon Yolanda hit the Philippines, the citizens of the world showed up too. In plane-loads and ship-loads of international Aid. Via trending Tweets and Facebook posts sending virtual but heart-felt hugs and tearful emoticons. The Pope, too, would later arrive in his pope mobile. 

Three months after typhoon Yolanda, the Philippines would thank the world, in a way only possible in this day and age. Electronic billboards lit up with “Thank You” signs at New York Times Square,Tokyo’s Shibuya Crossing, London’s Piccadilly Circus, Galeries Lafayette in Paris, and other cities.

The Thank You seen around the world would remind Yam of the day he used the telephone to wish a foreign stranger a Merry Christmas.

Now, of course, he has more than the telephone to reach across the globe.

“Now that I’m a film director, I make sure that my stories can cross over and transcend. I tell stories that tend to be universal and speak of our shared horrors and truths.

This is why I love writing and directing horror films. The language of horror films is the most visual and universal. We mostly fear the same things, like dark rooms, ghosts, and monsters.”

Which brings Laranas back to the Philippine presidential election – a monster of a race for which he cares “Not Much,” but hopes to be excused, having explained his reasons here. 

To be sure, he’s not alone. Einstein supports a more extreme version of the idea. This Citizen of World idea is, apparently, a thing.

So, there must be countless people like Yam out there… leaning into conversations over dinners and work breaks. Pretending to be more interested and knowledgeable than they really are.  All the while scanning the room for coherent bits to say, like Keyser Söze. Hoping to get away with it and, like Yam Laranas, walk free to join the rest of the world.– Rappler.com 

Gin de Mesa writes screenplays and literary essays. She was a former features Section Editor at thand a News and Documentary Producer for ABSCBN, GMA, and the National Geographic Channel. 

Once more we have a whole nation abnormally riveted on the results of the Bar examination. Actually we should be more excited when a Filipino earns a PhD in Physics, but there is a fascination with the Bar, because of the myth that has grown around it.

Justin De Jesus Sucgang is right – the cult is fostered by those who think of it as coveted membership in an exclusive club. Harry Roque is also right: It is very, very wrong to make competence depend on passing the Bar.

Understandably, those who pass are jubilant. We congratulate them. But those who did not pass, was it because they were weak, dense, stupid, dim-witted? Circumstances give us reason to pause. When you have 26% or so passing the examination, a good educator will ask himself: Are the students to blame, or might there be something amiss with the exam itself?

Preparing an examination is a science: test construction, evaluation, and measurement. There are considerations such as predictive validity to consider.  There are requisite tools, such as a Table of Specifications.

The Bar examiners, however, are selected (secretly) from the ranks usually of practitioners, some of whom may have never even prepared a quiz all their life, and who can neither make sense of the principles of test construction nor know how to use a Table of Specifications.

When you ask, for example, what "the Jason Clause" is, exactly what thinking skill in Bloom's revised taxonomy of educational objectives are you targeting? Why is such a question warranted, given the wide swath of transportation law, and the equally broad sweep of maritime law? In other words, why pick precisely on that?  The answer cannot be "Because I want to."  That would be whim, and constructing tests is not about whim.

So, I go with the Legal Education Board (LEB) project and will fully support it. Let us stop deceiving ourselves. Obsession with the Bar is what has truncated Philippine legal education, and let's learn from other jurisdictions what evaluative tools they use.

Seldom do passers in the Bar examination ever go beyond 40%. That means that, in general, 60% do not make it. If most of the products of a program do not make it, generally the educator will say: The program is broke. But all this time, we have been insisting: The examinees are broke... In a supreme act of injustice to them, and in an unbelievable option on our part as legal educators to remain intransigent about a really stupid position.

Congratulations then to the LEB for its initiative at veering legal education away from the Bar and making legal educators true educators, using educators' tools, and learning educators' science, rather than incidental teachers, or recreational teachers – for whom classroom teaching is recreational, after a day in court or in corporate boardrooms.

I look forward to the day that the fitness of the law graduate will be determined by more intelligent devices than a test that strikes anywhere, and the Bar shall be relegated to a still nerve-wracking exercise, yes, but of no more significance and fanfare than a final exam! These are my thoughts both as an educator and as an earnest student of the law. – Rappler.com

The author is Dean of the Graduate School of Law, San Beda College.

Dear Mayor Duterte,

When you first gained popularity, I made an effort to understand your appeal. I interviewed lawyers, business owners, writers and employees on why you were their choice.

I appreciated your do-or-die stance, your iron fist, and your seemingly incorrigible attitude that attracted so many of our citizens to join your side. I understood the level of desperation and hopelessness that could lead a nation to find salvation in your merciless eyes.

Your associations always worried me, as well as your high regard for the source of death and suffering in our country's recent past. Your language offended me, because image or not, joke or not, no woman deserves to be spoken of in the manner you consistently do. I became concerned that your popularity would cause more men to regard women as poorly as you do. 

'Kriminal lang ang pinapatay'

I always questioned how you kept your city's apparent peace and order. I worried for my friends when they didn't want to recognize the cost of keeping your city's crime rate low. "Kriminal lang talaga ang pinapatay niya," (He only kills criminals) they all said. They trust you so much to know by hearsay whether a petty thief should be executed or not, never mind that theft isn't even a capital crime.

You admitted it yourselfso I know it's not a joke when you say you will dump 100,000 bodies in Manila Bay. You said you would pardon police officers for rights abuses. You said you would pardon yourself for multiple murder. 

I worry when people around me believe that the "criminals" and "addicts" you promise to eliminate can't possibly be anyone they know. It bothers me more that just because they don't know these folks, that it would be okay to snuff them from society, no matter what their stories are or even if they are as young as 12 years old. It makes me nervous how you would possibly discern who is guilty or innocent on a national level without delegating this judgment to those who may not be as discriminating, conscientious, or as fair as you claim you are.

The powerful are spared

None of the people you've killed are rich or powerful. You have not condemned the Ampatuans, even if they massacred journalists and civilians, women and children. You do not vow to kill the convicted plunderers of our nation. In fact, you even promised to set them free, protect their rights to fair trial and release them on bail. You have assured these corrupt leaders the due process you couldn't offer to your own constituents.

Now that you've made international news and have made the United States' most ridiculous candidate appear more sensible than you, you have the ear of the world.

Your people adore you. 

Even if you admitted your seriousness in wanting to have first dibs in raping a dead Australian missionary. Even if you called your daughter a drama queen when she said she was also raped.

Even when you told women's groups to go to hell, or promised to cut international tieswithout regard for its impact on our economy or security.

Even when you're now facing a probe for hiding billions of pesos. Even if you're now asking to be considered innocent until proven guilty, a chance that suspected Davaoeño offenders never got under your rule.

Your supporters are becoming more brazen and sophisticated too, learning such phrases as "black propaganda," and their favorite "Bias!" without understanding that these terms also apply when you fail to listen to insight other than your own. They scour the internet for every mention of you. They threaten those who don't support you with rape or murder, following your unique brand of terror and violence.

They still worship you like a God, for you have no flaws and are the all-knowing, all-powerful savior they have been waiting for all their lives. They collect your snot and sweat as if you were a resurrected Jesus. You smirk and give in to their obsession, throwing smelly bimpos back at the elated crowd. They believe your stink will save their lives.

Ikaw na, as they would say. Your wish is their command. In the face of the most horrible and most offensive statements spewing from your mouth, to your supporters you can do no wrong. "Don't take it literally," they will say, even when you say you definitely mean it (until the next day when you say you don't). They love you because you say what you want, whenever you want, without regard for the repercussions of your statements. You are the voice they will never have - regardless of who wins the election.

Barring a sudden change of heart, your ardent supporters might very well vote you into power. Good for you! While I would accept the will of the electorate and resign myself to our fate, the idea of your leadership terrifies me.

I don't have much to lose when you begin your reign. Aside from shame for my country for electing an international embarrassment and my worry for my remaining loved ones in the Philippines, your impending presidency will not affect me as much as those whose lives are truly at stake. I am terrified by the human cost of your rise to power because it's those members of society who worship you who will be the first to be rounded up and killed if you fulfill your promises. 

Lack of pretense

What I like about you is your lack of pretense. I admire your fearlessness when declaring things that are universally wrong. You promised to free Gloria Macapagal-Aroyo and Bong Revilla. You want to give the country's most cruel dictator a hero's burial. You promised a dictatorship. You promised to close Congress. You promised that you would not be impeached until the job is done. 

Most of all, you promised to kill Filipinos. You vowed to have a leadership so bloody that even "God will weep" when you win.

My only hope is that you don't keep any of these promises you've explicitly stated again and again to the world. I pray that you lie when you make promises, and that only the beneficial social programs you had in your home city would be implemented nationwide. I pray that all the things you don't brag about are the ones that are true, and the ones you do talk about are all lies.

I hope you're a liar

I want you to be a liar. I want you to not keep your promises. Because I want to give those who worship you a fair chance with the prosperity they expect your regime to bring. Your supporters are not expecting to be taken from their homes the way you've rounded up the urban poor of Davao and executed them. They are not expecting to be lined up and shot for being afflicted with drug addiction, or for stealing so their families will not starve. 

Your worshipers are not expecting you to turn on them while you protect the big time criminals and drug lords, this time on a national scale when you occupy the highest post in the land. 

I want your devoted flock to keep loving you, even if it means my fears will be proven wrong. Even if your success confirms my paranoia, I'd rather be wrong about you because it means the ones who love you will not die. 

I want to be wrong about you, Dear Leader, because it would be horrible for your cult if your track record, promises, and bloody reign proved to be right.

Even if I disagree with your supporters, even if I don't believe what you've made them believe, they are all still Filipinos. Some of them are my relatives. Some are my friends and my family's employees. Most of them are strangers I'll never encounter in my life.

But as Filipinos, whether rich, poor, educated or not, whether their existence affects me or not, whether they have committed offenses or have been victims of crimes, each and every person deserves so much more than to be uncertain about his or her life. It's difficult to envision anything more when the loss of life and the violation of basic human rights are what you are promising with your presidency.

I hope to God for the sake of our country that all of the things you've promised are lies. –Rappler.com

Mar, Grace, Duterte, Jojo and Miriam.

Filipinos will be choosing their next leader from this quintet. None are exciting. All of them are flawed. (READ: The Imagined President)

You would think out of 100 million Filipinos, there would be one, maybe two, who would come out of the pack, grab the flag and inspire tens of millions from Appari to Jolo.

The plain, honest truth is that none of the above is worth dying for.

Mar, for all his earnest touting of his competence, is about as thrilling as wood. 

Grace does not inspire confidence in her judgment given her choice of vice president. Miriam doubled down on such a horrid choice for veep by picking Ferdinand Marcos Jr.

Jojo? If you do not like corruption and consider it the bane of existence in the country, scratch him off the list.

And Duterte? Let’s see. Hidden wealth? Check. Human rights violations? Check. And that is when he is only mayor.

Stupid, off-the-cuff remarks on rape? Got that in spades. Cussing at the Pope? That too.

A guy who is the son of a governor and a lawyer is not poor or masa. He only seems that way. Look at his bank account. 

Those who love Mar claim he is the cleanest, most experienced of the lot. 

That is what happens when you set the bar two inches off the floor. He should be able to hurdle it without even looking.

The argument for voting Mar is a negative. All of the others in the lineup are just unacceptable.

Grace Poe? I just do not think that ‘I will continue what my father did’ is an argument to become President.

If that is the logic, then she should be in showbiz.

I listened to her program of government. Long on ideas like reviving agriculture, and awfully short on specifics.

At the least, she matches Mar in being earnest.  

Come to think of it, I have not seen anything from the Fab Five on what specifically they will do for the country.

Economy? Nada. 

Relations with China? Zilch.

Ties with the U.S.? Duh.

On the economy, no big changes are expected from the quintet of candidates, except maybe launch an infrastructure program to clear out bottlenecks in the economy.

That means spending billions of pesos and creating jobs. Always a good thing politically and an excellent way to spread patronage among your supporters.

Boycott not an option

Like most national elections in the country, it’s been mostly a circus with very little discussion on what direction the country should take in the future.

I know the argument. People do not want to talk about that. 

That sounds very much like "the voters don’t really think a lot" so we go down to their level of intelligence.

Boycott is not an option please. If you do that, then you do not have the right to bitch and moan for the next six years about how bad the government is.

A lot of people will have to hold their noses in this election and choose who they think is good for the country.

Sounds very much like the phrase “swallow the toad.”

Can the country survive May 9?

Of course it will or at the very least muddle through.

What gives me hope are a couple of things.

For the first time in years or even decades, there is an inflamed intolerance of corruption. That can only grow.

Filipinos are more conscious about corruption and no longer sweep it aside as part of the "business as usual" nature of politics in the country.

Next, women and a lot of men are up in arms at Duterte’s rape talk. That alone means he shouldn’t be voted as dogcatcher in the Spratlys.

More than anything else, that is why Duterte is bad for the country. Enough of this BS macho talk. We are better than that and should get away from it.

And then there is Leni Robredo. She gives the country hope. She knows she has nothing to offer but good intentions and sound policy.

She has not given up on the country. 

There is a striking sense of decency in her positions. Just look at her stand on being against burying dictator Ferdinand Marcos in Libingan ng mga Bayani.

Not like Jojo who wants him buried there or Miriam, who says there should be a referendum. Miriam’s decision blows because she is hiding behind a vote when deciding is fairly basic. Stop looking behind your shoulder at Bongbong Jr.

Robredo will be there and I hope she wins and does not change. She should be the next President in 2022. 

I hope more people like her come out and serve in public life without getting contaminated by the radioactive quagmire that is politics in the country.

More important are ordinary Pinoys. They persevere and they sacrifice inside and outside the country.

They kept the economy afloat when the country was near falling apart.

The Fab Five in the presidential derby is plain depressing. I wish the choices are better.  One day, they will be. – Rappler.com

Rene Pastor is a journalist in the New York metropolitan area who writes about agriculture, politics and regional security. He was, for many years, a senior commodities journalist for Reuters. He founded the Southeast Asia Commodity Digest, which is an affiliate of Informa Economics research and consulting. He is known for his extensive knowledge of the El Niño phenomenon and his views have been quoted in news reports. He is currently an Online Editor of the international edition of the South China Morning Post in Hong Kong.

When I talk about leadership in my corporate talks or career articles on Rappler, I usually mean the qualities of CEOs and executives that allow them to propel a business from zero to hero.

In these cases, I emphasize the value of engaging people, setting a vision, and providing feedback. The corporate world is so mature and efficient in what it does that it can afford to sack incompetent leaders in a heartbeat and restore order just in time.

Unfortunately, we can’t say the same for our government which is ages away when it comes to the culture of leadership. The great thing however is that this election has trained us to demand better and for good, especially on social media.

In the spirit of voting for our upcoming president, vice president, and other future leaders this May 9, here are 3 leadership qualities I’ve learned in the corporate world that I consider critical when voting for #TheLeaderIWant. Here’s to also hoping that the leader who emerges victor possesses these.

A leader must be able to inspire his people

Leaders are also cheerleaders. Their goal is to inspire, motivate, and push you to be at the top of your game. They not only support you with physical tools to get things done (I love bosses who make sure I get my phone and laptop during my first day at work!), they also motivate you with emotional support whenever your heart gets shot down. Whenever you’re challenged, you know you can ask for help. (READ: 4 important questions to ask your boss this year) 

Your boss should know how to inspire you, or remind you of the very inspirations that keep you going – your family, your personal ambitions, your dreams. You want to keep on delivering during those tempting moments of quitting because you believe in what your boss stands for. 

You know that your interest is in good hands because it is in his hands. I remember my former boss, Didith, who once told me when I was challenged as a manager in the pharmaceutical industry. “This is not just about us making money, Jon. It’s also about the patients we can potentially save. Whenever I also want to quit, I always remember the very reason why this is worth fighting for.”

That was an important moment for me. We all need bosses like Didith. We need leaders who will effortlessly let us whisper to ourselves: “I believe in you” or “Wow, I want to become like you.”

We also need government leaders who can inspire. I want a president who can inspire us with so much integrity that every employee in BIR or LTO will think twice before stealing money not because he’s scared of getting locked behind the bars, but simply because he feels ashamed for betraying our motherland.

The president, vice-president, and senators will not and cannot do everything on their own. But if a leader can inspire, then he can also effectively delegate. An inspiring leader will not need to command or remind citizens to act responsibly. His class of inspired people, by their volition, will act responsibly on their own while he sleeps.

When we have an inspiring leader, we filter our actions because we believe it’s for the best: we drive responsibly, we condemn bribes, we even volunteer to clean the streets. We start thinking that we can contribute even in our smallest ways because we’re inspired. 

A leader must have the emotional maturity to deal with others

Leaders cannot perform in silos. They need allies to survive in a globalized world, regardless of how powerful they are. Steve Jobs had to enable Mac computers to run with Windows Office because the rest of the world uses it. Even if Apple wanted an empire of its own, it still needed to build bridges with Microsoft.

Similarly, your president will not only work within the borders of the country. He is required to perform international duties too, and this means that the face of the president is the face of the country. Together with his cabinet members or senators, he will shake hands, attend dinners, and speak in hundreds of international conferences.

At the heart of these undertakings, the president’s ability to connect and communicate with other leaders (who also have different egos and personalities) will be tested to its limits. This is why the mastery of communication is highly touted by psychologists as one of the most important skills a leader needs to succeed. But we know this already well: ideas and intentions are useless if you have poor social skills, or a foul mouth, to execute them.    

Ask yourself – what kind of diplomatic skills does your candidate have that can help in attracting more foreign investors? How will he engage leaders in the Middle East or Asia in requesting for more welfare protection of over 1 million OFWs abroad? We live at a time when our beloved country is pressured with many international concerns: a geographical tension with China, a military partnership with the USA, and a pending economic integration with ASEAN among other things.

Ask yourself, close your eyes, and visualize your candidate: how much does he know about international relations? How tactful is his heart and tongue during those diplomatic dinners? How deep is his networking ability to create allies with neighboring countries, and restore them when they’re damaged?

Leaders will never burn bridges because they know that many of us often cross the same paths and more importantly because “all roads lead to Rome”. 

A leader must have the “strong will” to get things done

Of course, bosses aren’t just there to please everybody. There will be moments when he also needs to show some fangs and use them to take control of bad situations. Each boss has his style and many fall under extremes. Some give you too many second chances while some fire you on the spot. (READ: 'I hate my boss!': 5 tips to deal)

It is your duty and responsibility as a voter to probe your candidate’s heart: does he love pleasing people too much or can he also make unpopular decisions that apparently work when given the chance? Will he take things personally or will he rather defend the greater good? Does he forgive easily out of fear of losing harmony? And is he taken for granted by his people because they think they won’t get caught?  

At work, great leaders are those who can skillfully draw the line between professionalism and relationships. (READ: At work, it's okay to say no to your boss)

We love a thoughtful boss who treats us to lunch during a rough day at work but knows when to distance himself when people get too close for comfort. I love managers who easily make friends with everyone in the room, but don’t hesitate to hold their friends accountable when they don’t show up for work.  

I support a candidate who unconditionally defends what is right, even if it may not please everyone (and besides, unless you are pizza, you can’t please everyone in this world!).

But I also loathe those who are too passionate to say that all ends can justify their means. At the end of the day, the ability to balance virtues is an art and skill that great leaders possess.

Who you are is what you do this May 9

We have gone such a long way, Philippines. Gone are the days when candidates just hire dancers or throw candies onstage to win public office. While I feel exhausted and stressed to see angry political rants on Facebook these past few weeks, I am happy also to realize that we have now graduated to become more critical and demanding of our leaders’ promises.

Finally, we learned how to tell them what we really want. This makes me smile and my dear sociologist friend, Nicole Curato, couldn’t have said it any better: “We deserve good leaders so let’s keep on interrupting. Let’s keep on giving them a hard time.”

May you all be enlightened to vote for The Right One this coming elections! – Rappler.com

Disclosure: Jonathan has expressed that he will be supporting Leni Robredo for vice president. He has not named any preference for a presidential candidate.

Jonathan Yabut is the proud Filipino winner of the hit Asian reality TV show, The Apprentice Asia and is currently based in Kuala Lumpur as the managing director of his own marketing consultancy firm, The JY Ventures & Consultancy. Jonathan is Asia’s leading motivational speaker on topics involving leadership, development of Gen Y workers, and career management for Fortune 500 companies. He is also the author of Southeast Asia’s 2015 best-selling motivational book, From Grit to Great.Visit his official Facebook Fanpage here.

These past few weeks, the temperature has gone through the roof in the Philippines and in social media, where conversations about politics have engaged everyone.

Friends, family, and acquaintances are fighting over their chosen candidates. From millennials to veterans, everyone has an opinion. Now and then, there are news breaks that momentarily interrupt talks on politics. 

For example, Beyonce's Lemonade album was released. The very personal virtual diary set off tongues wagging. Speculations have been lingering about her husband's rumored infidelities. Lemonade speaks of marriage, struggles of (racial) identity, feminism, and an affair.

I listened to the songs. Although I am not a Bey fan, the lyrics appeal to me as clear and strong. "This is your final warning. You know I give you life. If you try this shit again, You gon' lose your wife…" Bey was praised for coming out with her marital woes, making a stand that she is a woman not to be trifled with. Then, the Beyhive went after the alleged mistress. Amidst all of this mayhem, how come the husband Jay-Z was left off the hook?

A few days after Bey's Lemonade, the talk of the town goes back to local politics. Duterte comes under fire, once again, for encouraging wives to take philandering husbands back as long as they don’t bring back STDs. Prior to this statement, he made news globally for his controversial remarks on the rape of an Australian missionary. Duterte "joked" about a woman who was brutally killed and raped, saying "the mayor" should've had the first dibs on the woman. 

Duterte defenders were quick to admit: It was a bad joke. But they said he should be forgiven because that's just his humor.

After much ado, he took back his statement and apologized. But the damage has been done. His statement lost him not a few voters. For example, my mother-in-law's helper, Rose, told me she will not vote for Duterte. I asked why and she replied: "Mga lalaki lang ang mamayapa sa kanya (Only men will prosper under him)."

Her words are simple and true. Rose came from an abusive marriage with a philandering husband. She now supports her 3 sons on her own. 

Rose, however, is the exception. The rest of the Philippines see otherwise.

I saw Facebook posts openly sharing that they too have been raped, but are not affected by Duterte's joke. They don't realize that their statement just negated the silent, painful struggle of all other rape survivors.

Well and good for them that they can share their experience, even going as far as defending someone who perpetuates rape culture. It is heartbreaking to think how their supposed bravery could impinge on the determination of other victims to speak out against their abusers.

Duterte's daughter Sara leads those victims defending the abuser. True to form, the abuser further abuses the abused. Duterte silenced his daughter, relegating her real horrid experience to typical female hysteria.

Universal truth

Duterte apologists look away from what they know isn't right. Regardless of gender, they ignore what holds as universal truth – respect – all in the name of change. 

As one of his defenders said, Duterte is like her "father" who is decidedly chauvinist but is a fierce and loving protector. 

The issue of citizens defending Duterte is similar to the battered woman syndrome where the partner tries to protect her abuser. Filipinos have experienced abuse for centuries – from our former colonizers to our current corrupt government officials.

We've accepted sexism, rape culture, and patriarchy as the norm so much so that we don't have second thoughts voting for a misogynist candidate.

I am not for oligarchs. I am not for crooks. I am not for newbies using the woman card to further her interests. I am certainly not for misogynists. But I concede that the clamor for Duterte is loud and clear.

The defenders see him as the "savior, messiah, and knight in shining armor." They wait for change through him. They keep insisting change will only be through this person.

As cliché as it sounds, doesn't change come from within one's self? The late Michael Jackson's Man in the Mirror should be listened to more often.

This isn't just for me, but more so for children who will grow up under his stead if he wins.

We learn what we are given growing up. With Duterte at the helm, we are allowing boys and girls to hear and see a womanizer and a sexist to be forgiven for his woman-shaming ways, just because he has done good for the majority in Davao. 

Is it okay if someone like Duterte marries your daughter? Is it all right if your son acts and talks like him? Would it be fine if your children make fun of those who are disabled or to use derogatory terms? Is it fine for you to watch your daughter to live and suffer under a philandering husband? Is it okay if your daughter cries rape and be shut down? Would it be fine if your sons disregard girls as merely objects or for them to see other people as dispensable?

I believe the leaders we choose are a representation of who we are ourselves. 

Although in the end, despite himself, Duterte is the hero. 

I have two young daughters who are both less than two years old. They are named after Philippine goddesses – protector of women, defender of mankind, and goddess of hardworking laborers.

I can only hope my children will grow up as empowered as their namesakes. I hope they can do and be anything and contribute to a democratic society, despite this society. – Rappler.com

Nikki Luna is an artist, feminist and founder of StartArt a non profit providing art workshops to women and youth victims of human rights violations. A UP Fine Arts graduate, she took her art residency at the Cooper Union school of Art in New York. She has mounted several exhibitions in local and international galleries and museums representing the Philippines. Her visual discourse revolves around women's issues. Currently she is studying in depth her MA in women and development studies in UP. Follow her on Twitter @nikkiluna.

Stakes are high in the upcoming May 9 elections in the Philippines.

Amid the extreme poverty, severe drought, heavy militarization, a hanging Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL), and the renewed vigor of the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters and the Abu Sayyaf, Mindanao in southern Philippines has the most at stake.

Resource-rich Mindanao has 11 of the 20 poorest provinces in the Philippines, and the poorest region, the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM). The harshest drought in decades has pushed peasants to slaughter their cattle for food and abandon dried rice fields.

On April 1, police fired upon farmers in Kidapawan, who demanded food aid promised to them earlier in the year. Three were killed, scores injured, and 77 were detained for direct assault, including elderly and pregnant women. 

A similar roadblock protest was staged in South Cotabato on April 25, with protesters demanding access to the government’s calamity funds. Any incompetent government can rain bullets between hungry farmers and food aid marked for them. What farmers want to know, though, is will they continue to starve in the next administration?

Mindanao has been a stage for insurgency and counter-insurgency campaigns for over 4 decades. Over 120,000 were killed in wars between the government and the Muslim indigenous peoples from 1969-1990. Anthropologist Jowel Canuday has shown how displacement has been normalized in the government’s pursuit of rebels. An estimated 3.5 million people were displaced in Mindanao in the last 15 years.

While the current administration pursued peace negotiations with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), other armed groups are not shaking hands with the government. Last month, Abu Sayyaf killed 18 soldiers and decapitated a Canadian hostage. Those living in evacuation centers are interested in how the incoming administration plans to quell the conflict in Mindanao.

'Big man' syndrome 

This election is a big deal. Much power is assigned to the president, who can veto Congress, appoint the chief justice, and supervise local government units. Presidential elections thus reinforce a persisting ‘big man’ syndrome.

'Big man' elections reconfigure the networks that benefit from the highest public office. They distinguish the programs that get priority from the ones shelved for the next 6 years. For instance, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s administration (2001-2010) threw out gains from the peace negotiations between the National Democratic Front of the Philippines and the Joseph Estrada administration (1998-2001). But Macapagal-Arroyo resumed negotiations with the MILF aborted by Estrada.

While many administrations abandon achievements by their predecessors because of personal or party rivalries, there are exceptions. Current President Benigno Simeon Aquino III continued negotiations with the MILF that had experienced both momentum and setbacks during the Macapagal-Arroyo regime. From this, Aquino reaped praise in the signing of the celebrated Framework Agreement on the Bangsamoro in 2012 and the Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro in 2014.

The Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL) fulfills the agreements between the government and the MILF on economic and governance issues by building a robust Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in place of the ARMM. The BBL’s survival and final form are to be determined by the Philippine Congress. Watering down the bill, however, may make the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region indistinguishable from the ARMM, which Aquino called a “failed experiment”. Poised to be enacted in 2015, the BBL has been held hostage in Congress as the Aquino administration runs out of time.

Based on the April 24 debate among 5 presidential candidates on their plan for Mindanao, Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Dutuerte and former interior secretary Mar Roxas explicitly said that they will pass the BBL, while Senator Grace Poe promised to pursue “peace talks with all sides”. Senator Miriam Defensor-Santiago talked about dismantling private armies and strengthening customary law through the observance of Sharia, while Vice President Jejomar Binay underscored poverty as the root cause of conflict in Mindanao.

Historical injustice 

What form could the BBL take under the next administration? Defensor-Santiago seemed to be talking only about peace, while Binay seemed to be talking only about development in Mindanao. Dutuerte, Poe, and Roxas all alluded to both peace and development in the area. Roxas, the Liberal Party candidate backed by Aquino, vowed to continue Aquino’s support for the BBL.

For many, Roxas means the status quo, and that may not be a good thing for Mindanao. Dutuerte, the only candidate from Mindanao, expressed that historical injustice against the Muslim indigenous peoples must be corrected and gave unequivocal support for the BBL. Whether wittingly alluding to initial criticisms of the BBL or not, Poe strikingly suggests that a more gender-aware and inclusive talks could be in place. Poe was also the lone candidate who talked about addressing the terrorist threat.

The election outcomes are crucial to Mindanao. Decades of neglect, violence,  and impunity in Mindanao have widened inequality in the country, spurring a loathing for imperial Manila. To a certain extent, the campaign period forced both candidates and voters to consider the plight of the poorest and most marginalized in the Philippines. The poor, who has the most at stake, think and talk back with their votes.

Whether politicians can make good on their promises or voters are willing to hold them accountable beyond elections is another matter. Amidst the Comelec security breach and the recent market jitters, those of us voting on May 9 may ask, what difference does our vote make to farmers and the internally displaced in Mindanao? – Rappler.com

Teresa Jopson is a PhD candidate at the Australian National University. Her work focuses on internal displacement, shifting masculinities and comprehensive peace in Mindanao, Southern Philippines.

A version of this article was first published at New Mandala, the leading website on Southeast Asia and based at the Australian National University’s Coral Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs. 

“Ganito ba talaga ang tadhana natin? Kalaban ang kalaban? Kalaban ang kakampi? Nakakapagod.” (Is this really our fate? Our enemy is our enemy? Our enemy is our friend? It is tiring.)

When I started thinking of writing this piece, I hesitated a hundred times. Come to think of it, I share Heneral Luna’s sentiment in the movie: Nakakapagod. It is exhausting to have to try and understand the political circus that we have had no choice but to be unwitting witnesses to, if not suffer from. And it is even more exhausting to stand up and fight for our communities and the environment when it is quite manifest that very few politicians care.

Almost overnight (well, 90 days to be more precise), we turned into a nation of political analysts, and Facebook became a battleground for both civil and brutish altercations, the profoundly intelligent and the most stupid arguments, a smorgasbord of political memes that can last us a whole century. This season had seen the best, the worst, and the more than worst in the Filipino.

Already, many people, regular citizens and pundits alike, are drawing images of the post-election scenario, and much of the picture that we see leaves very little room for imagination. It seems that no matter the eventual outcome, this has been one of the most bitterly fought elections in our history. And perhaps because we live in the age dominated by social media, or maybe because we have somehow degenerated into an unthinking and wrathful society, the nation has never been so divided than it is now.

At the very least, this may very well be the most ‘hateful’ page in our country’s contemporary history.  Perhaps in the course of this spectacle, social media had seen the most number of clicks of the “unfriend” button.  Unfortunately, the manner by which wars are fought matters more than how they end. Because in the end, nobody really wins.

Many people have ventured to analyze every candidate – trying to make sense of their strengths and weaknesses, their mass appeal or lack of it, why they are glorious or why they are pathetic, why they will win and others won’t.

And amid the din and ruckus of the election period, when so much had already been said and we have all had an overdose of promises, what breaks my heart is that my notion that the environment is not a priority for our leaders has been reaffirmed.

My fervent hope was, somewhere along the way, we would hear the presidentiables offer compelling platforms that would safeguard the country’s ecology and thereby truly serve the long-term interests of our people. Not in the presidential debates, not in their speeches in the plazas, not in their pricey advertisements, not in their choice of political allies, not in their track records, and not by the names of their financial contributors.

Instead of discussing issues with depth, they were utterly shallow in substance and superficial in form. Instead of presenting a clear vision of how this nation can become a leader in protecting the environment and promoting ecological justice, they resorted to muddling the issue. Instead of showing knowledge, wisdom, and competence, we saw them bungling and grappling for words. Instead of empathizing and identifying with the suffering of the people because of the ecological crisis, they have managed to turn this whole thing into a ridiculous spectacle.

The ecological crisis that we are in has to be seen and appreciated for what it really is – a crisis. It requires no elaboration, and words cannot justly describe what farmers, fisherfolk, women, children, and millions of Filipinos have to endure as our natural life support systems continue to collapse.

Climate change is turning for the worse, and all the political wrangling and cornucopia of promises will not make it better.

The tragedy of our politics is that it ignores what matters most. As we are engrossed in the heat of the moment and participate in the hysteria of which assh**le should sit in Malacañang, we are blinded from the serious perilous change that is already upon us.  

The current El Niño is just a preview (a deadly one nonetheless). We forget that we have no option but to stand united. We forget that solidarity is not a choice but a necessity. We forget that in order to weather the storm, the Filipino people must embrace one another, dimples or warts and all.

Let us not wait until another “Kidapawan” becomes a household term. We cannot afford to stand idly by as our leaders coopt values and virtues such as malasakit, pagbabago, matuwid, ginhawa, and puso (compassion, change, upright, comfort, and heart) into mere political rhetoric.  We cannot lie helpless as our would-be leaders do not even know the difference between weather and climate, or embrace false solutions such as ‘responsible mining’ or ‘clean coal’, or allow other countries to dump their trash in our land.

It is heartrending to know that our indigenous peoples, who have been stewards of nature for ages, are ever more marginalized. It is distressing to see that the country is moving towards a fossil-fuel dependent energy sector despite the whole world moving in the other direction.

Because no person, even serving as President, can uplift this nation and rescue its people from the environmental crisis single-handedly, we ought to remember that the biggest danger to the Philippines is the belief that it is someone else’s job to save it.

As such, on May 9th, your vote is not an exercise of delegating authority to anyone. It is an exercise of solidarity and firm belief in our nationhood and common destiny.

The journey does not end on Monday. The future of this nation is neither in the hands of one man nor in the hands of 54.4 million voters. It is in the hands of 100 million Filipinos.

All of this may lead us to ask: Is the future worth fighting for?

“Bayan o sarili? Pumili ka.” (Country or self? You must choose.) Heneral Luna could not be so pointedly correct in laying down the choices. - Rappler.com

Naderev ‘Yeb’ Saño is the Executive Director of Greenpeace Southeast Asia.