This is the second of three columns written to mark the first 100 days of the Duterte government.
Last Saturday, I wrote about good news coming from the administration—the great decision to impose a moratorium on land conversion, the progress in the peace processes, and the excellent appointments the President has made across the bureaucracy. I am also optimistic about the anti-poverty programs of the Duterte government, the anti-monopolistic economic reforms being proposed, the measures to address the mobility and transportation crisis, the continuation of education reforms, the health interventions being considered, the plan to ramp up spending for infrastructure, and the radical environmentalism being now espoused. This is definitely a government of action.
For all of these, it is President Duterte who should be praised and no one else. He is a strong leader, with immense political will. If not for the targeting of the poor in the war against drugs, I would have described Duterte as pro-poor; certainly, with respect to workers, farmers, the urban poor, indigenous peoples, and other basic sectors, I believe that this government would instinctively be pro-poor.
He is also an authentic character, sui generis (unique, one of a kind) to use a legal term: his language is colorful; he is both sexist and solicitous in his treatment of women; funny and obnoxious at the same time. According to many who have met him personally, he is charming and full of empathy. (Disclosure: I have met him a couple of times before he became president but only very briefly so I could not form an opinion about his personal character.) Definitely, Duterte’s supporters idolize him. He certainly seems to have won the hearts, if not the minds, of rank and file soldiers and policemen.
Having acknowledged his strengths, I will now share Duterte’s weaknesses and the threats that his presidency brings to the country.
I will not sugarcoat the President nor interpret his words and actions, giving them a different twist than what seems to me to be loud and clear. I take his actions and words for what they are, and assume that he means them. Because of these, there are serious challenges before us as a people and country: on human rights, on foreign policy, and on the future of our democracy.
First, human rights. There is no doubt that the President does not care greatly about human rights in the traditional sense of the term. He has spoken numerous occasions about this. Certainly to him, human rights must be subordinated to the common good.
From his first day in office, in his dinner with the people in the slums of Tondo, he made it clear that drug addicts are dispensable, damaged goods. When he says that addicts are not human beings, I believe he means that. When he promises to slaughter three million drug addicts, I do not consider that hyperbole. Indeed, if I had a drug addict in my family now and we could afford it, I will make sure that family member leaves the country now and comes back only in 2022. It is still safe now for people in gated communities, as the massacre of the poor is happening only in depressed neighborhoods. Still, with the metrics that seems to guide the war against drugs, that could change in months. Even middle-class addicts and users, including suspected ones, will also be targeted.
Given this view of human rights and its disregard just to win the war against drugs, and given the language of the President, I am no longer optimistic that President Duterte can avoid an international indictment for wanton violation of human rights. I oppose the filing of such charges not just because it could be legally infirm for now but also it could create a backlash against human rights advocates in the country and could have disastrous consequences on democracy here. What is sad is that it is so avoidable—if only the President were more temperate in his language and if internal accountability mechanisms, such as the Commission on Human Rights, were given more support and encouragement to work. The fairness of the hearings in Congress are also crucial in this respect.
Second, foreign policy. I get the President loud and clear on this, too. He does not like the United States. He likes China and Russia better, thinking our strategic interests lie best if we make a realignment happen. It is not unthinkable that we will soon break relations with the United States. We have to prepare for that.
I do not object to President Duterte for making the case for a strategic realignment. But I wish this happened as a consequence of a debate within our foreign policy establishment, including in Congress, and not a result of one’s man perceptions and decisions. Years—nay, decades—of tedious and challenging diplomatic work are now being wrecked. The realignment should happen with the right information and analysis about Chinese and Russian intentions, and with knowledge of the enormous military, economic and political consequences of such a decision.
Third and finally, the future of our democracy. I fear for our democracy. There is hardly any political opposition left. The unintended consequence of the budget reforms, all well-intended, under the Aquino administration has led to the consolidation of presidential power over the budget, making Congress useless. The use of the impeachment power against Chief Justice Corona instructed future presidents on how to coerce the Judiciary. The unprecedented attacks, from all fronts, against Vice President Binay, have also been instructive. We now see that happening with Senator Leila de Lima. And then we have the manipulation of social media, with trolls unleashed at anyone that might criticize the President or anyone, like the Reuters journalists Manuel Mogato and Karen Lema, who are simply doing their job and reporting the facts.
It is not the fault of President Duterte that all these threats to democracy are unleashed, but it is within his power to stop them.
The Philippine president has awesome and mighty powers. As my constitutional law professor, retired Justice Vicente V. Mendoza, once wrote, our presidential system is unlike the United States which has at least Congress as a truly co-equal branch. Our system was based on the colonial office of the Spanish and then the American Governor-General. These chief executives had absolute powers, including the declaring of martial law when warranted, over the Philippine islands. True, the 1987 Constitution instituted more safeguards than the 1973 and 1935 Constitutions, but the Office of the President remained essentially the same with all the powers it has traditionally held, including the declaration of martial law which the 1986 constitutional commission foolishly granted again to the president.
In the first 100 days of his presidency, President Duterte has used his awesome and mighty powers well in some cases. But in others—as in human rights, foreign policy, and as guardian of our democracy—there are real concerns. One can only hope, that in the next 100 days (the subject of my next column), we will have more of the good than the bad.
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