“You cannot blame then BBM for describing his government as functional. Leadership and the presidency involve many complex functions”
“What we have managed to do in the first 100 days is put together a government that is functional.”
That is the No. 1 achievement President Ferdinand Romualdez Marcos Jr. cited after three months and 10 days, when asked by GMA 7 reporter Ivan Mayrina in the Q and A portion of “The President’s Night” of the Manila Overseas Press Club last Oct. 5 at the Sofitel Plaza.
Despite short notice, MOPC, chaired by me, produced the largest ever post-inaugural prestige audience for President Marcos Jr. during its “The President’s Night” Wednesday last week.
The gala event was attended by some 500 top media professionals and businessmen, including delegations from six of the country’s biggest business and professional groups—the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry led by President George Barcelon, the Federation of the Filipino-Chinese Chambers of Commerce and Industry led by Henry Lim, the Federation of Philippine Industries led by President Jess Aranza; the realtors group FIABCI led by Reghis Romero, Jun Dulalia and Architect Nestor Mangio; the Philippine Exporters Confederation led by Sergio Ortiz Ruiz, and the Philippine Constitution Association led by Speaker Ferdinand Martin Romualdez.
BBM’s second achievement is that the country’s most popular president ever has assembled “the best and brightest” to work in his government.
“Best and brightest” implies technocracy and expertise earned from formal training, usually from reputable schools, here and abroad, plus many years of experience for lodging many years of work, in government and in the private sector.
And the third achievement is having unified the entire country.
Marcos Jr. obtained 31.629 million votes in the May 2022 presidential elections—two to five times the votes of previous presidential winners, and 59 percent of the total votes cast for president. BBM’s votes were twice those of his nearest rival.
Fidel V. Ramos won in 1992 with only 5.3 million votes (23.58 percent); Joseph Estrada in 1998 with 10.7 million (39.86 percent); Gloria Macapagal Arroyo in 2004 with 12.9 million (39.99 percent); Benigno Simeon Aquino III in 2010 with 15.2 million (42 percent); and Rodrigo Duterte in 2016 with 16.6 million or 39 percent.
With such an awesome mandate, Marcos Jr. erased in one blow whatever negative legacy his father and namesake Ferdinand Edralin Marcos Jr. might have been associated with.
Marcos Sr. was blamed for human rights abuses because 14 of his 20-year rule were under martial or strongman rule. (Martial law was imposed on September 21, 1972 and lifted on January 17, 1981. – Editor)
Having assumed the functions of both the executive and the legislature, FM was a dictator and his rule became associated with cronyism and corruption.
Little, if any, of alleged massive corruption, was proven despite 36 years of a “functioning” Presidential Commission on Good Government created by Cory Aquino.
Marcos Jr’s justice secretary, Jesus Crispin “Boying” Remulla, has had the good sense to park PCGG under the Department of Justice, where the PCGG can be made to be more “functional.”
By now thus, you know the difference between functioning—which is doing one’s basic function—and functional –which involves many functions and many other things, like aesthetics, for instance.
You cannot blame then BBM for describing his government as functional. Leadership and the presidency involve many complex functions.
No other presidency has been so challenged as to be perceived to be a failure so early in the game.
With P13 trillion in debts, and rising, the government is technically bankrupt.
To recover from the worst economic slump ever, the government has to borrow more. The BBM administration has just obtained $2 billion in loans thru a first bond sale. Seemingly huge, the $2 billion is not enough.
So the government is looking for what you call free money. Foreign investments. And remittances of the 12 million Filipino expats abroad.
The best ever foreign investment is about $10 billion in one year. It was not enough.
The No. 1 source of foreign investments today is Singapore. So President Marcos Jr. has gone to that island state twice, meeting its prime minister on both occasions.
The No. 1 source of OFW remittances is the United States. So BBM went there for a week during which he also managed to introduce himself before the United States as “Ferdinand Marcos. I am the president of the Republic of the Philippines.”
According to surveys, the No. 1 problem of Filipinos is inflation—the fast rate of increases in prices of nearly all commodities and services, particularly food and energy items.
Bangko Sentral Governor Philip Medalla says Philippine inflation is 80 percent imported. Meaning if inflation were 8 percent, only 1.6 percentage points of that could be blamed on the pace of increase in price of domestic goods.
Today, the Philippines imports 25 percent of its total food needs and 99 percent of its crude oil needs. What can we expect BBM to do then?
Well, expect him to make more overseas trips. To arrange for investments for the production of or supply of food for Filipinos. To arrange for supplies of crude and other energy supplies.
And to re-connect the Philippines to the world. Under the Duterte administration, the Philippines gravitated towards China, as if it were the only source of investments, loans, and tourists.
As regards oil, Marcos says he will deal with any supplier, including Russia. The primary consideration is the interest of Filipinos, or national interest, not geopolitics.
After all, the Philippines, BBM says, is “a friend to all, an enemy to none.”