"Some of the candidates are running for the wrong reasons."
With the start of the official campaign period for national positions, the big question is who will make it to the Senate. Survey results indicate the preponderance of reelectionists and old names, with only one or two newbies seen likely to walk the halls of the august body come July 1st.
The surveys tell us that the leading contenders are those with the highest awareness percentages among the electorate. Hence, the current topnotcher has a 97-percent awareness rating, and the cellar dweller among 60 bets languishing at 0.2 percent.
The survey results do tell us that popularity or name recall counts a lot for candidates to score high. What they don’t tell us is the character of the candidates, their track record in public office, and their position on key issues affecting the nation’s future.
For many politicians, a seat in the Senate means prestige as it denotes a national constituency and is a stepping stone to higher political office. But the Senate is not for two-bit politicians, the overly ambitious and out-and-out clowns with nothing to offer the nation.
In fact, we expect our senators to be able to discuss issues intelligently, whether it’s politics, economics, foreign policy, national security, and so on. We do not expect them to be experts in these fields, but at the minimum, they should be able to ask the right questions so they can be sufficiently educated to make the right decisions on important legislation that need to be passed.
Unfortunately, not a few of the current crop of senatorial candidates can hardly pass the tests of unsullied integrity, proven competence and sterling track record.
What’s worse, from where we sit, is that some of the candidates are running for the wrong reasons. One wants to be in the Senate because he said the President wanted him to run. Given his leading role in implementing the administration’s bloody war on drugs, we seriously doubt if he can make an informed judgment on complex issues requiring political acumen and keen discernment.
Another claims to want to serve the public by putting up centers to help the poor, but that’s the work of the executive branch, not of lawmakers. The job of lawmakers is to study national issues requiring new laws or amendment of existing ones, not to make oneself visible in gatherings and functions simply for media mileage.
What we’re saying is that we should vote wisely in the coming midterm election, as this is one political exercise that’s going to determine whether we preserve and enhance our democratic system of governance and arrest the dangerous trend towards authoritarianism, while ensuring that economic growth is sustained to reduce poverty in this country.
We cannot achieve the goals of political stability and economic growth if we continue to elect to high office those already tainted by corruption and already facing graft and plunder charges before the courts, the unqualified, the incompetent, and the utterly useless.
A first for Masonry
The Naga City Masonic Lodge No. 257 (NCML 257), located in Naga City, Camarines Sur, and one of the more than 400 lodges under the jurisdiction of the Grand Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons of the Philippines, will hold its 38th Installation of Elected and Appointed Officers on Feb. 16, 2019, 2 p.m., at Avenue Plaza Hotel located along Magsaysay Avenue, in Barangay Balatas, Naga City.
The new set of officers will be led by Philip Mark Olivan, who will be installed as the 35th Worshipful Master of NCML 257.
Olivan, born totally deaf in Naga City, grew up and studied in Canada and USA, and was made a Master Mason in Granada Hills Lodge No. 378 under the jurisdiction of the Grand Lodge of California, USA, and affiliated with NCML 257 in 2012 upon his return to his hometown to join and help his family in managing their various enterprises.
Olivan, fluent in American Sign Language and also an accomplished lip-reader and oralist, will be the first-ever Deaf Worshipful Master not only in the 37-year history of NCML 257 and in the 100-year institutional history of GLFAMP, but also in the 250-year recorded history of Masonry in the Philippines.
Initial research also indicates that Olivan could be the first-ever Deaf Worshipful Master in the world.
Olivan will be installed by Arthur Allan Ponce, a Deaf rights advocate and Past Master of Quezon City Masonic Lodge No. 122, and he will be assisted by two Past Masters of NCML 257, Manuel Perez Jr. and John C. Buendia as Master of Ceremonies and Assistant Master of Ceremonies, respectively.
The guest of honor and keynote speaker is John Choa, a well-known Deaf and PWD rights advocate and Past Grand Master of GLFAMP.
The installation ceremonies are open to invited non-Masons, one of the very rare occasions that a Masonic lodge opens its temple doors to the public.
