Arroyo Must Have a Clear Mandate

Political analysts believe that President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, who her supporters say is likely to win Monday’s election, should deal with the credibility of the election first. She understands, they say, that the acrimony created by election protests and the political divisiveness these could create “will destroy her, that it could give rise to a host of problems, such as military adventurism.”

By Carlos H. Conde
Bulatlat.com

Judging by the trend in the counting of the ballots so far, and regardless of the howls of protest from the opposition camp over the results of exit polls and quick counts, it seems likely that President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo will win Monday’s election or so her supporters say.

This early, political scientists and analysts have pointed out that Arroyo, if indeed she wins, will have her plate full of unappetizing problems. But even before she thinks of attacking this problem, Arroyo needs to do one thing, analysts say, and that is, win credibly.

This early, too, the political opposition is already painting a scenario of fraud and irregularities in the election. This is something that could hamstrung Arroyo, analysts say.

“Arroyo should deal with the credibility of the election first,” said Benito Lim, a political scientist at the Asian Center of the University of the Philippines. “She understands that this acrimony” – referring to the protests and the political divisiveness these could create – “will destroy her, that it could give rise to a host of problems, such as military adventurism,” he said.

Arroyo, Lim added, “will become a minority president, like it or not, but the issue is not winning big but winning credibly. The public must be convinced that the election was clean and that no cheating happened. That is the only way she can have that mandate.”

Already, people are talking about the possibility of another Edsa 3, when supporters of deposed President Joseph Estrada rioted and tried to lay siege on Malacanang. The political opposition could exploit a suspect Arroyo victory to whip up an anti-Arroyo sentiment similar to Edsa 3. A glimpse of that possibility was Poe’s “victory march” in Makati on Tuesday night.

Luis Teodoro, a director of the Center for People’s Empowerment in Governance, a nongovernment institute that does studies and researches on governance and democracy, thinks that the myth of Edsa 3 has dissipated, that the political opposition doesn’t have the capacity to mount a similar uprising.

Mandate

But Teodoro concedes that Arroyo must have that mandate. Without it, he said, she would be hard put to deal with the country’s problems. “We have a looming economic crisis. That should be her next agenda,” he said.

For all her faults, Teodoro said, Arroyo is in a better position than Poe to deal with the economy, mainly because she understands what caused these problems in the first place. “If only she could surprise us all,” he said.

The Philippine economy is one of the worst performers in Southeast Asia, with growth forecast this year at only 5 percent, the lowest in the region next to Indonesia. The government’s humongous debt, $61 billion, is putting pressure on government spending, more than a quarter of which goes to servicing this debt. Foreign investments are down while a rapid population growth could worsen an already high jobless rate of 11.4 percent.

Arroyo should rethink the policies that she had implemented in the three years that she continued the term of deposed President Joseph Estrada, Lim said. He pointed out that Arroyo increased the country’s foreign debts in those three years, prompting financial institutions to warn that the Philippines may become the next Argentina, referring to that country’s debt default.

“Ours is development by borrowing. If we cannot borrow and default on our debt, a lot of people will suffer,” Lim said.

In those three years, workers had not had any increase in wages while poverty persisted. More than half of the country’s 84 million people live on less than $2 (PhP 110) a day, according to the World Bank.

Management by illusion

The trouble is, Lim said, Arroyo “has been lying through her teeth. She has been telling us that our economy was getting better when it was not.” Arroyo, he said, must be very frank to her people about these problems and to come out with meaningful solutions.

“The management by illusion, by propaganda that she has been doing for three years will no longer work,” Lim said.

The Asian Center professor said Arroyo should learn the lessons of Edsa Dos by now. “After Edsa Dos, she was paying political debts left and right. She has peddled influence. There was so much graft and corruption, but that was because she was convinced the military, the police and the Makati Business Club helped her took power. Unfortunately, there was not enough goodies to give around.”

Lim said Arroyo “cannot solve the country’s problem by rhetoric and propaganda, or by looking busy.” He said “she is in the best position to understand and correct the damage that she has done. If not, we are going to collapse together.”

Peter Wallace, a financial advisor based in Manila, enumerated to the Agence-France Presse a host of other problems facing the country, among them corruption, a weak education system and poor infrastructure. Without addressing these issues, he said, “the Philippines will be the basket case of Asia in one generation from now." Bulatlat.com

Back to top

We want to know what you think of this article.