July 06, 2003

The Philippine STAR, Opinion Page

All Roads Lead to 

A Minority President  

By Babe Romualdez

The list of potential presidential candidates is growing, and looking at the list, I’d say we would most likely have a minimum of three to four major contenders for 2004. Of course, Ping Lacson and Raul Roco have already indicated that they’re in the race come hell or high water. Our friend Jun Magsaysay recently joined the bandwagon. At the start of 2003, other names popped up: Angie Reyes, Fernando Poe Jr., Loren Legarda, Noli de Castro, and Danding Cojuangco, who is still undecided. Despite her claim that she will not join the presidential race, today, no one doubts that GMA will run in 2004.

Whoever it may be that will win in the coming elections, inevitably, this country will again have a minority president just like in previous years. In 1998, there were 10 candidates that competed for the presidency, eight of whom were major contenders. Of the more or less 35 million registered voters in 1998 (then we had a population of 73 million), according to our records, 39.9 percent voted for Estrada, 15.9 percent for Joe De V, 13.8 percent for Roco, 12.4 percent for Osmena, 8.7 percent for Mayor Lim, 4.9 percent for De Villa, 3 percent for Miriam Santiago and 1.3 percent for Enrile, with Dumlao and Morato getting .12 and .07 percent respectively. But the actual voter turnout was only about 28 million. Even with the extreme popularity of Erap, still, he was no more than a minority president. The same was true in 1992 when FVR won the presidential race. Of the more than 22 million actual voters, only 5.3 million or 23.6 percent voted for FVR, and the rest of the votes were divided among the six other contenders: Santiago got 19.7 percent; Danding Cojuangco, 18.2 percent; Mitra, 14.6 percent; Imelda Marcos, 11.3 percent; Salonga, 10.2 percent; and Doy Laurel, 2.4 percent. 

The multiparty system has not really worked well for this country because a minority president can only get an average of 25 percent maximum of the voting public in a four-way race, leaving 75 percent of the voting public virtually against him. It appears that politics is the end-all and be-all in this country, and this system can prove to be dangerous to the political and economic state of the country.  A leader needs the majority’s support, if not altogether the full support of the public to push for real changes and reforms. What do you think a president could do with only 25 percent of the public supporting him? Not only does our present system become a breeding ground for the “parliament of the streets,” it also makes electoral cheating or “Dagdag-Bawas” easier. It is more than apparent that the present system was made to make a president fail from the start. This alone is enough reason why the country has not moved. Either we push for a run-off or start planning and embracing another system of government to get us back on track. There were small political parties way back in 1946 to 1972, but it was actually the 1987 Constitution that provided a legal ground for a multiparty system in place of the two-party system that the country had during the early 30s. The original ancestors of the present-day balimbings may have jumped from one party to the other then, but we at least had better choices for the presidency during that period.

The proponents of the parliamentary form of government mostly argue on the topic of the status of the leader because they believe this form is more in keeping with the temperament of Filipinos. In a parliament, the leader – the Prime Minister -- is voted directly by the legislature. The leader and his chosen cabinet therefore are directly responsible to the legislature, which means that their positions are dependent mainly on the legislature’s vote of confidence. A serious error, an attempt at corruption, or just being lazy could give a leader a grave censure or a no-confidence vote – and this alone can boot him out of office. This also means that a candidate for leadership is not chosen by a popular vote of the masses. This form of government has worked well with many Asian countries. In fact, the Philippines is the only country that’s trying to survive in the region with a semi-American style of government. In our present system, the government can only remove a sitting president either through an impeachment proceeding (which may take some time because the alleged “crime” has to be proven through a series of trials) or the public can vote for another candidate during elections (which can come only after six years). In our case, we did a quick fix with EDSA II or the so-called “parliament of the streets.” There is really nothing in the Constitution that says we can go out in the streets and demand that a president relinquish his office.

But if we insist in keeping this American presidential form of government, we might as well go all the way and follow it to the letter. We could have a federal system of government, or even an “electoral college” so that the voting system would really be effective. And not this mestizo-form of government that has sectoral representatives on top of the regular members of Congress and the Senate, and where the Vice President comes from another party. We should consider reverting back to a two-party system much like what we had during the 1930s. This will help greatly in stabilizing the government and the country because in a two-way race, the leader is clearly chosen by the majority. 

If we continue with our present form of government, I have to agree with many of our esteemed columnists that when another EDSA happens, we may not be so lucky. What’s worse is we may suddenly wake up one day with an obscure “West Point graduate” military officer sitting in Malacañang. Anything can happen in a system that allows only those who are popular with the ever growing masa to win the elections. Today, if Noli de Castro or Fernando Poe Jr. decide to run in 2004, I have absolutely no doubt either one will become president.

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