Manny Villar never stops asserting that he is the champion of the mahirap. And many people believe him, as they did Erap some twelve years ago. His running mate is Loren Legarda, a person who has proven, since running for a Senate seat in 2001, very glib and conversant in Political Doublespeak, and praktisado in political turncoatism as well. As frustrated men in politics would label her, a ‘political prostitute’. Of course, what does that make of the men who labeled her that? Ehem, double-standards obscure the fact that men in politics are more politically ‘promiscuous’ than women. So, this cheapskate Loren L manages to get with Manny V (and perhaps Gloria A, who for the past twelve years has been playing a game not unlike that which Loren L is starting), after getting with FPJ six years ago.
Manny V’s campaign should not surprise us. It follows the lines of the Erap campaign in the 1998 elections. It has all these trappings of pagkamahirap, and the glaring incongruity of these trappings with the reality.
Erap was a rich kid. He belonged to the Ejercitos, the rich of San Juan. He dabbled in acting, and then, in the time of Marcos, entered politics. He was successful in San Juan, and then he went to the House, the Senate, and then went for vice-president before 1998. In that year he made his bid for the presidency. He won hands-down over JDV, Miriam and Imelda. His campaign has always been populist, though of course that is because the elite, of which he was familially a part, could not accept his being a drop-out at the Ateneo, his venturing into the entertainment arena, and his entering into politics without being beholden to the powers-that-be. Erap was a rebellious kid, some people might have said. He broke the mold. And so he was loved by the masses, who of course saw him only as the underdog in the movies. He only had to stretch out his arms and accept this support.
Manny V was not a rich kid. He was a poor kid who grew up in Tondo (we all know that courtesy of his ads), and then he had an opportunity to get rich, marrying a rich girl, Cynthia Aguilar, founding his own real-estate company (that was the ideal business for a person who intended to make money of the vast unused land tracts of Las Piñas, Muntinlupa, and further south) and working his way up the rungs of the Las Piñas government (the domain of the Aguilars). He never became mayor of Las Piñas – that position was reserved for an Aguilar – but became congressman, first of Las Piñas-Muntinlupa, then of Las Piñas only when Muntinlupa got its own congressional district, then ran for senator – in 2001, after the Erap impeachment and the Revolt of the Elite. He never became one of the elite, but he already had his own company – he never bothered to endear himself to them. “Self-Made Man” would be an epithet you could apply to him in more ways than one. He did not ride on the glories of his parents, he did not congeal with the elite, he forded with his own business interests and became an economic force to reckon with, at least in Luzon. Manny V is actually similar in this respect to Thaksin Shinawatra of Thailand, who had his own business empire when he decided to run for the post of Prime Minister.
Thaksin, however, proved very successful in developing the Thai countryside – he was ousted because of corruption linked to his business empire. What worries us about Manny V is that while he may do something for the Philippines, we can only count on him obtaining more for his business empire every single opportunity he gets. Thaksin did not use the development projects of the Thai countryside for his own business gain. It was not part of his business field – he worked on telecommunications. But Manny V is working on real estate. Anything related to development of the countryside, he is expected to – and may as well – possibly use for his benefit. The benefits that accrue to the people would be, for him, just a pleasant side effect of this use. And then we cannot say that he used it for his own benefit – kayo rin naman ang nakinabang eh (you also benefited from that), he would tell us. Such tactics are in fact deceitful, and on the basis of morality alone, the ascendancy of Manny V to this post is, at the very least, questionable.
Another thing is that Manny V actually represents “no change”. The election of Manny V to the presidency will mean that things will go on the same way they have been going on for the past 70 years. No, not just the latest crunch on Andal Ampatuan Jr. backing him, which in itself is troubling and disturbing enough. If Manny V is elected president, the corrupt will grow more corrupt, the pilferer will continue to pilfer, the cheater will continue to cheat, the liar will continue to lie, and all of the aformentioned in greater quantity than ever before, even more than these nine years of spiritual drought. For Manny V represents the dark side of the Filipino, he who finds it okay to propagate half-truths and disseminate them to the public, he who resorts to belittling his opponents with all sorts of black propaganda, he who even manages to bend the law to gain profit for himself, even if (as in the case of the C5 extension project) the end product would benefit people as well.
Manny Villar is not, however, a dark cardboard figure like Erap after 2001. Erap was painted then as a dark, nefarious figure, having so many mistresses, drinking in Malacañang, even dabbling in jueteng payolas. People really hated him, except of course for the people among the poor who actually believed these claims were false and that Erap was the underdog again. Erap was the devil, people said. Of course, they did not know yet about Gloria stealthily making her way to the top, where she could cheat, lie, and steal.
No, Manny Villar is the Pinoy Everyman. I do not mean that in a good way. Because the Pinoy Everyman always strives only for survival, not for development of his life and realization of his dreams. He does everything to ensure he can still be himself tomorrow, without caring about tomorrow. So he earns and earns, he makes profits and endeavors to make even more. He also cultivates political ties and at the same time make sure he can control the persons in a way that he is tying them and not the other way around. Many people have worked hard to fulfill their dreams without selling their souls; to say, however, that Manny Villar is one of these – as Gilbert Remulla and the ads do – borders on deception.
Not only that: to say that Manny Villar is one of these hardworking-poor types reinforces the erroneous concept of “virtuous poverty”, that is, if you are poor, you are righteous, and no one can tell you you are wrong because they didn’t suffer as you did, especially if they came from rich families. Poor people are either good or bad, we know. Poor people can be right or wrong; just because they constitute three-fourths of the population means that their perception of the world is the moral one. And usually, they only angle for survival – and depending on the moral fiber of the person, he either chooses 1) the path toward spiritual health and confidence despite material poverty or enrichment or 2) the path toward accumulating material wealth but fraught with spiritual impoverishment and self-centeredness. Both make for survival, but one destroys the personality of the person, while the other makes it bloom.
To say that Manny Villar is bonafide from the poor is to say: Take the path toward accumulating material wealth, and never mind spiritual life. You do not need to know right from wrong, but you do need to eat and survive. That philosophy has been ingrained in people all over the archipelago, because we are poor and we all angle for survival – but too few have considered choosing the path of spiritual health and confidence, the moral path. If we removed all other presidential candidates save Noynoy and Manny V, I will bet that Manny V will win by a close margin. Of course, people want Noynoy, but only to do the work (i.e. remove corruption) for them. They would – and I feel sad putting this down – more sympathize with a president who won’t disturb them, who’d say: everything is ok as it is, and y’all don’t need to get your butts off your beds or your seats because we’re going to enjoy life like before the elections. If Noynoy turns on the people and says they have to help him eradicate corruption, as sure as the sun rises in the east and sets in the west will they hold rallies against him and overthrow him. They want Manny V more – this according to the Law of Inertia, which states that if you ain’t pulling or pushing them in the way they want, you ain’t gonna make them move.
The figures which put Manny V in second place are not only dangerous. They are also typical of the Pinoy, and speak volumes about where we actually want to go from 2010. Even if, by some stroke of Providence, Manny V doesn’t win.
confused. confounded. 