THE national euphoria over Manny Pacquiao’s 10th-round TKO of Mexico’s Erik Morales has made many Filipinos forget that they are hungry and poor. They even forgot the assassination and coup jitters that the Gonzalez(s) twins floated during the weekend. It was like a massive dose of drugs that put them in the throes of ecstasy. There were no traffic jams; the streets were clear of vehicles and people. No crimes were reported while the bout was being broadcast. What a change Manny’s bout brought to Filipino society. If only he could have a boxing bout and win every day, maybe we could solve all our problems.
And wait until he comes home this Friday. The Philippines will roll out the red carpet for him. There will be a ticker tape parade. Politicians will try to outdo one another in bombastic speeches praising him. He will be taken to Malaca?ang to be photographed with President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, and maybe some of the goodwill will rub off on her.
Ate Glue has already beaten the others to the draw. Minutes after the bout, she called by phone to congratulate Manny, and the latter obliged by parroting her mantra about “unity.” Every politician with a ghostwriter issued a statement praising Manny. Political bickering was suspended. What a tremendous amount of goodwill his victory brought to the whole Philippines.
So why don’t we make Manny Pacquiao our president? I don’t think any Filipino will oppose that at present. On the contrary, I think the whole nation would welcome it.
Look at it this way: 80 percent of Filipinos want Ate Glue to resign but she doesn’t want to do that. They cannot get a big enough people power movement to force her to step down because they do not like the prospective successors. Vice President Noli de Castro? A cure that is worse than the disease. Retired general Fortunato Abat? Aaaaargh! Joseph Estrada? Oh no, not again. Senate President Franklin Drilon? Try again. Speaker Jose de Venecia? Oh, my God!
That is what is saving Ate Glue: her potential successors are not pleasant to contemplate. But if it is going to be Pacquiao, the new national hero, the people would dump her before you can count to eight.
No need to change the Constitution or the system of government. What we need is to change the President.
Even in a snap election, I don’t think anybody can beat Pacquiao now. Even if you put together the votes of Ate Glue, Fidel Ramos and De Venecia with the help of Garci, I don’t think they can beat Manny.
As president, Manny can put fear in the hearts of criminals without offending the bleeding hearts opposed to capital punishment. Those convicted of heinous crimes don’t have to be executed. Their punishment will be 10 rounds in the ring with Manny.
So let’s start the ball rolling: Manny Pacquiao for President!
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In fact, somebody already proposed that at the Kapihan sa Manila media forum last Monday. And former senator Francisco Tatad and lawyer Hector Villacorta, who were the panelists, seemed to agree. “Anybody but GMA [Arroyo]” was the unanimous choice.
On Charter change, the former senator said the proposal wouldn’t get past the Senate. In fact, the draft constitution written by the Arroyo-created Consultative Commission and sent to the House of Representatives has already been thrown away by the House committee on constitutional amendments. The President has no participation in the writing of a Constitution and so a commission that she has created has no legal authority, he said. The two bodies authorized to write a Constitution, Congress and an elected constitutional convention, would write their own charter. They don’t need another body to do it for them, Tatad said.
For his part, Villacorta said changing to a parliamentary system would be a step backward. The presidential/bicameral system was America’s improvement of the parliamentary system that the British brought over to the New World. There was no check and balance in the parliamentary system because the executive and legislative departments were combined in parliament.
Our presidential/bicameral system was copied from the American model. And it works wonderfully. The United States is now the richest and most powerful nation in the world.
As for the alleged gridlock in the system, that was intentional so that the two houses of Congress can check each other, Villacorta explained. Haste always makes waste.
All the poor nations in Africa, on the other hand, are parliamentary, he noted. We don’t want to be like them.
And look at this contradiction, Tatad and Villacorta said. The administration wants a parliamentary system where a vote of no confidence by a majority of the 250 or so members of parliament will force the prime minister to resign. Right now, 80 percent of the 90 million Filipinos have lost confidence in the President, as shown by opinion polls, and she still doesn’t want to resign. In the system the administration wants, less than 200 MPs are enough to force a prime minister to quit. But the President still doesn’t want to quit even if approximately 70 million Filipinos have said they no longer have any confidence in her.
And look at this, they said. The American Constitution is still the original that its founding fathers wrote more than 100 years ago. They have made a few amendments, but only one at a time. They have not revised it even once. We, on the other hand, have changed our constitution four times already and want to change it again. We keep changing constitutions when what we have to change are our officials.
