Wrong focus

from FRONTLINE by Ninez Cacho-Olivares (The Daily Tribune) Jan 18, 2010

http://www.tribune.net.ph/commentary/20100118com2.html

Two things appear evident in the way the Liberal Party bets are going about their campaign: One is the old style adopted by Noynoy Aquino’s mother, Cory Aquino, on the “fight between good and evil” against then President Ferdinand Marcos, and two, the concentration of attacks on Gloria Arroyo, which still hews to the Cory days’ way of her campaign.

This particular style of campaigning on the Cory Aquino camp was mainly done to demonize Marcos, which was easy, due to the existence of martial rule for 14 years. The fight between good and evil spiel was also one way of attack where Cory’s lack of experience in governance could be evaded.

It is clear that Noynoy and his Yellows are taking the same path, projecting Noynoy as being unstained by corruption, and even coming up with that plastic pledge of his vowing never to steal from government.

His campaign, which he said would be focused on the “lapses of the Gloria administration” is also a throwback to the Cory way of campaigning.

It is also clear that this is Noynoy and his Yellows’ way of evading his responses to very valid issues raised against him, such as the SCTEX project where he and his family benefited from government funds and not even giving the Hacienda workers their just dues, as well as his lack of administrative experience and lack of a legislative record in the last 11 years he has been in Congress.
He himself has stressed that he will no longer respond to “personal attacks” and would instead focus on the lapses of the Arroyo government.

The truth is, Noynoy can’t respond to these issues thrown against him because he truly has no record at all nor any experience to talk about. The problem also is that he is focusing on Gloria as the “evil” that he, the “good” will slay.

There is doubt that attacking Gloria, at this late stage, will do any good, as far as his campaign goes, mainly because Gloria is no longer relevant by way of the presidential campaign. What is relevant are the multi-faceted problems the nation faces, and the nation can’t go on for decades heaping the blame on previous governments and presidents to excuse their inability to resolve these problems as well as hide their own transgressions.

When Noynoy was made the LP’s choice of standard bearer, the first thing he said was that he will be going after the Marcoses. That already gives one a glimpse of what he will be doing if he gets to Malacañang, which is to wage yet another political vendetta — something that his mother also did. Now Noynoy has added to his list, Gloria and her allies.

What is likely to happen is that while he focuses on his vendetta, other pressing needs of the country will be set aside as he focuses on the “Gloria lapses.”

One of the reasons this country never progressed as it should have done was that the Cory Aquino regime threw the country back at least a decade. The focus was on Marcos and getting back the millions she claimed he had stolen from the people.

To date, there has been little that has been taken back, and here is the son, talking about yet another vindictive administration that will set us back more than a decade. And all this is being done to be able to portray himself as the good fighting the evil.

But it is no longer 1985 where the elections had only two presidential candidates, with Cory Aquino then running against the then incumbent Marcos.

Gloria isn’t running for the presidency. She will no longer be relevant by May at the earliest, and June 30 at the latest.

His opponents are many and none of them is Gloria. Besides, Noynoy is no knight in shining armor that can rescue the poor in society. He and his family never bothered to even give their hacienda workers what they deserve.

If that is the way they treat peasants and farm workers, how can Noynoy credibly claim to be for the poor and when he is surrounded by his elite supporters who are salivating to again recapture the power they lost after the Cory regime came to an end?