A benefit from early party alignment

The shell of a turtle, called carapace, is so hard that it provides its initial safe sanctuary from most predators. The carapace serves as an impenetrable shield to protect a turtle when it draws its feet and head under it. But, a problem surfaces. Every time the turtle employs its protective shield, by hiding under its shell, it stops all movement to any safer place like a water-logged area. In a converse manner of saying, when it sticks its head and feet out, it exposes itself to the higher risks of being caught.

 I surmise that in writing this article today, I stick my head and feet out of my carapace. Like the turtle, that is a risk I have to take if only to be able to move forward. Expressing my thoughts is my way of moving forward. Holding my tongue would have, admittedly, steered me away from any attention from the powers that be. It is possible that I can be red-tagged when I say that the popularity of President Rodrigo Duterte is not just on its downward trend. It is, by glaring indications, freefalling. The president may not like it and his diminishing horde of loquacious lapdogs, can on his marching orders, be ready to pounce on me. But, he has to be told that from my observation, he lost the respect and trust a great majority of the 16-million plus people who enthroned him. Many of the country’s professionals I have talked to, they who generated an uncharacteristic raucous bandwagon for him in 2016, have regretted their decision. Office employees, taxi drivers, construction handymen, janitors amongst the blue collar workers only shake their heads in total disappointment at the Duterte presidency.

I wrote, months before, here in this column that Facebook has the tendency to eat most of my waking hours. That is why I do not dabble in it. Yet, two days ago, I spent one hour to read FB posts. I really timed myself and I did my best to note every post. What did I find? There were groups formed each one inviting FB account holders to join them. The first of such groups include names aligned with the president. They are eagerly awaiting for someone anointed by Duterte to carry the banner of the administration in the 2022 polls. Other high government personalities composing the second group call for a united opposition to identify one among them to be their standard bearer. Let me get out of my carapace by saying that the second group observably outnumbers the first by a whopping 80-20 percent ratio.

A good number of local leaders are in observation mode. Even if the organizational fuel in the national scene has already been lit, most of them, including those in Cebu City, have remained non-committal. On one hand, I have not heard from the group of Mayor Edgardo Labella any expression of unconditional support to the president in his skewed stand on the WPS issue. That would have shown where his bets are placed. Former mayor Tomas Osmeña, on the other hand, has not voiced support to partymate, Vice President Leni Robredo. Such act would have also defined his opposition garb.

I expect Labella and Osmeña to announce soon their unequivocal support to the administration and opposition respectively. Their individual acts should define the return of a dynamic two-party system. But their continued inability to make commitment to their supposed party affiliations will cast doubt on their political creed.