As we head deeper into the electoral cycle, the 1Sambayan coalition is increasingly looking like a ship without a crew – as it strays into uncharted waters.
We all waited with bated breath for the June 12 announcement of 1Sambayan’s nominees. The group was supposed to have conducted an online poll and direct consultations with the probable candidates ahead of that announcement.
When 1Sambayan was formed, the group claimed to be an alliance of 40 groups. Its reason for being was to ensure the “opposition” would field only a single slate of candidates in the next elections. From the way things are going, it seems this “coalition’s” more imminent problem might be failing to field any candidate at all.
On the appointed date what we got from 1Samabayan was a promise to name their nominees sometime next September. That was not what they advertised.
Meanwhile, most of those named in the 1Samabayan list begged off. This happened even if 1Sambayan claimed consultations have been held with the potential nominees.
Nancy Binay and Isko Moreno declared they were not seeking higher office. Grace Poe, Chel Diokno and Vilma Santos-Recto expressed disinterest, claiming to be busy with other things.
Much earlier, potential presidential candidate Ping Lacson announced he wanted no part in the 1Sambayan process. Unless his party had changed its mind, Liberal Party president Kiko Pangilinan did say his group would conduct its own process of selecting its candidates. He never pronounced his party would be bound by 1Sambayan’s single-candidate rule.
1Sambayan’s self-righteous ringleaders had antagonized other potential candidates early in the game. They rejected pugilist Manny Pacquiao ostensibly because he supports the death penalty. They rejected Lacson because he authored the anti-terror bill. They were purging a list that was already too thin to be politically sustainable.
After several of the nominees abandoned ship the past few days, 1Sambayan was left with only three names in its nominees list: Leni Robredo, Antonio Trillanes and Eddie Villanueva.
Robredo, however, is still not committed to run for national office. Villanueva’s health has been in question. Only Trillanes appears ready to go, notwithstanding concerns about what he brings to the table.
Should Robredo eventually decide to run for Camarines Sur governor, 1Sambayan will be left holding an empty bag. Well, a nearly empty bag. Trillanes appears ready to accept any nomination for any reason and for any post. Recall he announced he was ready to run for president if Robredo backs out.
That would put Albert del Rosario, one of the 1Sambayan leaders, in an awkward situation. When he was Secretary of Foreign Affairs, Trillanes undermined del Rosario by keeping him out of the loop in backdoor talks with Beijing concerning the Scarborough Shoal. With all the sophomoric diplomacy that happened then, the country lost territory to China.
Last heard, 1Sambayan spokesman Howie Calleja said the coalition was considering inviting Bayan Muna’s Neri Colmenares to their senatorial ticket. It seems a rerun of the Bayan Muna-Magdalo partnership is in the offing. This was the partnership responsible for the Otso Diretso fiasco in 2019.
One billion
The Group of Seven (G-7) richest industrial countries concluded their summit meeting in Cornwall, England over the weekend with a hopeful announcement for all humanity. The seven countries will donate one billion doses of COVID-19 vaccines to the poorer countries.
The doses, including the 500 million earlier announced by US President Joe Biden and the 100 million announced by the UK, will be mostly coursed through the World Health Organization’s Covax Facility. This will help avoid accusations of “vaccine diplomacy” such as those leveled against China.
In announcing this historic donation, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson says it represents rejection of “the selfish, nationalistic approaches that marred the initial global response” to the pandemic. The donation is also an expression of the “values” commonly held by the world’s democracies.
Since March, when the experimental vaccines were granted emergency use authorization by many governments, about 1.5 billion doses have been distributed globally. Well over half of those have been administered. Nearly all the vaccine varieties require two doses to achieve full efficacy.
To fully vaccinate all of humanity, we will need about 14 billion doses. We will need about 7 billion more should a third supplementary dose be necessary. The global vaccination program is clearly the largest, most complex undertaking by all the nations of the world acting in concert.
Johnson emphasized that the development of the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine was made possible with UK public subsidies. The doses are being sold at cost to the rest of the world.
In addition to the vaccine donation, the G-7 announced the seven economies are raising $100 billion to help poorer countries transition to a lower carbon emission regime. The Paris Agreement did speak about the richer economies extending financing support for poorer countries embarking on energy transition. This freshly announced fund gives form to that commitment.
The fund will be initially used to phase out coal plants that do not have carbon capture features. This will open the door to greener power generation over the next few years.
A global infrastructure program was also unveiled in the G-7 closing statement. It is widely understood that this program will rival China’s Belt and Road initiative. The precise scale and details of this program is yet to be worked out.
More than any previous G-7 summit, this one most clearly sees the advanced industrial economies acting in concert and exercising leadership in a post-pandemic world. The outcome of this meeting deserves to be celebrated.