Spun

Every midterm election is a referendum on the sitting president. Always.

The pro-administration coalition delivered an underwhelming performance despite its overwhelming advantages. This outcome needs to be rigorously examined.

Elections are not revolutions, of course. The political dynasties (despite a few remarkable upsets) remain firmly rooted in areas where command votes outnumber market votes. In the race to control the Senate, however, market votes outnumber command votes. It is in this race where we could draw a clearer reading of public sentiment.

National elections are complex processes involving policy issues, ethnicities, party organizations and institutional endorsements. In our setting, fighting for a seat elected at large is always expensive.

The pro-administration coalition was well prepared for a costly battle. The 2025 national budget was mangled to expand the subsidy programs needed to buy popularity. Funds were moved from priority spending items to projects that would benefit favored local politicians. The pro-administration senatorial ticket was composed of reliable vote-getters – setting the stage to overwhelmingly dominate.

But the administration ticket lacked several things. It did not have a clear message. It did not offer a credible legislative program. It did not offer solutions to the things that trouble ordinary Filipinos – such as food inflation.

The administration ticket did not benefit from the President’s political capital. Polls taken in the months preceding showed declining trust and approval ratings for BBM. There was little to be said about decisive leadership propelling the nation forward.

One survey was particularly striking. It reported that 40 percent of voters considered themselves “pro-Duterte.” That overshadows the 15 percent that said they were “pro-Marcos” – just a fraction of a point ahead of the percentage that identified with the Pink Movement (whatever that is).

The numbers from the May 12 polls did show a strong performance (considering weak political organization and paucity in funding) for pro-Duterte candidates. Imee Marcos and Camille Villar were saved by Sara Duterte’s endorsement. A political newbie threw out Gwen Garcia in Cebu. The Duterte clan swept the Davao City elections.

President BBM clearly wants to reframe the results, which was a calamity for his political standing and his ability to lead going forward. In a recent interview, he expressed openness to political reconciliation with the Duterte camp. How that might happen, he did not say.

BBM also claimed that the people were tired of politics. That seems more like wishful thinking rather than fact. People want their voices to be heard. This requires political activity.

By attempting to spin the election results in a manner that glosses over the discontent suggested by the numbers, BBM does not invite honest conversation. He is attempting to foreclose it.

If he found the candidness and the courage, he might have proposed a conversation on how to govern this nation better. He might have acknowledged the poor work of his administration in addressing the most pressing concerns of the larger number. He might have offered to recast his administration team to deliver better performance. He did none of the above.

As an implicit admission of the poor oversight that produced the scandalous 2025 national budget, he did commit to more active participation in shaping the national budget. But that is something he should have done from the first day in office, not halfway through his term.

Whether it be because of indolence or diffidence, the Marcos II presidency sat back and allowed greedy legislators to carve up the national budget for themselves. Presidential priority projects were defunded. No centerpiece program could be attributed to BBM’s leadership.

When his father faced declining popularity, he tried to buy public support by heavily subsidizing oil and electricity through the infamous Oil Price Stabilization Fund (OPSF) and the once powerful Napocor. Massive subsidies kicked up our deficit and set the stage for the debt crisis of the late ’80s.

Today, Marcos the son is trying to buy public support through a heavily subsidized rice retail program. This is doomed to be a limited and unsustainable program – a poor copy of what the father did.

With the deregulation of the oil and power sectors, President BBM does not have the institutional means to subsidize the two other vital items that make life unbearably costly for ordinary wage-earners. This is a good thing. Otherwise, driven by political necessity, we might have been driven to yet another debt crisis.

The most dramatic thing BBM might have done in the wake of disappointing election results was to declare a war against corruption.

In his first three years, corruption simply went out of hand. The President’s allies seem to operate on the notion that, in the end, they might simply buy elections by overwhelming voters with subsidies of every imaginable sort. The results of May 12 tell us there are limits to how much legitimacy greed may buy.

BBM, in his post-election remarks so far, does not seem to have an inkling on how he might rebuild his own legitimacy. Without that, he cannot possibly compose a plan. Without a plan, he will rely on spin and hope citizens will be swayed by the spinning.

The last three years are a blur. These are years that are not stained by heroic achievements and by dramatic institutional reform. These three years do not provide a strong foundation for the next three years of BBM’s presidency to build upon.