Good God December 27, 2006
LAST Friday, the Kapatiran party came out with a full-page ad in the Inquirer. The ad invited people to join it and run under its banner in the May elections. The brainchild of Gunless Society exponent Nandy Pacheco, Kapatiran pitches itself as the antithesis of trapo politics.
Its agenda is one any God-fearing, civic minded, or just plain decent person can subscribe to. The only thing in it that I think will be harder to push than ending corrupt politics is ending "sports whose main purpose is to inflict physical harm or violence on the opponent." I can't see Manny Pacquiao's legions of fans in this country harking to that cry.
I asked Pacheco how many candidates Kapatiran would be fielding this May and what positions they would be seeking. He answered with his usual fervor that he doesn't know that yet, and that is precisely the reason they are inviting potential candidates to the party. Their very process is anti-trapo. The trapo method is to start with individuals or personalities and build platforms from them. In Kapatiran, they start with the platform and draw believers to the fold.
The trapo system is for individuals or personalities to be bigger than their parties. The politicians who join those parties do not do so because they believe in what the parties stand for, they do so because they believe in what their standard-bearers can do for their careers. That is why they think nothing about switching parties. That weighs as much upon the conscience as changing clothes. In Kapatiran's case, the people who will join it have only their convictions to reward their decision. Kapatiran does not offer much by way of resources, but it offers much by way of principles.
Their candidates will not spend a fortune to run for public office. They are banking on the voters, with the help of the Church and other institutions that champion morality, to see that candidates who spend a fortune to win office will extract an even bigger fortune from them after they do. The Kapatiran candidates will merely offer honesty and good government, with their own reputations or life's work to commend their cause.
Quixotic quest? Batty idealism?
Maybe. But before we dismiss it as such, let us look a little at ourselves and see if the problem does not lie there. Indeed, let us look a little at our world and see if this project or experiment is the one that is standing on its head or we are. Elsewhere, the idea that parties come first before members is the most commonsensical thing in the world. Elsewhere, the notion purveyed by exponents of Cha-cha, which is that you can have a parliamentary system while having no real parties, or where parties follow the ambitions of individuals and not where individuals subscribe to the beliefs of parties, would be the battiest thing in the world. Here the opposite is true. Maybe we should ask ourselves if we haven't gotten so used to looking at things upside down that we keep finding quixotic, batty, or plain wrong the things that are really standing right side up.
We keep complaining that we have no choice but to choose between GMA and Erap. That is batty. This country has never lacked for alternatives. It is not even a question of wit, or the ability to discern them. It is merely a question of will, or the willingness to act on them. That was plain to see in the last elections. Why should the contest be reduced only to a choice between GMA and FPJ? There were other candidates, and far more moral ones. To this day, I believe Raul Roco would have made a good president, notwithstanding that he would have served all too briefly, and notwithstanding that his personality would not have endeared him to a lot of people.
But the self-styled political pundits said the others were not "winnable." Seemingly savvy, that in fact is standing the world on its head. What makes candidates "winnable" is that we want to vote for them. What makes candidates win is that we vote for them. We refuse to want to vote for a jerk, he does not become "winnable." We refuse to vote for a jerk, he does not win. Other of course than by calling up Garci and employing the services of Esperon. Candidates do not become winnable by an act of God or by something that inheres in their person. They become winnable because of a power we hold in our hands. That is the vote.
I've said it again and again: The only thing worse than being powerless is having the power but not using it. And the only thing worse than that is having the power but not seeing it.
Are projects like Kapatiran quixotic and batty? Or have we just become jaded or blind? The Church has a point when it talks of character change rather than Charter change. But that is so in a deeper sense than the bishops themselves allow. We do need to acknowledge our own contribution to the mess that is this country. We do need to start doing what is right if only to end what is wrong.
The problem about political alternatives is not unlike corruption. As I keep telling audiences, we all like to damn public officials for having no honest bone in their bodies and hope to God lightning strikes them where they stand. But come the baptism or wedding of our children, who do we get as their ninong and ninang? Do we get the upright public school teacher down the street who can barely make ends meet, or the barangay captain at the other end of the same street who everyone knows to be dedicated only to collecting tong from drivers and vendors? You pick the first and people will laugh at you and call you stupid.
I do know Nandy Pacheco has been called many names. Well, I guess he deserves it. He is guilty of the most heinous crime in this country today: He is guilty of decency. And, worse, wanting to spread it.
http://opinion.inquirer.net/inquireropinion/columns/view_article.php?article_id=40301
Its agenda is one any God-fearing, civic minded, or just plain decent person can subscribe to. The only thing in it that I think will be harder to push than ending corrupt politics is ending "sports whose main purpose is to inflict physical harm or violence on the opponent." I can't see Manny Pacquiao's legions of fans in this country harking to that cry.
I asked Pacheco how many candidates Kapatiran would be fielding this May and what positions they would be seeking. He answered with his usual fervor that he doesn't know that yet, and that is precisely the reason they are inviting potential candidates to the party. Their very process is anti-trapo. The trapo method is to start with individuals or personalities and build platforms from them. In Kapatiran, they start with the platform and draw believers to the fold.
The trapo system is for individuals or personalities to be bigger than their parties. The politicians who join those parties do not do so because they believe in what the parties stand for, they do so because they believe in what their standard-bearers can do for their careers. That is why they think nothing about switching parties. That weighs as much upon the conscience as changing clothes. In Kapatiran's case, the people who will join it have only their convictions to reward their decision. Kapatiran does not offer much by way of resources, but it offers much by way of principles.
Their candidates will not spend a fortune to run for public office. They are banking on the voters, with the help of the Church and other institutions that champion morality, to see that candidates who spend a fortune to win office will extract an even bigger fortune from them after they do. The Kapatiran candidates will merely offer honesty and good government, with their own reputations or life's work to commend their cause.
Quixotic quest? Batty idealism?
Maybe. But before we dismiss it as such, let us look a little at ourselves and see if the problem does not lie there. Indeed, let us look a little at our world and see if this project or experiment is the one that is standing on its head or we are. Elsewhere, the idea that parties come first before members is the most commonsensical thing in the world. Elsewhere, the notion purveyed by exponents of Cha-cha, which is that you can have a parliamentary system while having no real parties, or where parties follow the ambitions of individuals and not where individuals subscribe to the beliefs of parties, would be the battiest thing in the world. Here the opposite is true. Maybe we should ask ourselves if we haven't gotten so used to looking at things upside down that we keep finding quixotic, batty, or plain wrong the things that are really standing right side up.
We keep complaining that we have no choice but to choose between GMA and Erap. That is batty. This country has never lacked for alternatives. It is not even a question of wit, or the ability to discern them. It is merely a question of will, or the willingness to act on them. That was plain to see in the last elections. Why should the contest be reduced only to a choice between GMA and FPJ? There were other candidates, and far more moral ones. To this day, I believe Raul Roco would have made a good president, notwithstanding that he would have served all too briefly, and notwithstanding that his personality would not have endeared him to a lot of people.
But the self-styled political pundits said the others were not "winnable." Seemingly savvy, that in fact is standing the world on its head. What makes candidates "winnable" is that we want to vote for them. What makes candidates win is that we vote for them. We refuse to want to vote for a jerk, he does not become "winnable." We refuse to vote for a jerk, he does not win. Other of course than by calling up Garci and employing the services of Esperon. Candidates do not become winnable by an act of God or by something that inheres in their person. They become winnable because of a power we hold in our hands. That is the vote.
I've said it again and again: The only thing worse than being powerless is having the power but not using it. And the only thing worse than that is having the power but not seeing it.
Are projects like Kapatiran quixotic and batty? Or have we just become jaded or blind? The Church has a point when it talks of character change rather than Charter change. But that is so in a deeper sense than the bishops themselves allow. We do need to acknowledge our own contribution to the mess that is this country. We do need to start doing what is right if only to end what is wrong.
The problem about political alternatives is not unlike corruption. As I keep telling audiences, we all like to damn public officials for having no honest bone in their bodies and hope to God lightning strikes them where they stand. But come the baptism or wedding of our children, who do we get as their ninong and ninang? Do we get the upright public school teacher down the street who can barely make ends meet, or the barangay captain at the other end of the same street who everyone knows to be dedicated only to collecting tong from drivers and vendors? You pick the first and people will laugh at you and call you stupid.
I do know Nandy Pacheco has been called many names. Well, I guess he deserves it. He is guilty of the most heinous crime in this country today: He is guilty of decency. And, worse, wanting to spread it.
http://opinion.inquirer.net/inquireropinion/columns/view_article.php?article_id=40301
posted by dqfan06 @ 3:43 AM
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