MY DEAR friend, Benjie Lizada, wrote on his Facebook, “The people have spoken. Duterte is the president.”
Over the years Benjie and I worked on various reform agenda for good governance, anti corruption, and electoral reforms. We campaigned together in 2010 for PNoy. Campaigned for Bam Aquino in 2013 elections.
But in this election, we were divided in terms of the presidential candidate. Although, we both agreed in campaigning for Leni Robredo, we moved separately in campaigning for our candidates.
I hope those who supported Mar Roxas and the Liberal Party will respect the will of the people. I hope that they will reflect what happened in this 2016 elections. Why is it that the “Daang Matured” did not resonate to the voters that supported and made Mayor Duterte won this elections.
By accepting the result of the presidential election and by discerning what happened to their definition of good governance, we can expect that our people will grow mature.
Since 1992 presidential elections, we know that party or political party machinery do not work at the local politics in making a presidential candidate win an election. Ramon Mitra experienced defeat even though he was the anointed by Pres. Cory Aquino. In 1998, Erap Estrada defeated Joe De Venecia who had the support of the Lakas party. In 2004, President GMA had a different story. In 2010, PNoy won not because of the Liberal Party, but because of the support of the Filipino people. The same story happened again in 2016.
What do we expect in the next few months? For me, I admired the call Mayor Duterte for healing the nation. We need to dialogue even further. We need to talk and hear the sentiments of our people. We need to work together and address the internal and external problems of our country today.
We can look forward of the past mistakes of the different administrations, but most importantly, we move forward. Let us end to conflict in Mindanao. Let us end the conflict with the communist insurgency group. Let us accept our diversity that the Filipino is not limited to the identity and culture of the people from Luzon and Visayas. Our nation is composed of many nations and we need to recognize these and accept our diversity.
I know that building this nation, we need to have sound economic reforms, good governance, pragmatic approach on our foreign policies, and restore the confidence of the business sector to provide jobs to our people.
A lot of things will happen in the next few months. I just hope and pray that we can help Mayor Duterte in delivering his promise to the Filipino people. This promise is a social and moral contract to our nation. Congrats Mayor Digong Duterte. We are happy that we now have a Mindanawon in Malacañang.
