The Philippine Online Chronicles

The senatorial race’s top spot is a much-coveted position. No other elected official will have more votes than the top-ranking senator when all the votes are read. Since there are at least twelve spots to be filled, senators will easily eclipse the totals of the other candidates in positions wherein there is only one spot to be filled. The amount of votes that a candidate gets can also be indicative of the political capital that he or she has for the coming elections. The Senate is never really the final destination for most senators – especially those who end up in the upper half of the list. The Senate serves as a testing ground for a candidate’s national recognizability and viability as a president or vice-president in future elections.

The power of the senator with the most votes doesn’t really translate to the Senate once he or she is elected. That candidate will not necessarily get a shot at being Senate president. The traditional partisan politics of voting along party lines, and sometimes seniority, determines who gets to have those sensitive posts atop the committees. One thing for sure though is that other politicians would have their eyes on the top candidates, who could end up leading the country after the next round of polls.

Senate 'success'

The best proof of this would be Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. Being a presidential daughter allowed her to enter politics in the very busy and chaotic 1992 elections. Twenty-four spots were up for grabs for the more than 120 candidates vying for the senate. The top twelve senators would serve out six-year terms while the ones ranked from 13^th to 24^th would only serve three years. Unfortunately for Arroyo, she was senator number 13; and to add insult to injury, the candidate who beat her to the last spot was comedian Freddie Webb. She served a term that was three years less than Webb’s because of a razor-thin margin of 72,000 votes.

Arroyo would buckle down and concentrate on building her reputation in the Senate. Despite her diminutive size and newcomer status in a playing field with well-known characters like Heherson Alvarez, Ernesto Maceda and Alberto Romulo, Arroyo was able to make a name for herself in the Upper House and show that she could legislate and debate with the best that the land could offer (yes, the “best” also included Tito Sotto, Ramon Revilla Sr. and Freddie Webb, but that’s for another article!).

In 1995, Arroyo would win one of the biggest mandates a senator has ever had in any Philippine election after 1986. With over 15.7 million votes – over three million votes ahead of the senator ranked second – Arroyo would be the first candidate to come close to gaining over 60 percent of the electorate’s support. This launched her as a household name and someone who was likely to compete for other posts in the future.

And compete she did. GMA won with almost 50 percent of the vote – unheard of in national elections – despite running with a relatively unwinnable candidate in Jose de Venecia.

And the rest was history. Arroyo would be thrust into power following a peaceful middle-class revolt in 2001 and would somehow retain power in 2004 as the first reelectionist president since the Marcos era.

For the “success” story of Gloria Arroyo, it’s just fitting that a woman also has the reverse of her fortunes.

'Passionate and fashionable voice'

Broadcaster Loren Legarda was one of the most trusted and likable people in media. When she entered politics in 1998, she commanded close to 15 million votes to secure the top spot by almost 1.8 million from second-placer Rene Cayetano. She would be projected as the passionate and fashionable voice of reason in the Senate while pushing for her advocacies of environmentalism, women’s rights and children’s welfare. She was also one of the senators who were for the opening of the second envelope during the impeachment trial of Erap Estrada and the scene of her crying next to Aquilino Pimentel as Tessie Aquino-Oreta shamelessly danced was one of the iconic moments of the trial.

It all went downhill from there. In 2004, Legarda would fail to get the vice-presidential party nomination alongside Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo so she would be forced to accept the offer by opposition standard-bearer Fernando Poe Jr. The matchup pit her against Noli de Castro – a longtime colleague from ABS-CBN and a staunch administration ally. Legarda would lose the vice-presidential race and allege that de Castro cheated his way to victory.

In 2007, Legarda would once again run for the senate and get the top rank. She bested newcomer Francis “Chiz” Escudero by about 250,000 votes and somehow rescued her political life in terms of her viability. Losers of presidential and vice-presidential elections rarely get a second look should they run for the top two positions again. The years of reckoning would come in 2009 when Legarda prematurely declared her intention to run for the second highest office in the Philippine government without a running mate. Escudero was widely expected by his partymates at the Nationalist’s People Coalition or NPC to carry the banner of the party as the organization’s presidential nominee but he chose to repeatedly delay his announcement of putting his hat in the ring. Legarda couldn’t wait any further and just went ahead with her declaration sans a presidential candidate.

Legarda would then eventually fall under Manny Villar’s party. It was the umpteenth time that Legarda had changed parties and allegiances just months before the polls. Admittedly, the consequences that forced her to jump ship may have been well out of her control and should not justify her being called a “political prostitute.” But just the same, the public perceived it that way, and the reputation stuck – Loren Legarda was immortalized as a “political butterfly.”

As of press time, Legarda has conceded the race to be the nation’s vice president after faltering miserably in the last weeks of the campaign. From securing over 12.5 million votes in 2004 for the same office, Legarda’s showing for 2010 is at a dismal 3.7 million. With over 88 percent already accounted for in GMA Network’s count, it is unlikely for her to eclipse the 4.5 million mark. An Social Weather Station exit poll suggests that Legarda’s votes only translated to 10 percent of the electorate. This is a major drop considering that she was polling in the 30s months before the May 10 polls. Legarda’s term ends in 2013 and it’s unlikely that she will taste the success that she seemed to be destined for during her golden moments in 1998 to 2001. While Legarda is the only two-time topnotcher in the seven senatorial elections held from 1992 to 2010, she is easily the one who has had the most humbling of journeys.

The middle ground

Noli de Castro is in the middle ground between Arroyo's success and Legarda's dismal failures. De Castro entered politics in 2001 as an independent candidate. The country was in all sorts of political chaos due to the fallout surrounding the ouster of then-president Erap Estrada. De Castro was adopted by the Puwera ng Masa ticket but the broadcaster was never seen campaigning with the rest of the group.

De Castro emerged as the top votegetter in the 2001 polls besting People Power Coalition’s Dr. Juan Flavier by over 4.5 million votes. In a highly fractured and divided country, it seemed like a good majority of Filipinos preferred to have Noli de Castro – a neutral force – as the intervening entity in an otherwise chaotic environment. All of this would change when it became apparent that de Castro was more than willing to align himself with the present administration just to move forward with his bigger political ambitions.

De Castro chose to take a rest in 2010 instead of seeking higher office. The surveys during the leadup to the election have been unfavorable toward the once-popular politician and perhaps it was right for him to steer clear of the potentially damaging consequences of a loss. De Castro has run only twice in his political career – once as a senator and once for vice president – and both bids were successful. He can probably try to build more political capital by running in 2013 for the Senate once again, or simply check his viability for 2016 if the opportunity presents itself.

Topnotcher

Mar Roxas topped the senatorial race when he entered the national scene as one of the K4’s top bets in the 2004 elections. He was able to secure over 19.3 million votes through a very aggressive TV campaign, driving his character as Mr. Palengke into the consciousness of the Filipino voter. His vote total continues to be the highest in history and it doesn’t look like the number can be eclipsed in this year’s polls.

Roxas had a very methodical game with the media that allowed him to stay in the public eye outside of his legislative duties. He had a very public courtship and wedding with broadcaster Korina Sanchez and was often seen in the popular noontime game show Wowowee. He initially set his sights on running for president in the 2010 polls but the death of Cory Aquino and the clamor to make Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III the next standard-bearer for the opposition forced Roxas to step aside.

Roxas ran a very spirited campaign and led in the surveys until the very end. As the results stand now however, it seems like Roxas is about to lose a very tight and close race against Makati mayor Jejomar Binay. Roxas was actually flirting with a very realistic chance of being a majority vice president until a few weeks ago when Binay started gaining momentum late in the game.

The last three topnotchers in the senate races of 2001, 2004 and 2007 haven’t really done well, come to think of it. Legarda failed magnificently in 2010 and didn’t even place second in the polls while Roxas is about to get a very serious dose of reality when Binay is declared the winner. De Castro chose to just ride quietly into the night instead of risking an embarrassingly grand flameout like Legarda.

Out of the five candidates who have made it to the top spot in the last six senatorial elections, one has managed to become president (Arroyo), one become vice president (de Castro), two ended up losing the vice-presidential race (Legarda twice and Roxas once) and  the 1992 topnotcher Tito Sotto ended up losing in the 2007 senatorial polls. If anything, getting the top spot ensures that the candidate would have enough guts to try for a higher position or at least a Senate reelection bid, but the results are definitely mixed. Legarda (a two-time topnotcher – 1998 and 2007) lost in 2004 to 2001 topnotcher Noli de Castro and in now in 2010, she has already conceded to Jejomar Binay who has never been in the Senate.

Contrast

In contrast, Noynoy Aquino – the likely winner of the 2010 presidential race – only finished sixth in the senate race of 2007. It's also surprising that Manuel Villar didn’t really do well in the senatorial polls during his two attempts at running. During his first run in 2001, he didn’t even make the upper half of the winners’ circle. He was seventh in 2001 and in 2007, despite spending a lot on advertisements, he ended up as the fourth placer behind Loren Legarda, Chiz Escudero and Ping Lacson.

With Chiz Escudero (2^nd in 2007) influencing the polls by openly endorsing a Noynoy Aquino and Jejomar Binay ticket on television, and with Binay likely to be the nation’s next vice president, it looks like topping the Senate is becoming less and less of a requirement for running for higher office.

Photos:

“Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo visiting Korea in May 2009” by South Korea, c/o Flickr. Some Rights Reserved.

“DSC_3161” by Presidency Maldives, c/o Flickr. Some Rights Reserved.

“Philippine Congress Joint Session on Maguindanao Martial Law” by Victor Villanueva, c/o Flickr. Some Rights Reserved.

“A greet to the town folks” by Franz Lopez, c/o Flickr. Some Rights Reserved.