The Philippine Online Chronicles

The President could only dream of another street party.

Almost a year ago, President Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III celebrated his inauguration in a star-studded street party. He enjoyed the night, just like the thousands who attended the event in Quezon Memorial Circle. Now the morning-after truth comes in: he will be finishing his freshman year at the Palace with sagging satisfaction ratings, aside from the fact there is not much progress to report on.

Leading pollsters Social Weather Station (SWS) and Pulse Asia both reported a continued dip in President Aquino’s ratings based on their recent surveys. SWS reported a five-percentage drop in Aquino’s satisfaction rating, from 69 percent in March to 64 percent this month. The recent rating is also way below the 74 percent satisfaction rating in November last year. Pulse Asia also recorded a dip in Aquino’s approval ratings, down to 71 percent in June from 74 percent in March, and from 79 percent in October last year. It should be noted that these are all satisfaction ratings, not net satisfaction ratings.

In a nutshell, more and more Filipinos are getting disillusioned in the yellow-parade-to-nowhere. The high tide of public approval which marked Aquino’s inauguration now becomes a thing of the past after just one year. The hype wore off so quickly that marking the President’s first year in office with a celebratory tone amid people’s loss of trust in him would be crazy.

It goes without saying that Aquino’s declining satisfaction ratings now cast a shadow on his upcoming first year report and on his second State of the Nation Address (SONA) set to be delivered next month, no matter how the Palace tries to downplay the figures. It’s like the scorecards are already out even before President Aquino highlights his accomplishments. As to how the sliding public approval can be reconciled with supposed gains is a puzzle for the Palace to figure out.

In an attempt to gloss over the survey results, Presidential Spokesperson Edwin Lacierda reasoned out that the Aquino administration has to clear “a lot of land mines” left by the previous administration. He cited the delay in infrastructure spending, which he attributed to some “leakages.” He also said the conditional cash transfer (CCT) program is also making progress.

"Ganitong mga klaseng bagay, pinag-aaralan muna ang proseso, nililinis, that's why it took some time. But we believe that umuusad na iyong CCT program, umuusad na iyong infrastructure spending, maghihirang na kami ng bagong Ombudsman at dalawang Supreme Court Justices. I think that would show our efforts towards poverty reduction and curbing graft and corruption,” Lacierda said in a press briefing.

Perhaps the Palace must be asked, is it really clearing land mines or is it plotting the same land mines? Aren’t the conditional cash transfer and the stress for heavy infrastructure spending the same tools which former president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo used to supposedly spur growth and push for poverty alleviation? These policies have been done before, and to expect that these will yield a different result is insanity, as Albert Einstein puts it.

Lacierda is making a fool out of us as he brags about the appointment of a new Ombudsman and two new justices to the high court. Whether the Palace likes it or not, the executive branch is obliged under the law to appoint new officials to such posts in cases of vacancies. It’s simply lame propaganda to desperately connect this natural function of the executive to the much-hyped anti-corruption drive of the Aquino administration.

President Aquino must face it: He is losing the people’s support because he simply rode the same sinking ship which former president Arroyo left. He just wore a new yellow cape and hoped that everything will head towards the righteous path.

On the economic front, Aquino practically offered nothing new for the nation in his first year in power. He is steering the same fragile economy that is merely reliant on external financing and overseas remittances. He continues to recite the decades-old mantra of goading foreign investments to supposedly create jobs and spur growth. His much-hyped public-private partnership (PPP), a World Bank recommendation just like the CCT, is only a less conspicuous term for Arroyo’s infrastructure privatization. Agricultural lands remain in the hands of the wealthy few while more and more farmers are displaced from agricultural activities. Hacienda Luisita for instance remains a milking cow of the Cojuangco-Aquino family.

Up to now, Aquino’s anti-corruption drive lacks overall design, direction and timeframe. Have we heard the President talk about a master plan to fulfil his promise of uprooting graft and corruption? One year after the anti-corruption rah-rah, it seems that efforts are piecemeal and scattered, and most outcomes are almost random. The first year has almost lapsed, and the President has so far only scratched the surface for show.

If anything, Aquino spent the honeymoon arousing only himself. He bought a P4.5 million Porsche and encircled himself with party mates, classmates and shooting range buddies. How can he satisfy the people’s longing for genuine change with that?

Photo by Anton Sheker. Some rights reserved.