MANILA
Despite all the bad news swirling around Vice President Jojo Binay, the crowds still turn out wherever he goes.
Are those people just being polite, as is the Filipino custom, and warmly welcome any guest to their communities? Or maybe they’re the usual Filipino rubber-neckers who have nothing better to do than come out and gawk around to see any celebrity?
Binay continues to go around the country, even as Makati City, his home base, figuratively “burns” as Rome did in Nero’s time. He’s testing the people’s reactions to his presence as the controversy over his alleged amassing of illegal wealth rages in his home city.
And maybe he can’t stand to be in Metro Manila because it’s too hot for him there. As the saying goes, “if you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen”.
And yet, despite the vortex of controversy around him, a certain, if smaller, chunk of the electorate claims to still want to vote for him for president. His share of the electoral pie has come down precipitously from some 70 percent to now less than 30 percent. That is a chasm of a drop in popularity.
But that 30 percent, plus a few hundred thousand votes here and there, could still elevate him to the presidency next year. That depends on how many will vie for the presidency.
We used to have a two-party setup but now our election for president and vice president allows multiple candidates. The candidate with the highest plurality (not necessarily majority) wins.
And, because of that, we’ve had a minority president in every election in the post-Cory Aquino era.
Fidel Ramos garnered only 23.6 percent of the votes in 1992, Joseph Estrada 39.86 percent in 1998, Gloria Arroyo 39.99 percent in 2004, and the current president, Benigno Aquino III, 42.08 percent in 2010.
The consistent history of having a minority president is dangerous, or at least not truly representative of all the people. In many other countries, if no candidate gets a majority of the vote, a run-off election is held between the two highest vote-getters in order to have a truly majority president.
Our lawmakers should look into this issue to debate and decide whether to make it compulsory to have a majority president, meaning gaining a vote of at least 50 percent plus one votes.
And so, because our election laws allow a minority president, Binay can still win with his 30 percent or so share of the electorate. Remember, Ramos only got less than 24 percent of the vote in 1992!
That’s what gives Binay hope that he can still win despite the scandals hounding him and despite the drastic drop in his survey numbers.
And that’s probably why Binay’s detractors haven’t stopped their attacks against him and are relentlessly pressing their case(s) against him in the Senate, the courts and the media. As a counterattack, he has now sued some of his critics for P200 million in damages.
As I’ve written previously, in the more politically mature societies of the world, such a pile of controversies as Binay is experiencing now would have led to the political demise of the accused politician. And, actually, in those societies, the accused would have excused himself from contention at the first smell of any wrongdoing.
But this is the Philippines. Honor, integrity and gallantry don’t necessarily go with our politics.
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