Sunday, May 19, 2013

Halalan 2013: Reactions and Impressions

It took me quite a time to finish this up, first I have to wait until the proclamation of all election winners is done and I also have to read a lot of news to hear both sides of the story about the Philippines latest midterm election. Even though this is a very opinionated article, I am also keen enough to see each corner.

To start-off, I want to congratulate all winners for a job well done. Indeed, the Filipino people have big expectations upon all of you as you all take your respective posts in July. Especially to our new mayor in Cagayan de Oro City, Hon. Oscar Moreno, you have finally defeated a politician who ruled this place for more than decade. We, Kagay-anons are really looking up to the change you can bring. Heads-up too for the national board of canvassers, COMELEC, for doing such a great job too in making this election fairly successful. 

Not surprisingly, this year's election is once again full of drama, although nearly all elections does. If we think of the elections as one movie, we have yung mga inaapi, mga nang-aapi, may mga problema sa pamilya, yung may maraming commercial per hindi naman nanalo, mga nagpapa-cute lang at yung mga taong magagaling pero di binoto dahil parang sideline lang sila sa movie. Sadly but true, the Philippine elections once proved that leadership is just all about popularity.


Here are my insights on the elections:

1. SLOW - This year's elections has a much slower canvassing rate than in 2010. It took them 4 days to count 75% of the total election returns whatever the cause for the delay is, I hope the government can do something about this especially the next elections would be presidential.    

2. NEW FACES - There are many new faces in the magic 12 and perhaps the most famous and notorious would be Nancy Binay. Although, I do have disappointments in her winning as a senator, I have to respect the results. After all no amount of bashing and name-calling can change the numbers. Now that she is proclaimed, we just have to   believe that she could do the job well or else she would only be laughingstock. (Well, the sad thing is that Filipinos still vote for laughing stock politicians though). Well, in regards to all these new faces, I really do hope they do their job, the Filipino people have cast their trust by voting so they better be good! 

3. TRAPOS - Former president, convicted of crime by Sandiganbayan and now mayor of Manila. Two words, he's back! I do not know if I would be happy or totally crushed by Erap's return to politics. Why can't he and GMA just retire like Ramos or at least isolate them for the political world? I do not question his passion but this is like an insult as a Filipino myself. Well, I do not want to write things anymore, I might have a terrible head-ache. I just hope Filipino people would just stop voting for TraPos (traditional politicians). 

4. SLIM MARGINS - If there is one election that I really had fun with that would be the local elections in Pagadian City. I was checking on the results when the votes for the mayor was really thrilling. Mayor Romeo Pulmones won with 40,727 votes against his competitor, Ann Co with 39,843. In total there was only a margin of 884 votes! In fact, there was even a time during the canvassing where the two competitors were only separated by nearly a 100 votes only. I hope elections wold really be this thrilling at least we would not be able to say, "ay sure na na panalo yan si candidate A or whoever it is". Well, I'm really not sure, maybe there are other local elections that have slimmer margins but this one surely did made my day.

5. ILLEGAL CAMPAIGN METHODS - Lastly, I also would like to point out the illegal campaign methods of certain candidates. Yung mga Pilipino nga magsasabi nalang na "Ay sanay na kami dyan". A practice that has been done a lot of times does not mean it is automatically legal. I believe COMELEC has to be more forceful in dealing with this. Kung bibili man yung mga kandidato ng votes sana ay silang lahat ay magbigay ng equal amount of money sa lahat ng Pilipino para fair pero as long as only a few gets and the other don't do it, then this practice has to stop. 

To sum it all up, the election was pretty good though there was minor election related crimes and occurrences. After every ballot is counted, we just have to observe and see for ourselves if we made the right decision and I hope these winning politicians would really do their best in the position they were elected in. 

Halalan 2013,

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