Eighteen
months into office and still, Rodrigo Duterte escapes identification; well, at
least as far as my little world is concerned.
Whenever two or more people are gathered, and the discussion drifts into
politics, there Duterte is in the midst of them. Whether it’s a casual chat between cabbie and
passenger, a family reunion, or a no-holds barred exchange between friends or
among media colleagues, I find myself having to articulate more seriously than
I would want, an opinion about the Philippines’ 13th president.
Due
perhaps to my occupation as a media person, I am always, always asked “What do
you think of Duterte?” I maintain that I
don’t think of Duterte at all, but an answer is expected of me just the
same. Just two weeks ago, at a small
gathering of religious and laypeople, the subject of Duterte inevitably sprung
up; then a nun grinned and broke into song, a la Sound of Music: “How do you solve the problem of Duterteeeeee?” Aye, there’s the rub! I don’t see Du30 as a problem. Were I to join the nun in a duet, I’d change
the lyrics into “How do you solve the puzzle that’s Duterteeeee?”
I
love solving puzzles, from the simplest kindergarten stuff to Mensa’s mind
bogglers—and the strangest chief executive that Pinas has ever had must be a
puzzle somewhere in between. From
everything Duterte has revealed of himself since pre-election time to the
present, I see as a work in progress.
Neither the man nor his work is a simple thing, and so the relationship
between him and the people—as the Facebook population would say—is necessarily
“complicated”. It would be imprudent (and
a waste of time) to say anything conclusive about him or his work, in reaction
to his actions, because he himself appears to be a bundle of contradictions.
Earlier
on, when “PRRD” was just beginning to be exposed through media, I would cringe
at his cussing (as we say, “Ang lutong magmura!”), being embarrassed for the
Filipino people. “Gawd, what would the
international community say, we have one of the most foul-mouthed leaders in
the history of the world?” And I’d also frankly
criticize him for his brazen display of misogyny, particularly when he joked
that he should have been the first to rape the murdered Australian woman
missionary. “Kadiring presidente”, I’d
hiss. But as time marches on and the man
reveals more and more of himself through word and deed, I—for the sake of my
blood pressure—am finding it judicious to view him with a little more Christian
empathy. The man seems unhinged, but
being so is not without its uses.
He’s
unconventional—attending important functions in T-shirt and jeans, or a barong
with sleeves rolled up, with total disregard for diplomatic refinement—but so
is his inaugural menu. Avoiding
unnecessary burden on the national coffers he chose to feed the dignitaries
with munggo and danggit. Impressive
conviction—how many of us would dare do that?
He
contradicts himself. He once declared,
with clenched fist, that he would ride a jet ski to plant a Philippine flag on
a contested island grabbed by China. But
now he’s playing footsies with China and tightening the noose on the United
States. Does he know what he’s doing, or
is it part of a clever strategy? He
once said he’d kill his own children if he found out they were using drugs, but
is now mum on the six-billion peso shabu shipment from China that dragged his
son’s name into the controversy. Once rejecting being compared to the
loose-lipped US president Donald Trump, he said “He’s a bigot, I am not.” Months later, after a friendly phone chat
with Trump where the latter expressed support for his drug war, Duterte totally
forgot that he might be dealing with a “bigot”.
He
carelessly makes promises he can’t keep.
Remember when he swore he’d stop cussing because his daughter was getting
the flak in school on account of her president-father’s laughable foul
mouth? He tried, his speech became
bland, but only for a week or so. And
also that incident when he said God talked to him on the plane, and he promised
never to cuss again because “a promise to God is a promise to the Filipino
people”? And that campaign trail
promise to rid the country of drugs in three-to-six months? See the pattern? Same banana.
He
trivializes matters. He blurts out
something infuriating and then turns around and says he’s just joking. Irate over the pronouncement of US human
rights experts about the drug killings being a crime under international law,
Duterte exploded into expletives, called the experts “stupid”, and threatened
to pull out of the UN, only to say later he was just joking. At a campaign rally he said about the raped
and murdered Australian missionary: "Nakita ko ang mukha, maganda… sabi ko sayang, na
rape, pinilahan nila. Galit ako dahil
na-rape siya, pero maganda, naisip ko, dapat ang mayor ang pinauna nila.” (I
saw her face and I thought, 'What a pity... they raped her, they all lined up.
I was mad she was raped but she was so beautiful. I thought, the mayor should
have been first.) His office defended
his “joke”, saying it was simply “how men talk,” but later on issued an apology
to pacify furious female voters.
If
people can’t tell when he’s joking and when he’s not, it’s probably because the
man himself doesn’t know how to make heads or tails of the problems in his
hands. He sounded funny and bragging
when he said, campaigning, “If I make it to the presidential palace, I will do
just what I did as mayor. You drug pushers, hold-up men and do-nothings, you
better go out. Because I'll kill you…I'll
dump all of you into Manila Bay, and fatten all the fish there." But thousands of drug related deaths later, mostly
of drug users and pushers who “resisted arrest” by the police, we realize
Duterte wasn’t joking about fattening the fish in Manila Bay, by feeding them
the small fry. A funny joker
president? Scary, to say the least.
Joking or not,
Duterte makes brash off-the-cuff remarks that should easily earn him the title
of “Pambansang Kahihiyan”. Anyone who
causes him displeasure he cusses as a “son of a whore”—former US president
Obama and UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon (“a fool”) over human rights issues,
and Pope Francis (“you son of a whore, go home and never come back”) for
indirectly causing him to get stuck in a traffic jam. Du30’s mouth also spewed
obscenities when the European Union urged his government to investigate human
rights abuses, calling the EU hypocrites, giving them the dirty finger, and accusing
them of "atoning" for their ancestors’ sins and "guilt
feelings" over occupying other countries in the past.
Are his intentions noble? Is he a misguided maverick? He always says he loves his country and would
get rid of anyone harming it or hurting the Filipinos. But the drug users and pushers are Filipinos,
too. So why is he vowing to kill the
country’s alleged three million drug addicts—“I’d be happy to slaughter them as
Hitler massacred the Jews… to finish the problem of my country and save the
next generation.” Or does he simply enjoy
shocking polite society, as when at a meeting with businessmen, he bragged
about being a womanizer thus, "I was separated
from my wife. I'm not impotent. What am I supposed to do? Let this hang
forever? When I take Viagra, it stands up."
If the surveys are to be
believed, PRRD seems to be still enjoying a high trust rating. Why? Is it because he pushed for free education up
to college, higher salaries for soldiers and teachers, more services for the
poor, the purge against corrupt officials, etc. etc.? I for one, though neither a fan nor a critic
of the man, think his warrior nature served the country well when he put his
foot down on the terrorists during the Marawi siege. The first video I saw of it was of the ISIS
recruits burning the cathedral and bashing the images inside. The fact that the terrorists are well funded
from abroad shows this is a real threat to the country, and the president for
once acted as a president should—with determination to fight off the
invaders. I shuddered to think what
could have happened had the one sitting in Malacanang then been any of his
rivals—Roxas, Binay, Poe, or (RIP) Santiago?
If everything is wrong
about Duterte, then not everything could be right about the 16,000,000
Filipinos who put him into office. They
heard him during his campaign. They knew
he was a womanizer. They enjoyed his
jokes and his kanto-boy cussing, and
yet they counted on his promises and voted for him. Lest we forget that the Philippines is not
just its president, or the president and his supporters, but is each and
everyone of us, we need to discern more in order to make of ourselves the best
we can be for the sake of our country and the future of our children. How do we solve the problem of Duterte? Accept that in spite of our purest intentions
there are things we cannot change—surely not the habits of conflicted leaders
that go against our grain or violate our standards of decency—and so try to
focus on changing ourselves. We can help
ourselves through prayer and obedience to the Father. How do we solve the puzzle that’s
Duterte? How do we face the challenge
that’s Duterte? Like it or not he is a
challenge to our faith, our humility, our charity, and our avowed desire for
God’s will to be done. And that’s the
truth.
