Understandably with the elections a few days away, the favorite topic in almost all huddles has got to be about our choice of political candidates. At least this always seemed to be the case whenever I joined a group for some brew and small talk. Be it in coffee shops or any street side sari-sari store, some things never really change. But I reckon, give or take a few months up to a year, these same people will be back. Still arguing nonetheless, not only about who won, but more so on who cheated in the elections. As this happens, they’ll also be quick to deny they are among those whom they mockingly-label as Marites-es. With pride, they’ll instead be branding their arguments as part of both serious and essential political discourse, even though there’s a lot of Google University graduates among their rank.
Pretty soon, we might one day wake up to find, one among them who will step forward, all hyped and groomed, to try his luck in the next electoral exercise. Some may even start humbly as kagawad and if successful, move up from there. In the present climate, that doesn’t sound surprising anymore. With already many clowns and jokers in both houses and in our party list system nowadays, why not one more? Quite simply, it’s this idea of ‘the more the merrier’ that is one of the reasons why we have among the good batch of politicians those whom we consider bad fruits.
It’s no laughing matter, that one. I forget the name of the writer who once said, like any banana republic, there’s a revolution every Thursday. However exaggerated that may sound, I guess what he meant was this. How do we figure out what’s going on in the political arena of the country nowadays? Little revolutions in their own right. Consider, since the end of the last presidential elections, it’s been nothing but endless bickering, mudslinging and political takedowns that could put professional wrestling to shame. Aside from this, there has been no tangible development to see or talk about. To add, in the countless congressional hearings, you’d wonder, with the way those in office do away with basic legal procedures, do they know anything about the constitution or the law at all.
And to think, here we all are again, primed and waiting (some laden with ayuda in their pockets) for the D-Day of the next few days’ poll exercise.
As with any ‘revolution’, when the smoke has finally cleared and the noise has died down, the politicians would’ve already returned back up their lush abodes while the common people will linger to wait what’s ahead. If in the future, things become unsatisfactory, slow rumblings will arise from among them and blaming will once again erupt from both sides. Then, it’s back to where everything began.
Understandably with the elections a few days away, the favorite topic in almost all huddles has got to be about our choice of political candidates…
