Blood, showbiz merge in Asia's beacon of democracy
Blood, showbiz merge in Asia's beacon of democracy
By Ruben Alabastro
MANILA (Reuter): The Philippine election campaign, a blend of showbiz and mayhem, lurches into the home stretch this week to the sound of gunfire.
In the latest outbursts of violence ahead of the May 8 election, gubernatorial candidate Honorato Perez of President Fidel Ramos's ruling coalition was gunned down at the weekend.
His long-time rival, the incumbent governor of Nueva Ecija province north of Manila, Tomas Joson, was charged with the killing.
The murder brought to 30 the total of people killed in the run-up to the legislative and local elections and highlighted the tribal ferocity of politics in what Election Commission chief Bernardo Pardo says is "a beacon of democracy in Asia".
Pardo's description stems from the 1986 People Power revolution that swept away a dictatorship and restored democracy after a 20-year hiatus.
The global impact of hundreds of thousands of unarmed people taking to the streets of Manila in defiance of troops and tanks was credited with encouraging the growth of democracy movements throughout Eastern Europe.
Political analysts attribute the fierceness of Philippine politics partly to the passionate Filipino temperament and largely to the fact that the fight for an elective post is a fight to get rich.
"Politics to people who indulge in it is a way of creating wealth," analyst Amando Doronila said in an interview.
"Competition for public office is a life and death struggle in this country. You combine political power with access to economic power. That's why Filipinos are hot tempered when it comes to politics."
The way to the Philippine polling booth has always been paved with blood and money, giving rise to an American journalist's often-quoted remark that elections here are about "guns, goons, and gold".
Sixty people died in the 1992 election, when Ramos beat six rivals to win the presidency, 149 died in local elections in 1988 and 87 were killed in congressional polls in 1988.
In 1986, when then political neophyte Corazon Aquino challenged the late autocrat Ferdinand Marcos, a total of 151 were killed, many of them in the closing days of the campaign or during the vote-count when goons snatched ballot boxes.
With a total of 15,661 posts up for grabs around the country from the national Senate to local councils, and with passions rising as the campaign heads into its final two weeks, Perez's blood will certainly not be the last to flow in the current campaign, analysts say.
Poll officials have identified at least 174 cities and towns as potential "hot spots", where intense political rivalries could erupt into bloodshed any time.
These are the places where communist guerrillas and Moslem extremists are active and where political warlords maintain dozens of so-called private armies.
The emergence of new Moro extremist groups, principally the Abu Sayyaf, in the southern islands has compounded security concerns, officials said.
The Abu Sayyaf has been blamed for the massacre of 53 largely unarmed civilians in a raid on southern Ipil town on April 4. Police say they and other fundamentalist groups may be plotting to disrupt the polls.
But this year's campaign, like previous ones, is not all about guns and goons.
Accompanied by sexy movie actresses and singers on their sorties, candidates have turned the campaign into one rolling carnival across many of the country's 7,100 islands.
Besides the usual tirades against their "corrupt" or inept opponents, candidates sing love longs and dance the cha-cha on the stage in their efforts to win votes.
Even comedians have gotten into the act.
Jun Urbano, a television comic, is running for a congressional seat in Manila. He blazes the campaign trail dressed in his trademark Mongolian costume.
Another comedian is running for governor in nearby Bulacan province and still another for mayor of Paranaque town.
Fellow television comedian Vicente Sotto blazed the trail for them by topping the senatorial elections in 1992.
Analysts said the successes of movie actors and comedians in politics showed Filipinos have not fully matured as voters and personality, not issues, is what sells during elections.
"Filipinos can't seem to differentiate real life from movies," political analyst Teresita Arce-Herrera said in one newspaper interview.