A reason for Third Force

Within this last week for filing senatorial candidacies, the Liberal and Nacionalista parties must decide whether to link up in a Third Force. It will be a tough call. Historically no third party has ever made it to power. Election fights have always centered on the administration and opposition coalitions, and that’s also how major campaign donors decide. At best, one or two members of a third group would make it to the magic circle of 12 senatorial seats. And that’s mainly through personal popularity and family campaign machinery. So the lesson there is that they all might as well run as independents.

Still there’s a compelling reason to form a Third Force. It’s called "principles". And because "principles" is that one lacking element in Philippine elections, the idea of a Third Force is worth a try against the historical and financial odds.

As usual for mid-term elections, many voters are disgusted with the administration. Pundits predict the May balloting to be a referendum on the legitimacy of the Arroyo presidency, which has yet to explain the "Hello Garci" tapes. Judging from the sentiment of the media, religious leaders and civil society against the junking of two impeachment cases against Gloria Arroyo, it will be an uphill fight for the administration’s senatorial bets. Predictably the high jobless rate and unsolved political killings also will be used as campaign issues against the administration. That’s why the men assigned to form the ticket are having a hard time convincing anyone beyond Mike Defensor and Juan Miguel Zubiri to run. Opposition leader Aquilino Pimentel was not exaggerating when he said being linked to Arroyo could be a kiss of political death.

That is the mundane reason why NP head Manuel Villar, his party mate Ralph Recto, LP vice president Kiko Pangilinan, and independent Joker Arroyo are reluctant to sign up with the administration. In truth, it was the administration that brought them to power in 2001. But since then they had called for Arroyo’s resignation in 2005 at the height of the Garci scandal. Thus they also cannot in principle now run for reelection in her team. To do so would smack of crass opportunism. They would rather have that label reserved for former senators Tito Sotto and Tessie Oreta, bitter campaigners against Arroyo in the 2004 presidential election but who now lean towards joining her ticket.

Reelectionist Villar, Recto, Pangilinan and Joker would be hard put to join the opposition as well. This is because the opposition has not matured into an alternative choice but stands merely for the restoration of fallen President Joseph Estrada. Villar was the Speaker who ensured Estrada’s impeachment in 2000. Recto was among the signature gatherers for impeachment. Joker had led the panel of congressmen-prosecutors in the Senate trial. And Pangilinan was at the forefront of civil society exposés of Estrada’s many mistresses, mansions and misdeeds. For the four to join Estrada now would mean they were insincere in impeaching, prosecuting and exposing back then. That is another label they would rather leave for Noynoy Aquino, Cory Aquino’s son and LP member who has joined the Estrada slate despite his family’s leading role in the ouster.

Members of a so-called Senate Wednesday Club for the day they regularly dine and consult, Villar, Recto, Pangilinan and Joker wish to remain intact as a group. Villar, the richest legislator, could bankroll the campaign, against the plans of an LP billionaire against whom he reportedly would run for President in 2010. Popular Vice President Noli de Castro, once a member of their club, has promised to campaign for them alone. All this gives them a fighting chance. From there, they need to fill up the Third Force with eight more credible names.

Some observers have declared a Third Force as good only for the administration because it would divide the opposition. That could be the reason for the opposition’s hurried announcement last week of its senatorial slate of eight names – with the last four slots reserved for Villar, Recto, Pangilinan and Joker. But then, there’s no point in a united opposition if all it can offer are political dynasts, Estrada loyalists, and a misplaced fellow like Noynoy.

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My piece on the government’s negotiations with Swiss firm SICPA for a $250-million untried technology against tax cheats (Gotcha, 31 Jan. 2007) caught attention in America. After all, it involves high-profile traders throwing a banquet for President Gloria Arroyo at the World Economic Forum in Davos. Albert Nissim, apparently a competitor in the financial security business, writes:

"A friend, knowing I was interested in a competing company with a proven security product in the same field, forwarded your article. Thank you for bringing out the facts. You have touched a very raw nerve. SICPA has been up to such ‘personal’ sales tactics and winning orders, though not through a better product or even better economics. This stifles competition. And the consumer – which is all of us – pays in the end. The company in which I had an interest has made many presentations to interested parties in direct competition with SICPA, and has been told that its product is the best around. Always, at the last minute, it loses the bidding. Very odd.

"It is happening this very moment in Turkey, which is strengthening a stamp tax. With the competitor emerging as the favored bidder, SICPA made claims that delayed the order decision. Suddenly the prospects of the competition dimmed, though not yet extinguished. SICPA’s original bid was 370 million Turkish lira, substantially more than the competition’s 268 million (2 lira equal one euro). Not wanting to lose, it engineered another round of bidding, in which it dove to 215 million – almost half. The competition’s bid was genuine from the start and thus could not be reduced. There has been no decision yet. The competition has a proven state of the art product. What more can I say? I wish there was a way to let the Turkish public know, through the Istanbul press. Perhaps you can help, or at least make your readers aware of what’s happening."

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Another American reader, requesting anonymity, has this to add:

"The security ink business is a mature one and has taken SICPA as far as it can go. Not too long ago it was a client of Alvarez and Marsal, European management consultants who specialize in turning around failing companies. That’s how it diversified into hi-tech areas such as product security.

"The question is whether the hi-tech solutions will be too expensive, probably even costlier, than the problems intended to be solved. In this case, the incremental revenues from SICPA’s proposals for cigarette taxes might be wiped out when it takes out the valuable foreign exchange paid for its services."

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