Incorrigible idealists

At a time when "pragmatic politics" seems to hold sway, and when principles, it is said, appear to have been sacrificed on the altar of "winnability," it’s still quite refreshing to note veritable voices in the wilderness which call for "responsible and accountable" political parties.

As I write this, it’s the last day for filing certificates of candidacy for those running for the Senate of this Republic. Apart from those who are running as "independents," most of whom do not seem averse to being guest candidates of either the administration or opposition party, there are at least four candidates who are really going it alone.

Nandy Pacheco called to let me know that the party he co-founded and of which he was the first president, Ang Kapatiran, is fielding four candidates.

The Kapatiran slate is composed of prominent legal eagle Mario Ongkiko, party president; Zosimo Paredes, former military man and executive director of the office administering the controversial Visiting Forces Agreement; Dr. Martin Bautista, a young (44 years of age) balikbayan medical specialist in gastroenterology who returned to the country after establishing a successful rural practice in Oklahoma, USA; and another lawyer, broadcaster and Ateneo teacher, Adrian Sison.

Nandy tells me the party, which by the way was accredited by the Commission on Elections back in May 2004, will field only four candidates. I don’t know whether Kapatiran will be open to guest candidates. That, I suppose, will depend on whether candidates belonging to other political parties will be willing to subscribe to the party’s principles and platform. But since in a political season, candidates will be willing to say anything and promise even more, the party should adopt processes which hopefully will weed out the impostors, the sanctimonious and the merely glib.

When one hears Kapatiran describe itself, one is reminded of what one now deceased political leader called his fighting faith. Although we can’t quarrel with that formulation, one has to remember that the phrase was uttered by Ferdinand Marcos. Still, the words are powerful and, in many ways, true.

In papers distributed recently, the party started out by quoting the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines’ diagnosis of our political milieu. Said the CBCP in a "pastoral exhortation" issued in 1997: "Philippine politics — the way it is practiced — has been most hurtful to us as a people. It is possibly the biggest bane in our life as a nation and the most pernicious obstacle to our achieving full development…If we are what we are today — a nation with a great number of poor and powerless people — one reason is the way we have allowed politics to be debased and prostituted to the low level it is in now."

The party maintains that since 1997, "there has been no improvement; on the contrary, the situation has turned from bad to worse." Thus, the party says, "Ang Kapatiran focuses more on moral principles than political expediency, more on the needs of the poor and the vulnerable than the interests of the rich and the powerful, more on the pursuit of the common good than the demands of special interests, more on the culture of life and peace than the culture of death and violence."

Fundamentally, then, Ang Kapatiran is sworn to "bring to an end the politics of pork barrel, celebrity politics, deception, deceit, hypocrisy, dishonesty, patronage, pay-off, unprincipled compromises, expansion of political family dynasties, and the politics of guns, goons and gold."

While we don’t have enough space here to detail its full platform, it is interesting to comb through it and highlight what I anticipate will be quite controversial when the party ventures forth into the hustings.

In the "moral dimension" of its platform, for instance, Kapatiran says it will, among other things, dismantle the social structures that glorify sex and pornography, abolish all forms of gambling, abolish the death penalty, actively promote responsible parenthood and natural family planning, and reorient mass media towards fostering values that contribute to a national commitment which is "maka-Diyos, maka-bayan, maka-tao, at maka-kalikasan."

I’m sure you will remember Nandy for his gunless society crusade. If you think the Kapatiran platform side-steps this issue, you don’t know Nandy. Indeed, the party’s "peace and order" approach, declares as contrary to public policy, public morals and public interest the glorification of the gun, and makes it a criminal offense for anyone but police officers or soldiers, and licensed security guards in uniform and on duty to carry firearms in public places.

Kapatiran wants to outlaw tinted windows on vehicles, ban firearms "exhibits" on public malls, tightly regulate the importation and production of firearms, and mandate the melting down of all confiscated firearms into "useful instrument."

In its economic agenda, the more noteworthy aspects of the party’s agenda are the limiting of all future debts to levels within the country’s capacity to pay based on export earnings and overseas remittances (in other words, no deficit spending), streamlining of the government bureaucracy, prioritizing agricultural development, pursuing agrarian reform, promoting industrialization and participating in globalization.

In reforming the political culture, Kapatiran goes into such specifics as standing for the appointment of an armed forces Chief of Staff to a fixed term of three years regardless of the statutory age of retirement, disauthorizing active military and police personnel from being appointed as aides and security officers (to anyone, not merely politicians), and passing a law outlawing political dynasties.

Kapatiran also wants to prohibit elected and appointive public officials from writing regular columns, acting in movies and television shows, acting as commentators or anchorpersons on radio and television, and appearing on commercials, advertisements and billboards.

The party also bats for an additional requirement that candidates for President, Vice-President and Senators and Congressmen must be college or university graduates.

As I said, we don’t have the space to list all the aspects of the Kapatiran platform. But even if the debate is limited only to points raised here, one can see the party’s candidates will be kept busy explaining its positions. The hope, of course, is that the party be taken seriously, and that its platform be discussed thoroughly.

Winning, I’m sure, is neither the most important nor the only thing for Kapatiran, whatever American football coach Vince Lombardi might urge. What would really help our flawed political situation, I think, is that the party’s ideas elbow out the bogus issues and focus national attention on the points it raises, controversial as I know they are.