Democracy won in last Monday's elections!

The votes have been cast, the Filipino people have spoken and they apparently chose Liberal Party standard bearer Sen. Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III to be the next President of this country. Congratulations to those who chose him. For those who chose the other Presidentiables, we commiserate with you in our humbling experience. To the victors, we know that you’re going to get the spoils. We just hope that we would finally rid this nation of the corruption within the next six years. But as the saying goes, “Be careful for the things that you wish for… you just might get it!” There is even an old Chinese curse that goes, “May you get what you wish for!”

We’ve written that the SWS and Pulse Asia failed to predict the win of Pres. Fidel V. Ramos back in the election year of 1992. Then they accurately predicted Erap to win the Presidency in the 1998 elections. In the election year of 2004, they predicted FPJ to win over Pres. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo (GMA) who won. This time around, they were accurate in their predictions. But in this political race, no one predicted that Binay would lead over Sen. Mar Roxas or that Erap still had the numbers that would put him on second place. Filipinos are still politically immature.

As for our support of former Defense Sec. Gilbert “Gibo” Teodoro Jr., I have no regrets. We fought a good fight, using our own resources without the support of the Lakas-Kampi Party. I salute the Cebu Green Team for their passion and their daring and above all their hard work. That Gibo Teodoro is placing a strong second to Noynoy in Cebu City despite the absence of a Lakas-Kampi lineup is a remarkable job that can only be attributed to the efforts of the Cebu Green Team. Kudos to their efforts!

Allow me to reprint a text from a Green Team member in Manila who said, “It’s the country’s loss not to have chosen the best option. To all Greenies and Giboans, we all dreamed of a better Philippines. It is a sad reality that the Filipino people have not learned from the past. We have done our best to campaign for the best. I salute you. We stood for the best. God bless our country.”

Indeed, something totally unexpected was that Erap, despite his trial and conviction, would still end up in second place after Aquino. As my friends positively said, “If not for Noynoy, we’d be having another Erap Presidency!”

Above all, we salute the Commission on Elections (Comelec) for their doggone determination to push for automated polls despite all the glitches that had many people demanding for the return to the old, but prone to cheating manual count. Despite all the problems with PCOS machines, the most important thing that Filipinos need is a credible elections and that’s what we got last Monday. Of course, we hope that the Comelec would learn from their mistakes last Monday and prepare themselves for the up and coming Barangay polls. Indeed, democracy won in last Monday’s elections.

It is easy to analyze the whole process and start blaming others for not producing the votes necessary to make our candidates win. I would rather not go into that and simply and humbly say that we lost this fight despite our valiant efforts. Now the problems of this country is in the hands of the Liberal Party, especially Noynoy Aquino. The task he faces is daunting, especially about getting rid of corruption, something that Filipinos have learned to live in the two decades after the EDSA Revolt.

But while we have lost in the Presidential race, the people we rooted for still won, like Vice-Mayor Michael Rama and the complete Northern Cebu slate from Cutie del Mar to all the councilors, including the South District of Cebu, although we couldn’t vote for them in the north. In Cebu Province, Gov. Gwen is still leading over Davide, while it is still a toss up between Vice-Gov. Greg Sanchez and Glenn Soco. We will know the real winner when all the results will be counted, hopefully by tomorrow.

At this point we need to take stock of the problems plaguing our country. For instance, the huge number of Party-List groups has to be reduced or removed all together. It has turned our ballots into the size of a tabloid newspaper. Cut the Party-List and the ballots would be easier and faster to write on or read. Then there are the problems we are having with the multi-party system of governance in a Republican or Presidential form of government. This is why there are just too many candidates running for President.

We must impress upon Noynoy Aquino that there really is a need for charter change through a Constitutional Convention (con-con) so we can fix our system of governance properly. We either go back to the Parliamentary form of government with our current multi-party system or make our Presidential system work properly with a two-party system. Of course, we shall afford Mr. Aquino a honeymoon period of his first 100 days in office and hope that he would finally perform as President of this sick land.