Will Rody Duterte win?

Over the week I attended a political meeting in a hotel in Quezon City.  I expected the usual crowd of politicians and their hangers-on. I was pleasantly surprised that those present were ordinary citizens, with a sprinkling of former local officials and the topic was about what needs to be done soon about the worsening conditions in the Philippines.

The meeting was called by a group calling themselves Friends of Rody Duterte (FoRD) Inc. I was pleasantly surprised that Duterte was still in the running after he failed to file his COC in time for the deadline. Instead he said that he was running but not to be president, but for reelection in Davao, a city he had governed well. “It is different governing Davao. I know the parameters of the city and what I can and cannot do. But a whole country of 100 million people is different.” he said in an interview.

I was invited by an old friend, Andrea Domingo, who has left her retirement to help organize the group. I brought along Jose Alejandrino, the adviser of BayanKo and Katipunan.

The topics tackled in the meeting were federalism, anti-illegal drugs, environment, generation of jobs, graft and corruption and peace and order. From the enthusiasm of the crowd and why they believed Duterte was the right man for the job, this column’s answer to the question – Can Duterte win? The answer is yes. But will he win is another question?

I say this because of the unresolved question of the Smartmatic-PCOS, the automated election system responsible for the 2010 and 2013 elections that responsible voters described as failed elections. We should never have left it at that. But any election that will take place in 2016 will just do that no matter the discussions between citizens and Comelec. If the elections take place anyway, despite the flaws, Filipinos are fooling themselves if they think they voted. It is the machines that voted. And any complaint after the elections had taken place becomes an election protest that will take years to resolve.

Indeed, what it means is that there will be a lot of wrangling and broken hearts but once the deed is done, there is nothing that the electorate can do. I cannot forget the words of then Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile saying to his colleagues to stop their questions and interpellations. We had to have a president by the end of June and he warned of ?grave happenings if the electoral tribunal failed to do so. To this day, I am puzzled by what he meant.

In 2010, despite the unfinished tabulation of the electoral tribunal, the US ambassador visited Noynoy Aquino III to congratulate him and other ambassadors followed and so did the rest of the nation. It was a fait accompli. It is happening again. An election will take place with flaws that will not guarantee that the votes are correctly counted. It is in the nature of automated election systems that any computer programmer can change results without detection before or after.

That is why the German High Court decided automated electoral systems are unconstitutional. It decided in favor of the ordinary voter who must, it said, know, see, and understand how he voted and how it has been counted without having technological knowledge. That means millions of Filipinos, including optimistic Duterte fans who think he will win with the Smartmatic-PCOS. The machines have taken over the elections in the Philippines.

I left the meeting with a heavy heart. If we had to go manual, we should go manual so Duterte votes are counted and once he becomes president he can call for a new constitution that will change the political structure of the country to be able to get good people in government. Today, it has just become a game of greed, money and power from top to bottom. That is our situation today. With Duterte or no Duterte, can we ever solve it unless we change the present political system? Duterte himself recognized the problem when he said he would not run for president knowing the parameters and shortcomings of our presidential system. Sure we can make Duterte win but what for if in the end it will fall by the wayside like all leaders before him because of the system. Even a genius cannot solve national problems under an impossible political structure.

This is BayanKo’s and Katipunan’s stand. There has to be a firm commitment to constitutional change to make the Philippines a parliamentary federal government just as our heroes had envisioned when they fought against Spain and America with a courage we can be proud of.

MISCELLANY: We continue to receive written messages of support to the Katipunan. The latest is from retired Admiral Reuben Lista, former commandant of the Philippine Coast Guard, who wrote, “Please include me as one of your adherents and supporters.”

Former AFP chief of staff Gen. Hermogenes Esperon Jr. and Emmanuel Loyola, MD, former president of the Philippine Medical Association, have also joined BayanKo. We showed their picture on our website holding their BayanKo card.

We are being deluged by requests to join we have to apologize we cannot handle it and ask for their patience because we have to screen applicants before accepting them.

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Did you know that there are wines named after Alejandrino, the hero? Our BayanKo adviser of the third generation holds the patents to these wines known as Alejandrino I wines. There is an Alejandrino I Cabernet Sauvignon red and Alejandrino I Airen white. They appeared in the market in 2000 produced in Spain. The Cabernet Sauvignon was replaced by an Alejandrino I Syrah red in 2010.

The holder of the patents has now authorized a major wine-producing company in Valdepenas that won many gold and silver awards in international wine fairs to bottle an Alejandrino I Gran Reserva.

These are the only wines in the world named after Gen. Jose Alejandrino, a Philippine revolutionary hero who was the friend of Dr. Jose Rizal and Gen. Antonio Luna. The patents were approved because Alejandrino was of Spanish ancestry. Let us drink to that.