Withdrawals, substitutions and other electoral aberrations  

The greatest service to the nation that Senator Bong Go has done was his unexpected withdrawal (or was that a part of the script of this administration's grand plan for 2022) for the presidential race. When he said that he was not ready, he could have meant not ready not just for the campaign, but also for the presidency. Of course, he was and is not ready.

Senator Bato dela Rosa too, by withdrawing earlier, was doing something good for the Filipinos. All of us know that withdrawal by both of them will redound to the good of the country. They created their own problem. Or, the PDP-Laban Cusi Faction created its own problem. Now, that so-called party is ending up without any presidential candidate. Senators Manny Pacquiao and Coco Pimentel must be laughing at those impostors of the honorable party founded respectively by senators Nene Pimentel (PDP) and Ninoy Aquino (Laban). President Duterte was just adopted by PDP-Laban in 2016 to give him a launching pad for his candidacy.

The Cusi wing are riders of the party and then they ousted the originals and assumed leadership. They were transient visitors who ousted the owners of the house. Karma brought them to where they are. They are nothing but copycats of General Emilio Aguinaldo and the Magdalo who grabbed the Katipunan from Andres Bonifacio via the highly-controversial Tejeros Convention, then they executed the supremo. The Cusi wing is now badly wounded and cannot fly, while the candidacy of Senator Manny Pacquiao is flying higher and higher with millions of ?1,000 bills. This group is in a panic, as they only have President Duterte as a candidate for senator. They have no more bets for both the presidency and the vice presidency. Good for them. And good for the people.

Substitutions for convenience were started by the president himself in 2015 when he substituted the place holder, Martin Dino. This year, Senator Bato dela Rosa was ordered to file his certificate of candidacy for president at the last minute. Then Bong Go was ordered to file for vice president. The two obeyed as ordered. Then Bato was ordered to withdraw. He complied. Bong Go was ordered to withdraw his COC for vice president and run for president. He obeyed. Then he withdrew. Was this last withdrawal also ordered? We can no longer follow these series of withdrawals and substitutions.

These actions set very bad precedents. They show that some legislators are vassals of politicians, who could be pulled and pushed like robots. Making a joke out of the sacrosanct principle of separation of powers, they are making a mockery too out of our electoral systems. They are making our country look like a banana republic, and cheapen the legislature as adjunct to the executive. If you add the weak party systems, the lack of ideology and principles among political parties, the shenanigans in conduct of elections, and the series of practices bastardizing the partylist systems, all these again make the Philippines the laughing stock of Asia and even among the ASEAN member nations.

It is high time to raise a red flag against these people who do not have the slightest respect for our democratic systems. The voters should punish them by rejecting any and all bets they endorse. The people should assert their sovereignty and tell these guys that if they have nothing good and decent to do, they better go back to where they emanate, and spare the whole nation from further injury. Total, immediate, and unconditional withdrawal could be their greatest gift to the Filipinos.