We are in the finish line of the most crucial election that will define the course and future our nation. The primordial question as the electorates make their final choice of candidates is whether or not to keep the Marcos administration in power and therefore vote for its Congressional bets and its tentacles of power in the local government units.
Where are we today? Our external debts is at ₱16.32-trillion and growing with short term borrowings to prop the bureaucracy. The Central Bank has sold 25 tons of gold and nobody knows where and how the proceeds were expended. Billions of pesos were siphoned from PhilHealth, Land Bank, Development Bank of the Philippines and PDIC and elsewhere. The fate of the 2025 Budget is in the Supreme Court, but talks are wild that already 80 percent of the budget had been spent.
The most worrisome is food supply. Local rice production is in all time low and there is no concrete strategy how to address the lethargy. The government had slashed the tariff on rice imports down to 15% from 35% a perfect plot of the government competing with its own farmers. The ₱20 per kilo rice is far from the fulfillment of an election promise in the 2022 presidential campaign. It is part of an election sweetener to lure votes. But even that became dud.
The nation is divided and the gap only widened with the arrest of past President Rodrigo Duterte who is now detained at the Hague in the Netherlands. The impact on the polls cannot be under-estimated. Add to that the insidious impeachment of VP Sara. In Davao City, the rage of the people is reflected in the results of surveys done by Ateneo de Davao University and the University of Mindanao Institute of Public Opinion. Despite his physical absence former President Duterte who is running for mayor , his sons Paolo and Sebastian including his grandson are runaway winners. Candidates, led by Karlo Nograles who are identified with Speaker Martin Romualdez are clinging to nothing but hope.
In the national scenario, Davao Senator Bong Go is ensconced in first place while his colleagues in PDP-Laban is gaining grounds.
What remains to be seen is the outcome when the counting of the votes starts. How the manner of the counting and transmittals of the results will be conducted however may define earlier what this nation will be on the 13th of May.
