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PHILIPPINES: After Nine Years, a President’s Lost Political Capital

MANILA, May 6 2010 (IPS) - The longest-serving Philippine president in decades, Gloria Macapagal Arrroyo has seen consistent economic growth during her tenure, and boasts of statistics showing nearly three million jobs created and the country getting 15 percent of the world’s business process outsourcing industry.

All these should be making Filipinos rue the last days in office of Arroyo, who took over the reins of power in 2001 after then president Joseph Estrada was ousted amid a popular uprising triggered by allegations of massive corruption during his administration.

But this is far from what has been happening. On the eve of the end of her term in June – soon after the May 10 election that will choose her successor in this country of 92 million people – Filipinos cannot seem to wait until Arroyo leaves the presidential palace. Her nine years in office are the longest since dictator Ferdinand Marcos’ 21 years ended in 1986.

“For a long, long time, (Arroyo) was seen as the worst leader this country has ever had after Marcos, or for some, even before Marcos,” commentator Conrad de Quiros wrote in the English-language daily ‘Philippine Daily Inquirer’.

“Filipinos will see better times only when Arroyo bows out of power,” said Jun Aguilar, who used to be a migrant worker in Saudi Arabia. “She has made many questionable decisions that spurred the flight of millions of Filipinos to seek jobs they can’t find in the Philippines.”

These thoughts are reflected in the surveys by the country’s biggest and most credible polling groups, Social Weather Stations and Pulse Asia, which showed record-low ratings for the President.

Pulse Asia reported that Arroyo’s disapproval rating, polled during Mar. 21- 28, reached a record high of 59 percent or the worst since March 2001, just a few months after she took office.

In the Social Weather Stations survey of Mar. 19-22, the President scored a net satisfaction rating of -53. This was a decline from the -38 she got in a December 2009 survey.

Obviously, there is a disconnect. While the Philippine economy has been growing – even bucking the 2009 global slowdown and posting a cut in the jobless rate at the start of 2010 going by government data – Filipinos have been getting increasingly disenchanted with and distrustful of their leaders. How could Arroyo, thrust into the presidency in place of a disgraced predecessor, have squandered all that enormous political capital at the start of her administration?

The economic trends under this former economics professor and daughter of a former president are of no small import – more so for a country that has long been bruited about as South-east Asia’s most liberal democracy but one unable to deliver the economic goods to make it more like Thailand or Malaysia.

Indeed, the Philippine economy has posted growth for 35 consecutive quarters. GDP growth reached 0.9 percent last year and 3.8 percent is expected this year.

But what many Filipinos recall are the allegations about anomalous deals during her tenure, involving her officials and relatives, including her husband, after she won the presidential elections in 2004.

A year after that, a national scandal erupted over the release of a recording of what was purported to be Arroyo’s voice asking a senior election official to ensure that she kept a one-million vote margin over her closest opponent.

That scandal was followed by others, including the alleged diversion of state funds worth 728 million pesos (16 million U.S. dollars) for fertiliser purchases for farmers to her party’s campaign war chest; bribes allegedly given to legislators ahead of a vote on an impeachment move against Arroyo; and a 329 million-dollar deal for a proposed national broadband network that Arroyo’s spouse was allegedly involved in.

In recent months, Arroyo gained more flak for appointing allies to key positions such as that of Armed Forces chief and for her plan to select, despite a ban on appointments prior to a national election, a new Supreme Court chief justice.

Critics say Arroyo’s appointments could be part of a plan to stay in power beyond the one-term limit set by the Constitution. Her supporters deny this.

The fact that she is now running for a seat in the House of Representatives has done little to ease criticism from those who call her power-hungry.

Analysts say that Arroyo did not have a deep well of public support to start with.

Amado Mendoza Jr, political science professor at the University of the Philippines, says that Arroyo’s satisfaction rating actually “has been low from the very beginning of her presidency in 2001, with her highest mark almost at the same level as the lowest mark scored by Estrada (even with corruption charges against him).”

Pulse Asia’s chief research fellow Ana Maria Tabunda noted that Arroyo got the highest distrust rating of 76 percent among the ‘ABC’ or high-income group, 69 percent among the poorest or ‘E’ group and 66 percent in the lower middle or ‘D’ sector.

To be sure, there are those who say life has improved under Arroyo. Isabelita Mateo of Hagonoy town in Bulacan province got a 50,000 peso- (1,150 dollar-) cheque as a loan to her farm-based business. “This has been substantial capital for our livelihood project in our barangay (village). I hope future administrations will provide the same support that President Arroyo is giving us,” newspapers quoted her as saying.

But in a twist of irony, former president Estrada – who Arroyo had pardoned after his conviction for plunder but who remains popular among the poor – is again running for president in next week’s election.

A former actor who won by the biggest-ever margin in a presidential poll in 1998, Estrada is now in the second place in the latest presidential poll surveys.