The real question from the midterms

Former president Rodrigo Duterte will likely remain isolated in The Hague for the foreseeable future, possibly until the 2028 presidential elections. The mantle of leadership for the pro-Duterte opposition will, therefore, transfer to his daughter, Vice-President Sara Duterte. Senator Bong Go has a shot at being number one in the senate; but this does not automatically turn him into a presidential contender. The race for the presidency and vice-presidency of the land is littered with the political corpses of top-placing senatorial winners.

This gives the potential impeachment trial against Sara Duterte greater importance. If she is found guilty, she will not only be removed from her post but disqualified from running for the presidency. The narrative that emerges from the May 12 midterms could signal whether the administration has the momentum going into the possible impeachment trial against her. I use the word “possible” because the impeachment trial is still not certain. There may be a challenge before the Supreme Court on whether an impeachment filed in a previous congress can continue in the next congress. Also, the administration may be taking a calculated risk, because senators could be unwilling to convict the vice-president — and the answer to how they see the impeachment could depend on the outcome of the midterms.

Several surveys done in February — before Duterte’s arrest — show the administration slate winning at least nine, even possibly 10, of the 12 senate seats. Should this be the case then the administration will trumpet the outcome as validating its policies and politics, and may even use it to push its impeachment plans forward. However, should the administration win only seven seats or less, then it may give pause to senators, who could read it as a sign that the former president’s arrest may have created more sympathy for him and the Duterte family.

The senate midterms have degenerated into popularity contests, where ideological consistency and policy platforms are weak currency. At best, a candidate might sneak into the 10th to 12th positions by trying to hit the equivalent of an election bullseye — which is to ride on a popular narrative on a topic in the hope that there are enough marginal voters who care about that issue to catapult them from the ranks of the also-rans to the tail-end of senate winners. Meanwhile, congressional and local government races will be decided mainly by local issues, as well as the promise of delivering patronage, not so much on whether a local candidate can implement a national program at the local level.

Before the former president’s arrest this would, all things being equal, have worked against the nominal opposition, which for now is the slate identified with Vice-President Sara Duterte. Finding the hook on which to pull voters to the Duterte side is not as easy as it was in 2016, when the family stormed onto the national stage.

Now, however, it could try to build public animosity and anger with the administration on the arrest of President so that its second-tier candidates outside of incumbent senators Bong Go and Bato de la Rosa have a chance. And it will have to do this within two months.

But this is also not assured. The economy is doing moderately well, and inflation is broadly under control, so the gut economic issues are not problematic for the administration. International rice prices are at their lowest in years, and this should feed into the economy soon.

Also, trying to ride on the same issues that defined the Duterte brand under the former president, which is that of the political outsider who would upend the entrenched elite-dominated system in Manila while bringing lawlessness under control, and making the streets safe, is no longer a slam dunk. Duterte’s anti-drug campaign may have had some success, but at a very high cost in terms of lives, while generating significant public — even moral — anxiety over the way in which it was prosecuted. His embrace of China to balance out foreign policy was muddled by his administration’s inability to bring the worst of the POGO problems under control. And ultimately, the identification with those policies may be personal to former president Duterte, with only limited transferability to his endorsed candidates.

In analyzing why voting has degraded into a process that focuses on these political caricatures of pro- or anti-Duterte and binary formulations, instead of substantial issues and party platforms, the easy way out is to blame the voter, for being undiscerning, or the politicians, for substituting song-and-dance and comedic routines on stage, flooding the streets with their posters and billboards, or, at the local level, promising largesse to those who support them, instead of engaging in serious debate on the issues.

But both the voters and politicians are simply being efficient. Making an informed choice on who to vote for across a wide range of issues is time consuming and costly for a voter. After all, who has the time to go through the track record and programs of every single candidate for the senate, and then figure out which of their promises are proper or viable, or have the support of their allies and their parties? Holding politicians accountable once they are in office is even more difficult, because that requires coordinated action. A politician can make 10 promises easily during a campaign, knowing fully well that they will be barely held accountable three years from now on whether these promises were fulfilled or not.

The belief that the internet would make for better-informed voters is unjustified. It is a myth because we can absorb only so much information without being overwhelmed. Instead of fostering debate, the channels for political debate and engagement that have arisen through technology have instead increased the flow of disinformation, catered to biases, and walled us off into tribes.

On the other hand, politicians recognize that recall at the ballot box matters most because voters have little trust in the system, so building a consistent policy platform has low electoral returns. Instead of focusing on programs or party-building once they are in office, most politicians direct their time to fund-raising and alliance building (or preservation) and enhancing the patronage networks that they, or their relatives, will need for the next elections. Coalitions within congress are built on this assumption, i.e., the access to resources, not on differentiation based on programs or ideology.

The solution to this problem is a redesign of the political system, and public and private investment into education and, just as importantly, institutions that foster measured and informed discussions, not the demonization of voters. But the specifics will not be easy. Going straight to the voters with information campaigns is ineffective. We need to build a system that will encourage the development of what I call intermediary institutions that can effectively work between voters and candidates, and sift through information and distill these into digestible and understandable formats so that voters can focus on programs, not personalities. In the past these roles were performed by political parties, social organizations, interest groups, and the media. But these were co-opted by powerful interests through public or vested-interest corruption, and their credibility eventually diminished.

Redesigning our political system in an age where algorithms constantly adjust so that they can capture or even dominate our attention will be even more difficult than in the past. But the alternative is more of the same, where voter frustration morphs into disenchantment and polarization, which discredits institutions and leads to distorted electoral politics and more voter frustration and so on. In some societies, this leads to a social blow-up; in our case, it leads to emigration.

To move out of this spiral, we will have to pursue real democracy, but that will require a deeper overhaul of our system than what is currently achievable under our current politics.

Bob Herrera-Lim is a managing director at Teneo, a New-York based consulting firm that advises companies and investors globally. He covers all of Southeast Asia for the firm’s clients. He is also a fellow of the Foundation for Economic Freedom.