THE PHILIPPINE POLITICAL LANDSCAPE is dominated, not by political parties driven by principles and ideologies, but by political clans driven by patronage, pork, and vested interests.
This, according to Dr. Julio Teehankee of the De La Salle University, is still the biggest problem that continues to hobble the political system and encourages the growth of even more clans. Teehankee delivered a lecture on the historical roots of political clan during the basic investigative reporting seminar of the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ).
Teehankee said that party switching and patronage politics continues to strengthen the influence of the political clans. While all political personalities claim to subscribe to principles of one of the many of the latest political parties or coalitions, these are memberships only on paper.
“What we have is a series of ad hoc electoral and legislative coalitions,” Teehankee said. “What we have is a coalition of clans, not a coalition of parties. The reason is because of the mechanism of party switching.”
“Political parties are not major consideration for party alliances. What we have seen are coalitions by convenience,” he added. “If you look at the composition of Team PNoy, it is an amalgamation of different personalities from different parties. The fact is that the only true Liberal Party members in the (Senate) ticket were four, and only two were considered original Liberal Party members. This betrays the inherent weakness of the party system.”
The one major attempt to curtail the growth of the political clans into political dynasties actually backfired, Teehankee said. When the 1987 Constitution set term limits for local and national officials, the intention was to discourage the continuation of political dynasties.
However, Teehankee said, the effect was of encouraging political clans to make their younger generations run for public office when the elder clan member has hit his term limit.
“When the term limits were implemented, it forced all of the dynasties, instead of stopping them from multiplying, it actually hastened the passing of power from one generation to another. They started passing their elected positions to their sons, daughters, their wives or mistresses,” Teehankee said.
Teehankee stressed the need for a real party reform bill, one that would encourage the growth of real political parties and penalize turncoatism.
Such a bill has remained pending for the last two Congresses. The pending bills provide for state subsidies for political parties, and penalizes party switching. The Senate version provides for an absolute prohibition of turncoatism,where political turncoats lose their position and are required to reimburse whatever state subsidy he received, plus interest. The House version is much more liberal, allowing turncoatism within six months before an election.
Teehankee said a major problem is the amount of time needed to undertake real structural reforms in the political system. This is made more difficult by the fact that the issues that need to be addressed are institutional and endemic. In fact, Teehankee said, this is the problem faced by the Aquino administration. In setting a path of matuwid na daan, Teehankee said the Aquino government has tried to rush several institutional reforms within its term; and in pushing some of these reforms, the Aquino administration may have had to strike compromises with the same people it intended to work against, using some of the methods that it originally meant to eradicate.
“If you start grappling with the problem, you might expend all your political capital and energy, and your six years are ip and you have done nothing.” Teehankee said. “It s also a function of pragmatim.”
“Paano mo ipapasa ang reform bill mo kung mahina ang partido mo? So, you reach out to the dynasties. And how do you attract them to your side? You offer them pork! So the very instrument of reform and change under this administration is perhaps the very source of corruption in government,” Teehankee said.