Philippine national elections were held on May 9,2016 and polling stations closed at 1700 hours. For the first time ever in Philippines history, the nation knew who the new President would be by midnight and one of the major contenders had also conceded defeat around that time. By the morning of May 10,2016 the other major contender had also conceded defeat. As of May 12,2016, the incumbent president’s team had already reached out to the presumptive winner in order to create teams to manage the turn over of power.
This has NEVER happened before in Philippines history. The election process in the past could be described as a race between a snail and a tortoise, and the only victor was the threat of uncertainty and dubious results. This time the computerized system came up trumps, and the process was hailed as a resounding success, and the result accepted widely. If you consider that the Philippines is a country of 7,100 islands, it is easy to imagine the difficulty of transmitting results to the capital,Manila. In 2004 when the Philippines was still in the paper age, it took months to learn the winner of the contest. In 2010 when the Philippines first experimented with computerized voting it took days to obtain a result, but this time it was almost instantaneous. This has been greeted by the stock market with two days of fresh highs, and the Philippine currency has strengthened.
What about the man who would be president? He is unorthodox to say the least. He has been described as the “Donald Trump of the East”. He has also been accused of being privy to sponsoring death squads in Davao City where he was the mayor. To his credit, 20 years ago Davao City was a “no go” area because communist death squads known as “sparrow units”, roamed freely. Without judging the man, I guess he fought fire with fire, and now Davao is a model city with a disciplined citizenry, where smoking is not allowed in public places, and the ban is respected.
Will he be a good president? People who have heard his speak find him sincere. Sad to say that criminality is rampant in Manila, and the drug menace seems to loom large. He was elected by a population whose families or friends have been touched by criminality, and he was elected by people who want him to fix this. His tough talk against crime struck a national chord and he was elected with a large majority.
On economic matters, he has already said that he will continue with the programs of the previous administration. Furthermore, we must not forget that the Philippines is a consumer driven economy. In 2015 the Philippines received $25 billion from Philippine overseas workers, and that money is spent almost immediately. There is also a young workforce that earns and spends. The Philippines is a country of 100 million people and if the crime rate goes down, then it is easy to see that there will be incentive to spend more, which will boost the economy. The Philippines is no different from countries in the western world in some ways. We are governed by a constitution and even a maverick like Mr. Duterte cannot make sweeping changes as he likes. He has to abide by the rule of law, and at the end of the day, that constitution will have to be his guide.
