Winnables - SKETCHES by Ana Marie Pamintuan

By now Joseph Estrada must have lost faith in feng shui, numerology and the rest of that mumbo-jumbo (or maybe he just fired his feng shui adviser). But it may still spook the country’s 13th president to realize that his fate is now in the hands of 13 associate justices of the Supreme Court, after Chief Justice Hilario Davide Jr. and Associate Justice Artemio Panganiban inhibited themselves from the case yesterday.

In a week or two we’ll know if Erap can campaign for his five candidates in person or if he’ll have to do it from a Metro Manila jail. Just to remind you, his favored five are Juan Ponce Enrile, Gregorio Honasan, Panfilo Lacson, Ricardo Puno and Miriam Defensor-Santiago. As you can see, President Arroyo wasn’t the only one who set aside winnability in the choice of candidates for the Senate.

I must concede that in terms of mass appeal and name recall, a number of the opposition’s candidates (including one or two of Erap’s favored five) have the edge over some of those in the People Power Coalition. What was President GMA thinking, fielding Liwayway Vinzons-Chato for a national post? Revenue collectors, no matter how honest, are people you love to hate. As for Obet Pagdanganan, he was a nice guy as far as I can remember, which is quite some time ago. Do people still remember him?

Oh well, we’ve had miracles since October. Obet, with his folksy touch, can harp on the fact that he was dislodged from a Senate seat by the woman we love to hate, the Dancing Queen.

Maybe the presence of superstars Sharon Cuneta and Vilma Santos (Nora Aunor will be with Satur Ocampo’s group) in the PPC campaign sorties will work wonders for those who aren’t rating in the surveys. But this is so "old politics"! There are those who contend, however, that this is Philippine realpolitik: the people’s love for entertainment, for the popular and good-looking, did not go out with Erap.

Thus we have "Kabayan" Noli de Castro, who’s running as an independent, consistently topping all the surveys. That’s one seat less for the PPC.

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Of the 11 senators who voted against the opening of the second envelope, six will still be in the Senate until 2004, including the balato twins. If President GMA wants to push her legislative agenda without much difficulty, she will need a substantial number of the PPC’s candidates to win. Or is she confident that she can get bipartisan cooperation from Congress, whoever wins? Not with Erap insisting that he’s still president, and not with money still flowing into certain bank accounts. Remember, the Velarde account was emptied of nearly P3.3 billion only last November.

The administration will have an easier time in the elections for the House of Representatives. Erap’s House allies have joined or are joining the administration coalition, which is what happens each time there’s a change of occupant at Malacañang. 

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So if politicians are behaving as they’ve always behaved, will voters vote the way they’ve always done? Has movie star fatigue set in among Filipino voters after Erap’s downfall? Are Filipinos ready for "new politics"? It’s tough to hazard a guess after all the surprises of the past months.

The PPC should coin a more masa-friendly slogan than "new politics" if it wants to make inroads into Erap’s traditional constituency. As far as many people are concerned, there’s little that’s new in the political firmament. Even the Arroyo administration is full of recycled faces.

Even when translated into Tagalog, "new politics" does not have that attention-getting ring to it. Bagong pulitika. What’s that? It won’t sell.

Except when addressing the business community, this campaign must be in Filipino. Remember the impact made by defense lawyer Estelito Mendoza when he was cross-examining witnesses in his folksy Filipino. Look at the way "Kabayan" talks. Listen to Erap make an emotional pitch to his masses. Too many of them actually believe he’s a poor boy who made good. They don’t like being told that they were fools to have voted for him, that they were victims of a grand con.

There are those who say that we should have faith in the people, in their capacity to learn from the errors of the past. But just in case, the PPC won’t lose nothing if it brings out Ate Vi and Sharon. And throw in all those entertainers who were at EDSA Dos.