Will the Lenten spiritual retreats, announced by rival political camps, mark the end of negative campaigning especially in the presidential race? Unlikely. If anything, blades were sharpened during the Holy Week break for the deadly thrusts that are expected in the final weeks of the campaign. Philippine politicians have long learned the effectiveness of campaigning on a platform of nothing except dishing out dirt against rivals.
The campaign tack makes you wonder about the sincerity in all that religious devotion manifested by the typical Filipino candidate. With so many politicians professing deep piety and filling their homes with religious statues garbed in jewel-encrusted, gold-trimmed clothes, this nation should no longer be facing problems of corruption and political violence. But we know this is not the case.
There is hope, however, as long as people profess faith and believe that good will always triumph over evil. With evil abounding, this belief needs constant renewal – something Christians experience especially on Easter Sunday.
Today, after a week of rest, the nation is ready for the final stretch of a bruising election campaign. Politicians are doing all they can to pull rivals down in the race to victory. It will be naïve to ask them to see the good in their rivals after their Holy Week introspection. But the politicians can be asked not to lose track of the only valid reason for seeking public office: to do good for the greatest number. In aspiring to lead, these politicians must vow – if not to their Creator, then to themselves – that they will do what’s right to make this nation better.