Divisoria boy

On Nov. 13, 2000, then House Speaker Manuel Villar banged the gavel and announced that President Joseph Estrada had been impeached.

Villar did not call for a full vote among the 218 members of the House of Representatives. Instead he presented signatures to prove that more than the required third of the House membership had endorsed the impeachment.

Erap’s opponents, wearing peach-colored ribbons, erupted into applause and rushed toward Villar to give him a hug. Erap’s supporters questioned the absence of a formal vote and what they said were procedural flaws. Someone punched the chamber’s sergeant-at-arms in the tumult.

Villar would receive similar applause and hugs from strangers in the next months. Erap was the first president to be impeached and subsequently tried by the Senate. Within two months he had lost the presidency. And his impeachment made Villar a shoo-in for a Senate seat in the 2001 elections.

Today Villar is preparing for a tougher race. His battle preparations remind you of meetings in corporate boardrooms. He talks about motivating employees, encouraging “quantifiable competition” and rewarding performance. He wants an “entrepreneurial revolution.”

Such messages can captivate the business community and the middle class. But like talk about “paradigms” and sound fiscal management, those messages can put the masses to sleep on the campaign trail.

For the masses in need of immediate assistance simply for day-to-day survival, Villar has a new message that will replace his “sipag at tiyaga” slogan: Galing sa hirap, tumutulong sa mahirap. Rough translation: A man who rose from poverty is now helping the poor.

Among all the potential presidential candidates in 2010, he is the only one who can honestly claim a humble background.

Though Villar’s family was not as impoverished as initially perceived, his childhood was certainly not one of privilege. His mother was no sidewalk fish vendor, but their fish retail stall in Divisoria was modest. Villar is a product of schools in Tondo, Manila: the Isabelo de los Reyes Elementary School and the Holy Child Parochial School.

Back then he harbored no big dreams; he was focused on selling fish. He began to suspect that he might be destined for bigger things only when he was accepted into the University of the Philippines in Diliman, whose sprawling campus nurtures big dreams.

Today his four sisters are still in the same business, which has grown, but not as dramatically as Villar’s vast real estate enterprise.

“I created a billion-dollar company at 42,” he said, adding with a grin, “I lost it in ’98 (during the Asian financial crisis) but regained it.”

Apart from his corporate skills, he cites his stints as head of the House and then the Senate as proof of his management track record and capability to lead a country.

He asks, without referring to any of his potential rivals: how can anyone who has never been elected to head even a homeowners’ association profess to have the capability to manage the Philippines?

The highest qualities are required of corporate executives, Villar points out. Yet we don’t make competence and leadership indispensable requirements for the presidency.

“Six years is a very short time,” Villar told STAR editors the other day. “You have no time for on-the-job training.”

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Villar is careful not to promise the moon to voters. The best that he can do, he said, is lay the groundwork for sustained economic growth whose benefits will trickle down to the grassroots.

He has avoided forums together with his potential rivals, saying they would all end up mouthing the same motherhood statements about the same goals, with the best speaker earning the highest points with the audience. But there can be no gauge of who actually has the competence to achieve those goals, he said.

He prefers to address smaller groups and the masses directly.

Anyone who vows to eliminate corruption “is either lying or doesn’t know what he’s talking about,” he said.

But the problem can be reduced through a system of performance-based reorganization of the bureaucracy, with the pay made commensurate to the skills. The allocation of scarce government resources will also be based on the performance of a school or health center, for example, or an office.

The most important thing, he emphasized, is to wage the battle against corruption from the top, by setting an example. “The president must not be corrupt,” he said.

Allegations of wrongdoing tainted Villar’s record recently, over a supposed double insertion in the budget for two flyovers in Sucat and C-5 Road. Villar again refuted the accusations point by point.

“I did not steal a single centavo,” he told us. “I’m very proud of what I have done.”

Along Sucat Road in Parañaque, a giant billboard with images of President Arroyo and Public Works Secretary Hermogenes Ebdane now gives the President credit for the project.

Villar can go into detail about his plans for encouraging investments both foreign and domestic – measures to reduce power costs, create a reliable regulatory environment and encourage fair competition. He has detailed plans for the infrastructure projects needed to stimulate economic growth, all of which must be finished within six years.

Many of these measures do not need constitutional amendments, he emphasizes. He adds that many of the reforms are possible if the leader does not ask for anything in return, such as kickbacks or political loyalty.

Charter change is not a priority for Villar, and he can live with the current system of government.

If he wins, he also does not plan to make prosecution of President Arroyo and those close to her a personal crusade. This he plans to leave to the judiciary and those who want to see justice meted on the corrupt.

“I’m applying for president, not chief justice,” he said, adding that the nation has to return to a situation where the three branches of government truly enjoy independence and respect is restored to the judiciary.

He does not have the charisma of Erap, but Villar’s plans appear doable, and the absence of lofty promises makes him seem more honest than most of his rivals. 

“You have to work within the system,” he told us. “And then you can move on.”