Wishing our President well

I woke up to a TV interview of retired Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Oscar Cruz warning that at least 2 groups are plotting to wrest power from President Noynoy Aquino. Cruz said that one group “has money and wants to get back into power.” He also claimed that one of the two groups has a military component.

I don’t know what retired archbishops do. I imagine that they would spend their days praying, saving souls, contemplating God, and doing similar Christian things. Since I don’t have personal knowledge of their lives, I suppose that complaining about government officials and other temporalities occupies their time as much as it occupies the time of less holy people like me.

I do count it as a blessing of living in a democratic country that His Excellency could make pronouncements like this without being hauled off to jail and tortured until he reveals who the people who want to overthrow the government are. We are free to say and write whatever we want, with the unfortunate exception of those who are sued for libel or slander (a badge of honor for some as it means one is being read or listened to by enough people to matter), or worse, killed.

I understand Archbishop Cruz’s frustration and disappointment with this administration. A lot of people supported President Aquino’s candidacy because he represented change and the chance to dream again. Surveys showed that people did become more hopeful a few months after he took office. To borrow from the credit card commercial, to be able to hope like that again is priceless.

The Manila hostage crisis, the gruesome killings of car dealers, the inept legal advisers who can’t write proper executive orders, the appointment of presidential friends without qualifications to government offices and government-owned corporations, his unabashed

support for mining, the Porsche and Lexus fiascos, and other similar incidents made people who campaigned against him gloat and the people who supported him cringe.

I’m cringing but I have not lost hope. It’s only been seven months since President Aquino assumed office and while I believe in miracles, I think it is too soon to write him off as a failure for not being able to undo years (if not centuries) of damage to our social, economic, political, and cultural institutions. These are problems that would need a disaster of epic proportions to solve quickly—the kind where only about five people are left, making it easier to start over as there would be less people to consult.

I continue to hope that President Aquino would choose to seek discernment (through cheaper means like meditating or going on a retreat instead of tastelessly buying an expensive sportscar while his countrymen starved) in trying to solve our country’s ills.

I continue to hope that he will not be blinded by ties of blood and friendship and that he will transcend the system of political payback when making appointments to government positions. There are intelligent, competent people who love this country who should be occupying those government offices. It should be irrelevant whether or not they supported his candidacy (or for that matter, whether or not they will support Mar Roxas in 2016).

I continue to hope that we will all support our democratic institutions by speaking out when we do not like the way things are going (and ensuring that this administration hears about it), performing our duties as citizens (obey laws, pay taxes), and doing whatever we can to help this country stand up instead of crawl. That can include wishing our bachelor President well and praying that he will get over his midlife crisis and focus on his job.

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