Noynoy not a lameduck president

According to its true meaning, a lameduck president is one who is serving out the remaining days of his term, there being already a president-elect just waiting in the wings for his own term to begin.

In such a situation, there is no longer so much that a sitting president can do except go through the motions of the waiting game. His power, so to speak, is already lost in transition, hence the description lameduck.

But Noynoy Aquino, halfway through his six-year term, can hardly be called a lameduck president. In fact, to my mind, he is far from being a lameduck president, and I don’t know why some people, journalists who should know better included, are already calling him that.

Any person, president or not, who is still halfway through a term is never anyone who can be considered a lameduck. Being at the halfway point means what is to come is still as long or as much as what has already gone.

So, if Noynoy was dangerous during his first three years by showing a complete disregard for the rule of law and disrespect for the rights of Gloria Arroyo and Renato Corona, who is to say he is already a lameduck and no longer dangerous when he still has three remaining years.

Noynoy Aquino, I would like to say categorically, is not a lameduck president, at least not for the next two-plus years. He will only become a lameduck, in the definition understood by most people except in the Philippines, when a new president-elect is known in 2016.

Now, I don’t know if there is a connection to the premature use of the term lameduck here or not, but some people think they already know who that president-elect is, and they say it is not going to be anyone from within the circle of Noynoy’s friends.

Is this why they now label Noynoy a lameduck president? Because while he still has three years to go, once he goes he goes without influence? That unlike if the next president-elect is from his camp, at least he can go with some of his powers as an “elder” still intact?

Three years is still a long way to go, whether for Noynoy, his successor, or for someone from the opposite camp. And while I have never changed my personal appreciation of Noynoy, I nevertheless cannot, in all honesty, consider him a lameduck president.

To explore another direction in this misappropriation of terms, perhaps some people are driven, subconsciously if I may add, to apply the term lameduck on Noynoy based on the reality we know from a six-year presidential term.

Our six-year presidential term does not allow any reelection. Unlike before when our presidents served for four years but were allowed a chance for reelection to another four-year term, our presidents are nailed to a single term.

Perhaps in this light, knowing that Noynoy cannot be reelected to another term, and that he has already reached the halfway mark of his single term, maybe we can indeed consider him to be now a lameduck president.

Nevertheless, I would concede that only very grudgingly. As I said, a remaining three years is still a long way to go for anyone, least of all a president, and even more so with this kind of president.

A president with the frame of mind as Noynoy is always a dangerous president, even if he is president for only a day. There is no being a lameduck with Noynoy even for a day. And yet he has three more years to go. Those who call him lameduck better run and hide.