Burgeoning

Of course, this was all about elections. Not the next one but the one after it.

After many months of uneventfulness, the political scene was rattled last Friday. In almost routine fashion, the leadership of the House of Representatives announced former president Gloria Macapagal Arroyo has been replaced as Senior Deputy Speaker. Henceforth, she will just be one of several deputy speakers.

Arroyo’s reply was curt. The replacement was the prerogative of the House leadership. Later she would add that some of her actions were misconstrued.

True to her DNA, Vice President Sara Duterte responded in more colorful fashion. She abruptly resigned from the Lakas-CMD, the largest party in the ruling coalition and the party vehicle that took her to victory in last year’s elections. She announced she has had enough of the “execrable” politicking of, well, our politicians.

The component parties of the House supermajority all dutifully issued suspiciously uniform statements reiterating their support for Speaker Martin Romualdez and President Marcos. The President tried to tamp down the significance of Arroyo’s demotion, saying this is routine reorganization. But the Speaker himself maintained an uncomfortable silence until the growing political fallout pressed him to issue a statement.

In his crudely crafted statement, Romualdez said that “destabilization” moves in the chamber needed to be “nipped in the bud.” That raised even more questions. Was there an effort to topple him as Speaker or is he just being paranoid?

It turned out the offending action of Arroyo was taking a group of congressmen from her home province on a foreign trip. That did not seem extraordinary, much less threatening. By virtue of her political record, Arroyo is innately a power center whatever political post she holds. She had served in government for years and was president for the second longest time after Marcos Sr. The legislators from Pampanga were her natural base.

Arroyo denied any plot to topple Romualdez. As things stand, of course, she will always be the natural choice to replace him if he does his job badly. No one else is close to her stature.

As former president, too, she fully understands that only one “vote” matters on the choice of Speaker. That is the President’s. Recall how, when she was president, she replaced master coalition builder Jose de Venecia as House Speaker at nearly a flick of a finger.

It would be a complete underestimation of Arroyo’s much vaunted political cunning to imagine she would challenge Romualdez at this time. Martin holds the strongest cards. He is first cousin to the President, one of the closest advisers and one who makes it a point to appear beside the Chief Executive at every important engagement. No previous Speaker has been closer to the sitting president as Romualdez. No House leader has figured in the presidential entourage as often as he has.

This, too, is obvious: Romualdez sees himself as successor to his cousin Bongbong in 2028. He is clearing the way for that, eliminating all other possible contestants who might vie for the same prize.

Now the only thing standing in the way of Martin is precedent. No House Speaker ever won the presidency. This is because the job of keeping the peace at the House requires the Speaker to horse-trade all the time. To survive in that post, he must be the most traditional of traditional politicians. This militates against the public expectation of what a president should be: firm to the point of unyielding on behalf of the common good, a capacity to stand above the partisan fray to secure the nation’s future.

A speaker who behaves like a president should is doomed. A presidential contender who aspires to be chief executive cannot behave as a resilient speaker does. The two jobs require two very different political personalities. This is the Gordian Knot entrapping Martin’s ambition.

Those who wish the Marcos II administration to fail were quick to crow that the ruling coalition responsible for the electoral landslide last year was beginning to crack. Of course, it will.

The lopsided 2022 elections did not decimate the Liberal-Left “opposition.” That political wing has been obliterated. Whatever happens in the internal politics of the ruling coalition will not benefit the Liberal-Left axis. History will simply transcend them. It will not resurrect them.

The rank amateurs of the Liberal-Left think that any Pedro or Maria can simply wake up one fine morning and decide to seek the presidency. This is a task that requires years of preparation and intensive networking.

At the moment, the two brightest prospects for the 2028 elections are Martin and Sara. Because there is a virtual void outside the ruling coalition, the brightest stars come from the same constellation.

Because the ruling coalition is so burgeoning, it cannot keep every partisan happy. Those grappling with local rivalries or expecting more gravy than they are getting will reach out to a powerbroker. That powerbroker will have to be from within the ruling coalition, naturally, considering that outside this constellation there is only dark matter.

Arroyo, and now Sara, are the only recourse for members of the ruling coalition who feel they are not getting what they deserve. That produces its own specific dynamic – not a “coup” the most paranoid power-wielders might imagine.

As the two most viable contenders for 2028, Martin and Sara will have to be rivals in a rather curious way. There is no other way to manage both the centrifugal and centripetal forces hegemony creates.