Why Filipinos are dissatisfied with PBBM

More Filipinos are dissatisfied with President Marcos Jr. than satisfied. This was revealed in the latest SWS survey where PBBM recorded a net satisfaction rating of negative three.

As customary, Malacañang has began to spin the survey results to save the President’s reputation. But no amount of spinning can disguise the real cause of dissatisfaction. PBBM has failed to deliver measurable progress in any meaningful dimension of development.

I recently attended a high-profile economic forum where economists and industry leaders took turns presenting their assessments of the economy. Most tried earnestly – almost desperately – to coat their findings with optimism. But beneath the polite language, the message was unmistakable and unanimous: the economy is rapidly losing its competitive edge under PBBM’s leadership.

The reasons were clear. A lack of policy direction. An inability to enact vital reforms.

This manifests in anemic investment inflows, ballooning debt, insipid manufacturing growth, shrinking export earnings and the ignominy of ranking seventh lowest in human development index in ASEAN.

In 2022, the Philippines held the distinction of being among the world’s fastest-growing major economies. That narrative has collapsed under the weight of PBBM’s leadership. Growth has decelerated every year since 2022 and bottomed in 2025 to an anemic 4.4 percent growth. It is hardly an achievement, given the country’s demographic advantage.

Today, the Philippines is better known for something else entirely: a country where most politicians maintain parallel careers as institutional thieves; where compliance with the law is optional; where the powerful are not held to account; where impunity is routine; where crime pays and where government inefficiency is a given.

The country’s failures are no longer known only at home… they are known in international circles too, to our great embarrassment. The Philippines is infamous for having a greedy political class that is also incompetent. Leaders who view the state not as something to build, but something to extract from.

At the center of it all is PBBM – passive in the face of dysfunction, unwilling to pursue real reform and complicit through the budgets he approves. Under his leadership, institutions have weakened tremendously and the economy has lost steam.

On the sidelines of that forum, a foreign ambassador pulled me aside and asked in hushed tones, “What the hell is happening to your country, Andrew?” Two other dignitaries quietly echoed the same question.

Embarrassed, I answered with what everyone knows. We are paying the price for electing a leader with no track record of personal business success, an unremarkable legislative record and a family whose main enterprise is politics.  Figuratively, you cannot expect honey from a mosquito.

I know these words are sharp. But they are sharp because the truth is sharp.

Directionless leadership

From the very beginning, PBBM offered no vision beyond the vaguest of slogans. “Unity” was the entirety of the pitch – an empty vessel into which we were asked to pour our hopes. We waited for substance. None came. Bagong Pilipinas arrived wrapped in spectacle, but hollow at its core. No roadmap. No measurable goals. No results.

After three years in office, PBBM has nothing to show in terms of meaningful contributions to national development. No new industry developed or engine of growth to drive the economy. No new facet for global competitiveness. No mastery of technology. No game-changing infrastructure initiated. PBBM’s real achievement is becoming president and the beneficiary of that is himself, his family and friends.

The President has no detectable industrial policy either. Manufacturing’s share of GDP has stagnated at 18-19 percent, well below regional peers who leverage on manufacturing to climb global value chains. Vietnam and Indonesia, by contrast, have adopted aggressive industrial policies and their manufactures have risen in their complexities. They are also growing in wealth from it. The Philippines, under PBBM and DTI Secretary Cristina Roque, do not even pretend to pursue sectors to lead, industries to build or technologies to master. Philippine industrial policy is adrift.

Trade policy fares no better. The Philippines remains marginal in global supply chains, contributing less than six percent to ASEAN’s total exports. The Philippines leads no product category, anchor no critical node and commands no strategic leverage. While neighbors negotiate, position and integrate, the Philippines remains largely passive – exporting its people instead of products.

Even in the low hanging fruit of tourism,   this administration fails. Following the plagiaristic “Love the Philippines” campaign, foreign arrivals to the Philippines barely hit six million last year, the lowest among ASEAN-6. No detectable structural improvements either.

And then there is corruption. PBBM himself promised to confront corruption squarely. His rhetoric was loud. His outcomes are pathetic. No “big fish” has been convicted even after seven months of assurances. Worse, no meaningful structural reforms have been enacted to ensure that wholesale corruption does not recur.

Neither does he have anything to show in terms of political reforms. We are still waiting for the anti-dynasty bill and party-list system reform to be passed.

On culture and values, the silence is deafening. There is no project of cultural renewal, no serious investment in national memory, civic ethics or national identity. Value formation is absent for the youth. There is no detectable progress in education either.

And as for PBBM’s own declared priority – food security – the same story: nothing significant to show. Farmers still live from hand-to-mouth. Cartels continue to thrive. Consumers remain vulnerable. Agricultural outputs remain flat to negative.

Filipinos see all these. This explains the dissatisfaction.

On the bright side, PBBM has done well in his foreign policy and wisely put a stop to EJKs. But in terms of the economy and strength of institutions, our hopes are anchored on 2028. Hopefully then, the Filipino will elect a leader with real vision, ambition and direction.

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Email: [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @aj_masigan