At this point in time with the euphoria over an impending Duterte presidency still roaring high, the general feeling is that at last a champion has come to "fix this country," to use a line from the Davao mayor himself during his campaign.
Certainly, many things in this country need fixing, major things like ineffective governance policies and massive poverty or minor ones such as traffic congestion, flood control, criminality and other social ills.
Some of these are malaise that have accumulated from more than six decades of distorted democratic practices, some are negative influence from foreign cultures, while some are homes-bred tendencies of ethnocentrism that militate against the idea of national unity.
These are gargantuan problems. To solve them gargantuan efforts are needed not just by one man, our new president, but by all of us citizens of this country.
Of poverty, for instance, who can get rid of it but the poor themselves? Conditional cash transfer is good but it's a transitory treat, a mere band-aid measure. The poor themselves must seize the bull by its born and subdue it. They need not wait for the champion.
Of criminality, how can it be wiped out in six months? Criminals have been a fixture in any social order since time immemorial even in developed countries. It can be minimized perhaps, but it cannot be completely eliminated. And in this endeavor the people themselves not just the champion are the needed actors.
Our enthusiasm therefore over the Duterte presidency should be tempered with the realization that a leader can only lead, can only inspire, but it's we the people themselves who can fix this country.
In the control of criminality for instance the police can only do so much if the people will not cooperate. But if the rank and file is solidly behind this project by acting as "look out" for criminal elements, or by serving as whistleblowers for criminal incidents, or by doing other related steps supportive of this initiative, the impact could be massive and immediate.
Of course, the quality and intensity of the people's support can happen only through a no-nonsense backing by the leader. If he equivocates or if he falters because some boyhood friends or political affiliates are involved, popular advocacy of weeding out criminal elements could be compromised. And then we will be back to square one.
In the campaign against corruption as well as in the pursuit of other initiatives the collaboration of mainstream Filipino is critical. That's why our euphoria and high expectation of the incoming leadership ought to be coupled with a general resolve to keep our attitude and thinking aligned with that of the new president and his policy directions.
But can this be done? Actually, most of us Filipino have no problem with some of the policies and objectives Duterte has so far publicly articulated. With these we can be strongly behind him.
However, with regard to the strategies he plans to adopt to accomplish his objectives, it is doubtful if we can go along with all of them. The plan to restore the death penalty, for example, is one which will likely rub against the conscience of many of us because this is against Christian ethos. The release of political detainees despite criminal convictions or pending charges is another because this would be off-tangent to our criminal justice system. Moreover, Duterte's threat to abolish Congress if it does not cooperate with him and install a revolutionary government is a repulsive idea because it would mean a disregard of the Constitution and the dismantling of our democratic way of life.
Duterte may have touched the inner persona of the 16 million Filipinos who voted him to power. Their hope is high that he can lead them to make this country a better place to live and die in. But this does not mean that they have given him a blanket authority to desecrate what they believe to be right and wrong.