Author Archives: DON J. PAGUSARA

This early, ambitious contenders for the top electoral posts in the national government especially the Presidency, are already making their preparations for the contest. With the opening of Kwaresma comes this categorical announcement of Vice-President Jejomar Binay that he is definitely running for President come 2016 . And he is forming a new political party to which he is inviting Boxing Champ Manny Pacquiao to be part of the senatorial line-up. Senator Cayetano has also made known his interest in the top position. God knows how many other politicians harbor the desire to become President.

So many views have been advanced as attempts to interpret the significance of the People Power 1 revolt at EDSA twenty eight years ago. In the little eatery — the usual hangout corner of the local residents in my village – I overheard this interesting discussion-

“Ngano man kahang gi-initan man gyud sa CHR ang atong Mayor, no? Imbestigahan daw tungod sa iyang pamahayag nga patyon ang dakong taeng smuggler sa bugas kun moanhi sa Davao!” [Why should our Mayor be the object of reproof by the CHR on account of his statement that he would kill the Number One rice smuggler if he comes to Davao?”]

(I)n the comforting process of tickling the “funny bone” of the masses, the social problem of poverty and other attendant problems are forgotten or laid aside. It’s like giving a sugared chocolate to a malnourished child in tatters. This is tyranny in its most noxious form, a masked expression of treachery.

And the State, quick to exploit these religious and semi-religious spectacles as tourist attractions, has soon color-coded them in their Tourism Calendar.

…when Lee Kuan Yew saw how intelligent, creative, passionate, and hardworking the Filipinos were in Singapore, he was moved to say that , if only Filipino leaders will listen to the people, there’s nothing in the world that the Filipinos cannot do. I can’t agree more.

Applying genetics in the study of politics, we find that what the Americans birthed in 1946 was a monstrous Hispano-American state that inherited all the bad political and cultural genes of the Spanish colonial state and the American colonial state. From the very start, the genetic codes of this malformed state spelled anti-Filipino, anti-Filipino nationalism, anti-people, and anti-poor.

The festive atmosphere is of course a masquerade. Behind the merriment and the hullabaloo are the clandestine vote-buying and other shady deals that transpire in the dark between patrons and candidates. The patrons are usually figures from a political party or a political dynasty. . And there are more happenings between the candidates and followers, and so on and so forth. Oh, sometimes, between the contending bets themselves!

The desire for glamor and the preoccupation with vain pursuits for physical and personal beauty as stepping stones towards the beckoning glitters of showbiz stands as the extreme exercise of individualism. And it serves as a serious stumbling block on the road to societal transformation.

By DON J. PAGUSARA DAVAO TODAY It’s happening!  And it’s happening in more terrible and ferocious fashion! There’s no need…