"THE Philippines today produces one illiterate for every five senior high school graduates." This was the disturbing finding of the Functional Literacy, Education and Mass Media survey (Flemms) released by the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA). Under the promulgated redefined standards starting with the graduating class of 2024, the following categories apply (PSA Board Resolution 13, series of 2024):

"Functional literacy is the ability of a person to read, write, compute, and comprehend. In addition to the basic literacy skills, functional literacy includes a higher level of comprehension skills, such as integrating two or more pieces of information and making inferences based on the given information.

"Basic literacy rate is computed for individuals 5 years old and older, while functional literacy rate is computed for individuals 10 to 64 years old."

In the usual bureaucratese, the latest redefinitions thus interpreted was officially submitted to the Senate last year, that: "18.9 million Filipinos who completed secondary education between 2019 and 2024 may be considered 'functional illiterate' — students who could read, write, and compute but could not comprehend what they had read."

In light of these shameful facts, this column attempts to assess the impact of this number of illiterates on our country's development. The 20 percent illiterate graduates will be entrusted, together with the literate four-fifths, in the crafting of our future government when they reach voting age in the next couple of election cycles. It is uncomfortable to know these statistics. But prior to 2024 we have already unleashed many of those illiterate graduates upon our body politic.

Midterm election results

In my past two columns on interpreting the results of the midterm elections, I quoted a former senator describing the midterms as the mechanism for allowing comedians, actors, performers and the corrupt into positions of power, and whose basic qualifications are their popularity and brand name recall, heavily contributing to their electability.

I advanced the arguments that the poor showing of the Alyansa senatorial slate was not exactly a result of a referendum on President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.'s three-year-old administration. There was never a serious debate on the notions of governance by the president. There were of course the complaints of inflation resulting in high prices of practically everything "...bigas, pamasahe, gasolina, twisyon, atbp.," and on the perception of an inept leadership that cannot control corruption in the bureaucracy and a rising tide of criminality.

But these problems are offshoots of the systemic dysfunctions of governance, which have transcended various Philippine regimes in varying degrees of gravity and discussed ad infinitum in past columns. These are old lingering issues.

The 5-5-2 senatorial results (Marcos-Duterte-Aquino camps) were personality-driven which have always underpinned our traditional political practices. But this time, former president Rodrigo Duterte's rendition to exile elicited massive sympathy votes, always a factor to the underdog-loving Pinoys. This gave the DDS a huge advantage. Marcos' imprudent strategy of putting his whole administration behind this act two months before election was milked by the Duterte camp to its last drop.

For a deeper appreciation of the results, the much hyped and anomalously funded campaign only produced five senators for the Alyansa, five for the PDP-Laban and two from the old pinklawan camp. The latter couldn't be called "pure" opposition, as Bam and Kiko, abhor either of the political dynasties. Nevertheless, this pinklawan duo, plus the rest of the incoming senators-elect, will have to coalesce with the seated senators based not necessarily on ideological or principled kinship but on purely personal or pecuniary interest coated with the usual motherhood statements calculated to be attractive to the populace, particularly those who voted them into office. Impeaching Vice President Sara Duterte may be in their interest, narrowing the field for the 2028 presidential race.

Effects of illiterates' voting patterns

And here is where the two concepts of this column converge. The effects of the voting patterns of illiterates — if they do indeed vote — to their role in crafting good governance through the election of a responsible political leadership.

Let me reiterate the Flemms contention that "Functional illiterates can read, write, compute but could not comprehend what they have read."

It is obvious that we need to mitigate these deficiencies. Central to understanding the voting patterns of these illiterates are their inability to undertake critical thinking and to discern complex ideas that involve government policies and governance, which lead to these voters prioritizing popularity of candidates over substantive qualifications.

A candidate's popularity, charisma, or media presence trump those with the more relevant experience and expertise, but less public exposure. These illiterates are also more susceptible to the influence of social media and networks of influencers which have proliferated Philippine internet in the past few election cycles; with catchy slogans but inane and attractive memes resonating on these simple minds.

These shrewd candidates connect better with these types of voters with the former appealing to their emotions and rudimentary humor and rendition of "budot" dances, so popular at the "entablado" rather than initiating substantive policy discussions. Thus, our political leadership, particularly in the Senate, are filled with populists inured to dispensing resources profligately, prioritizing immediate, popular measures over long-term planning, which can lead to unsustainable policies.

Functional illiterates unequipped with tools to distinguish the nuances of a candidate's qualifications more often must rely on endorsements from community leaders, organizations and even glib-tongued charlatans from religious sects that can guide their voting decisions. Local politicians and ward leaders in their communities often serve the highest bidders within a slate. These are those whom the mostly illiterate gravitate towards.

And the more deadly attraction is the distribution of "ayuda" which could really clinch the preference for the candidates who dispense the most. And in the Philippine system of traditional politics, all sides resort to these types of incentives — herding the functionally illiterate voters to the candidates best endowed with such logistics.

The officials we get

With the impelling voting patterns of this large segment of our electorate, we get the officials few of us deserve. We therefore put into power populist officials who give premium to maintaining popularity rather than addressing complex societal issues. They may lack the skills to implement effective policies, let alone initiate or create the same — leading to dysfunctions in governance, yet they are our duly elected political leaders.

This column doesn't in any way suggest that 20 percent of the voters of each side — as reflected by the 5-5-2 senatorial results — are functionally illiterate and the minority are independent-minded electors. I leave this to the pollsters to frame the questionnaires that could unravel this conundrum; mindful of the fact that these major pollsters, SWS, Pulse Asia and OCTA had eggs in their faces in the last elections, for arrogantly predicting erroneous outcomes.

But what is certainly called for is for the senators to look into the Flemms findings that propelled the Philippines to the 87th world ranking on illiteracy out of 130 countries. And for whatever its worth, have the courage to correct these infirmities. Or disprove prevailing suspicions that the illiterate voters are just mirror images of those that now sit in those hallowed halls.

Erratum

In my column of May 28, 2025, presidential assistant to the president Anton Lagdameo was erroneously referred to as Anton Floirendo. Floirendo is Lagdameo's middle name.