UNDER normal circumstances, election fever sets in around this time of the year as a prelude to the campaign circus coming to town. But these are extraordinary times. Covid-19 cases are surging, people are dying and the economy is collapsing. Coming out from a year’s lockdown, perhaps the world’s longest, the National Capital Region (NCR or Metro Manila) reverted to a stricter one. Since early March, Covid-19 cases now average 10,000 to 15,000 daily from February’s 1,800 to 2,000. While waiting for the vaccine rollout, a pall of helplessness, fear and death hover.

On the other hand, there is no vaccine against the election virus ravaging the body politic, diverting us from what is important. For the opposition, this could be the perfect time to grab the political narrative focusing on the pandemic, providing the government some modicum of solution — if only it can get its act together.

Not this time around. The opposition has been so damaged and demonized that they are bereft of personalities within their ranks with the credibility to lead. The once formidable Liberal Party, now a caricature of itself, never was able to fashion any coherent alternative to the current regime except to take ineffective potshots.

Yet, oblivious to the contagion, only names of potential successors mostly from the majority alliance appear, all waiting for signals from the patron who people suspect may himself be in a political stupor of late. Watching Duterte’s IATF press briefing, he seemed to be unhinged, rambling and incoherent, jumping from one topic to the next, unable to complete a train of thought or a sentence (“PRRD addresses the nation,” March 24). I thought the President, who understandably is under tremendous stress, might, like the coronavirus, have mutated from a dominant alpha male to a lame duck.

Perceived leading actors
Two sets of names float around the outer perimeter of Duterte’s circle. Akin to centrifugal forces, Lacson and Gordon, relatively more independent-minded are playing too careful a game, unable to cut their apron strings from the President by thrashing him where he is so vulnerable – his handling of the pandemic. The other names could be those of Grace Poe and Bongbong Marcos, still popular but moribund after their respective 2016 presidential and vice-presidential runs. The centripetal forces drawn to the center are those closest to the President who could be the tools to extend his regime. The DDS or diehard Duterte supporters and their cohorts have woven the storyline that Covid’s interference somehow disrupted the country’s trajectory towards fulfilling the Deegong’s legacy. Thus, the need for time extension.

The blueprint for any regime to extend itself is to do either one of the three formulas. The first is obvious — run for reelection. This just happened recently in the United States election of 2020. President Trump lost his bid to do his “unfinished business,” but his rejection of his defeat with delusional arguments that his election was stolen from under him, despite evidence to the contrary, has marked the man as raving mad. In the Philippine scenario, the Deegong is neither delusional nor irrational. Presidential term limits prevent his reelection, and this alternative path is closed. He knows this.

RevGov
The second track is one preferred by totalitarian regimes and the primary path of choice of the Duterte fanatics and those out to protect their sinecures and prerogatives. Declare a revolutionary government, which in effect is a coup against itself. But this involves the acquiescence of the military component, which is doubtful despite the two dozen or so former senior military personnel seconded by Duterte to this government. More importantly, the Filipino, at times seemingly accommodating, may not see this as an alternative worth espousing. Also, Duterte has lost the taste for such adventurism.

Election of surrogates
A third avenue is for the regime to skirt the constitutional term limits and go for election with some twist. Field the surrogates to the highest posts. In this case, Duterte allows his daughter Sara to run for the presidency with him as the vice president. This foolish idea seems to be the preferred solution of the presidential sycophants. This scenario rests on a presumption that the Filipino electorate is gullible and as ridiculous as those who advanced this idea. Despite the popularity of PRRD, the idea of a daughter or his gofer with him in the same ballot is idiotic. Even many of the people from Davao, loyal to the Duterte père et la fille will find this combination nauseous. Davao people are not that stupid. But this is gaining traction among the carpetbaggers of the PRRD’s nominal party — the PDP Laban.

Which suggests that this scenario is simply a red herring, a diversion concocted by the genius strategist himself preventing a lame-duck status. In the end Sara must be his choice as successor, feeding the fiction of supposedly preserving a legacy, a family’s unfinished business, but more importantly as protection against political retribution or even against possible repercussions of human right violations earning PRRD an indictment in the international courts.

Possible permutations
The President will not depart from traditional political practices. What better security than imposing a political dynasty with the unquestioned loyalty of the successors with a gofer for a spare tire. Sara may have to be paired perhaps with the moneyed progeny of the Villars or Marcoses as VP — not Bongbong but the smarter Imee, in keeping with the traditional Luzon or Visayas combination with Mindanao. And this woman-woman combination will be a first and a formidable one.

That leaves the PDP Laban president and popular billionaire boxing hero an odd man out as the potential spoiler. The tragedy of politics in this country is that these entertainers run on their popularity counting on name recall for votes, not so much on what they stand for and a clear articulation of their vision. Pacquiao intuitively understood this coyly releasing a tastelessly done “poor- man- from-the-masa-who-did-good-and-can-go-further” video.

The rest of the gang will just have to mill around reacting simply to the vicissitudes of the regime. Lacson, Gordon, Poe, Marcos and even the reluctant and qualified businessman, Ramon Ang.

Minimums the Deegong can do
I wrote two columns on “Duterte’s time running out — monumental failures” and “A case for repairing his legacy”(The Manila Times, Feb 10 and 17, 2021). It is too late for people to still hold him accountable for his promises prior to his ascendancy when he pompously declared “Change is coming — ‘Ang Pagbabago’ — war on illegal drugs, elimination of corruption in government, and federalism and Charter change.” On this, he has already shown himself a monumental failure. While not detracting from his triumphs and some peripheral successes, he can still do two things — seriously repair a tattered legacy and be judged kindly by history.

“He needs to decouple from the ugly maelstrom of politics now engulfing his presidency; for one, the singular ego-driven thought that he alone can finish what he started.” If he is compelled to name a successor, he needs to choose beyond his kin and coterie.

But more importantly and immediately, he must solve this biggest anomaly — the pandemic!