BBM and GMA

Ferdinand “Bongbong” Romualdez Marcos Jr. is the luckiest president in Philippine history.

He was elected in May 2022 with the largest number of votes garnered by any president, 31.6 million. The mandate enabled him to unify the country, combining the Solid North and the Disparate South in one full swing of an electoral exercise with a record number of participants.

He inherited an economy with strong fundamentals after coming from the deepest recession in 100 years. That strength manifested itself in a 7.6 percent GDP growth in 2022, the highest in 46 years.

The last time the economy showed higher growth rate than 7.6 was in 1976 (8.8 percent), under President Ferdinand Edralin Marcos Sr. In the first quarter of 2023, GDP growth was 6.4 percent, the best in ASEAN.

BBM is hugely popular. So many countries, big and small, want him as their guest, either as a working or official visitor, like what the United States did, or for a state visit, like what France wants.

Such fame gives the President a tremendous platform to do two things: one, to sell the Philippines as a tourist or investment destination; and two, to rehabilitate the Marcos name which had been battered by western media smear campaign painting BBM’s dad as a strongman, dictator, human rights violator.

But then strongmen and dictators have suddenly become fashionable. Take a look at the leaders of India, China, Brazil, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and to some extent France. More than half the world is under the grip of strongmen.

Finally, BBM is lucky to have one thing his predecessors did not have – three living ex-presidents – Joseph Estrada, Rodrigo Duterte, and Gloria Macapagal Arroyo (GMA). Actually, BBM had four living predecessors, until Fidel V. Ramos succumbed to COVID-19 on July 31, 2022.

Among these predecessors, GMA stands out, a sui generis, a class by herself. Her father was Diosdado Macapagal (president from 1962-1966), the former partymate and later bitter political rival of Marcos Sr. In the elections of November 1965, then Senate President Marcos Sr. easily trounced reelectionist Macapagal, 55/45 percent.

GMA, however, is an ally today of BBM. What an ally.

She brokered the BBM-Sara Duterte Unity Team of 2022 that shattered the opposition to oblivion, for good.

GMA has the second longest presidency (nine years) after the elder Marcos’s 20 years. She presided over the longest uninterrupted economic expansion in the country’s history, 36 quarters. Arroyo had pro-growth foreign and economic policy. She opened up the economy, expanded ties with China, joined the Coalition of the Willing in the invasion of Iraq, and sold a number of huge government assets.

That experience GMA brings to the BBM team. Marcos Jr. appreciates it. In nearly all his foreign trips, GMA was beside him, as an elder statesman and as a senior adviser.

Such a role, however, breeds envy and intrigue.

As the second longest serving president and a good president at that, GMA has natural allies and constituency that can be parlayed by any ambitious politician. She is thus reckoned as an emerging opposition leader, by proxy or in reality. Benigno S. Aquino III knew that. So the son of Corazon Aquino put her under house arrest for nearly four years.

The latest intrigue painting Mrs. Arroyo as a villain is linking her to allegations that the House of Representatives May 17 coup, removing her as the Senior Deputy Speaker, had the blessings of First Lady Liza Araneta Marcos (LAM).

“I am truly sorry that she should even be dragged into this political fantasy of a House coup,” Mrs. Arroyo said on May 28, “it is disrespectful to her and to her intelligence.” Here is the rest of GMA’s Facebook statement:

“Whoever is spreading these pathetic rumors are the ones duping the Filipino people, and they should now move on to the serious business of making positive contributions to national progress.

“I will just say three things:

“First, every politician worth his or her salt would know that in the Philippines, no House coup can ever succeed without the consent of the President. That is simply a fact of life in Philippine politics.

“Second, I made a humble contribution to the joining of forces that became the UniTeam, and the resulting supermajority in the House is a major force for delivering our President’s agenda. Thus, I would never take any action to destroy it.

“Third, I did not have any conversation, here or abroad, with any congressman or congresswoman, or any other politician active or retired, to plot, support, encourage or participate in any way in any alleged House coup.”

In an earlier statement on May 18, 2023, Mrs. Arroyo also stressed:

“I do not want to precipitate or intensify any tendencies toward early politicking. We are just barely a year into the administration of President Marcos, Jr., and it would be unfortunate if early politicking resulted in any dilution of the tremendous mandate that the UniTeam, led by our President, earned in the 2022 elections. After all, the President ran on the platform of unity.”

“To be clear, my political objectives are three:

“First, to represent the 2nd district of Pampanga.

“Second, to support the legislative agenda of Speaker Romualdez and President Marcos.

“Third, to use whatever experience I have as a former President to help out when I am called upon to do so.

“Outside of my role as Congresswoman, my public interest going forward is to help reduce tensions between the United States and China, given that I was strongly allied to both countries when I was President.”

As to her ambitions to become speaker again, GMA sneered,  paraphrasing an American public figure, the Civil War General William Tecumseh Sherman who, when being enticed to run for the American presidency in 1884, declined by saying something like, “If nominated, I will not run, and if elected, I will not serve.”

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