No hope for the Philippines?

The Philippines doesn't seem to be in good shape by any measure. Now that I'm nearing the end of my stay here, I've been able to talk to lots of folks about it, from senators to journalists to taxi drivers to store owners. Hope is in very short supply around here.

Any discussion of the current state of the Philippines always leads to one thing: corruption. "The No. 1 problem in the Philippines isn't poverty," says my friend Tita Valderama, who writes about politics and government for the People's Journal. "Our biggest problem is corruption."

In fact, the Philipines is the second-most corrupt nation in Asia, according to various studies. Nearly everyone is on the take, with a backlog of 2,000 anti-graft cases in the courts. GMA's husand and family have been accused of taking illegal jueteng gambling money. Average Filipinos are shaken down everyday when they run a traffic light or apply for a driver's license.

My journalist friend, Tita, says she's often offered thick envelopes of cash to write or not write certain stories. Many journalists take them.

Second, everyone agrees the political situation in the Philippines is whacked. And it's been that way for a very long time. The current president, Gloria Macapagal Arroyo (or "GMA"), has been embrolied in scandal the last few months since the Garci tape turned up, in which she purpotedly tells an election officer in a phone conversation that she wants to lead by 1 million votes in the 2004 presidential election and he says he'll "force it." She denies wrongdoing but has acknowledged that it was a "lapse in judgement" for her to phone an official on the Commission on Elections, but that the Garci tapes were doctored to make her look bad.

Since then, the opposition has unsuccessfully tried to impeach her and she's doing everything she can to fight them off. There are rumors and stories everyday in the paper that she might declare martial law. Last week's spy case story, in which a Filipino-American FBI analyst allegedly stole files pertaining to the Philippines and sent them to GMA opponents, is on the front page everyday. GMA is using it to vindicate herself, calling on the US to reveal which opposition members received the stolen files.

Everytime I ask folks who live here what they think of the situation, everyone shakes their head or clucks their tongue. One taxi driver, Ray, astutely puts it: "The problem isn't this or that administration. It's the character of our government. We need consitutional change."

The opposition has been unable to succesfully harness a people power movement like the one that kicked former President Joseph Estrada, whom Arroyo succeedded. But now there's a movement afoot by the country's elite thinkers and academics--Black and White Movement --which is attempting to galvanize the apathetic middle class into action, as well as civil society organizations. Cielito Habito is a Black and White leader. He's also one of the country's preeminent economists, having served under two presidents. "When it comes to the truth, there's no gray area. It's black and white," he tells me from his office at Ateneo University, where he chairs the Center for Economic Research and Development. "She cheated. We can't just turn a blind eye to that. "

Habito's movement wants Arroyo to step down, and for a transitional government headed by Gloria's VP to call for new elections. He supports former ex-President Corazon Aquino. And therein lies a problem too: the same names always pop up. No one's talking about real change.