THE CAMPAIGN

First-World Techniques, Third-World Setting

The X-Men: The Story of Activists-Turned-Political Consultants

With a Little Help from (U.S.) Friends

Campaigning, Filipino Style

Spinning the News

Campaigns on the High-Tech Road

Songs in the Key of Politics

PHOTO ESSAY

The Presidency as Image

ELECTION PERSPECTIVES

Elections are like Water

Between Tinsel and Trapo

The Enigma of the Popular Will

VOTER'S VOICE

First-time Voter

Regular Voter

Non-Voter

Hope and Elections in Payatas

THE LIGHTER SIDE

Making (Non)Sense of Politics

Election Lexicon

Quickie Quiz for the Politically Insane

CANDIDATES belonging to political clans are fortunate, since they bear names that already have recall among older voters. Former trade secretary Manuel 'Mar' Roxas II is one such candidate, but just in case younger voters are unfamiliar with the nation's history, one of his ads reminds viewers that his grandfather was once president and his father was a legislator. As senator, he will therefore be carrying on what they had started. But the ad fails to say exactly what ideals his elders had espoused. Then again, it may not help his cause any if voters knew that his lolo and namesake had pardoned those who had collaborated with the Japanese during the war and also pushed for parity rights for Americans, who would then be able to enjoy equal rights as Filipinos in business and own property here.

His commercials do try to assert Roxas's very own identity as "Mr. Palengke," but it is a label that leaves viewers with only the vaguest notion that he may be focusing on trade. Indeed, instead of helping voters understand what he means when he says the market should be revitalized, this Wharton graduate resorts to the old politico trick of entertaining the masses by dancing a jig with actors pretending to be vendors.

Osmeña is another family name with resonance among Filipino voters. There has been at least one Osmeña active in politics in each generation since the Commonwealth, when Sergio Osmeña Sr. made it all the way to Malacañang. Senator John 'Sonny' Osmeña, though, has been in politics longer than Mar Roxas, and no longer needs to harp on his political lineage in his commercial as the younger politician has done. Mercifully enough, Osmeña also restrains himself from indulging any terpsichorean frustration he may have in his commercial. Rather, he presents himself as a legislator with a good track record — good enough, it is implied, to merit him another shot at the Senate. As proof, he offers R.A. 7962, which, he tells a fawning audience in the ad, made it possible for Filipinos to enjoy the conveniences offered by cell phones.

The commercial therefore presents Sonny Osmeña as nothing less than a hero of the telecommunications industry and of the cell phone-crazy public. Osmeña's past, however, also includes two provisions he pushed for in an earlier bill, R.A. 7925 — provisions that prolonged the monopoly of the Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. in the telecommunications industry. In short, had it not been for him, more efficient phone service could have been available to more people sooner. But because of the delay caused by those insertions to R.A. 7925, millions of Filipinos are still without a landline service — which explains why many consider the cell phone as a necessity, rather than a luxury.

Opposition senatorial bet Jinggoy Estrada, meanwhile, evokes his father's image in his TV spot, down to the former President Joseph 'Erap' Estrada's barako costume of plaid shirt, denims, wristband, and sneakers. The ad even tries to push once more the Erap para sa mahirap myth, which helped clinch the presidency for his father in 1998, by showing footage of the poor before a segue to Jinggoy lifting up a child in ragged clothes. It is a storyline that has not only been overused by politicians, but also one that has become rather tattered in the hands of the Estrada-Ejercito clan. Erap Estrada was ousted in a people power reprise 2001, and has been in detention for almost three years, facing charges of plunder. Up until last year, his son Jinggoy had been keeping him company there, and is now only out on bail. There was no visible improvement in the lives of the millions of Filipino poor while Estrada was in Malacañang, and even the middle class had many reasons to grumble. There was, however, a vast improvement in Estrada's personal finances — which enabled him to build mansions for his mistresses — as well as those of his friends, many of whom were already millionaires to start with.

Then there is Ernesto Maceda, who may not come from a political family, but has been in Philippine politics for so long he has become one of its artifacts. Maceda, however, does not dwell on his being a political veteran in his ad, choosing instead to style himself as 'Mr. Expose,' because of what he says was his role in uncovering many cases of corruption in government, including the infamous Public Estates Authority (PEA)-Amari deal that he calls the "grandmother of all scams."

It is the latest incarnation of Maceda, who has switched sides so many times in his long political career that no one remembers (or cares) anymore which party he now belongs to. (He is currently part of the opposition's senatorial slate.) What many remember, though, is that when Maceda was still in his 20s and a city councilor of Manila, the late Manila Mayor Arsenio Lacson made a telling observation about him that he has never lived down: "so young, and yet so corrupt."

Mr. Exposé, therefore, should perhaps been the subject of exposés. Take the PEA-Amari deal, which Maceda takes the credit for exposing in 1995. He even called it the "grandmother of all scams," in 1995, but later kept mum on the anomalous transaction, supposedly for hundreds of millions of reasons.