Hon. Rodrigo R. Duterte

Published in Mindanao Times 9/23/08

Watching last September 21, 2008 episode of Gikan sa Masa, Para sa Masa—a program aired at ABS-CBN “by, for, and of,” the government of Davao City—led me to a conclusion that, in contrast to most local and national politicians, Mayor Rodrigo Duterte is one conscientious public official.

What did exactly the mayor do? In that particular episode, a letter sender was profusely thanking the mayor for what he’d done. Instead of being flattered by the letter sender’s gesture, the mayor reminded the people that they should not be thankful to him because he is merely doing his job. Infrastructures, services and government projects—all these do not come from his own personal money, the mayor said. They come from the taxpayer’s money. Who are the taxpayers? The people.

Thus, Mayor Duterte said that the people should get rid of this kind of mentality (“paradigm” is how the mayor termed it)—thanking public officials for the things they’ve done to their constituents as if they do it out of personal benevolence.

Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo (GMA) is the radical antithesis of Mayor Duterte. If the Mayor wants to have this kind of mentality eliminated from the people, GMA does otherwise. Rather, she exploits it and uses it to her advantage, especially during her presidential campaign in 2004.

As sociologist Prof. Randy David observed, “She [GMA] has treated the beneficiaries of government programs like feudal subjects dependent on the personal benevolence of the sovereign rather than as citizens with formal rights.” It is not only once that GMA repeated her “you-owe-me” message, as Prof. David called it, but many times. From increasing the soldiers’ pay to distributing “land titles,” to “laying down of water pipes,” GMA never missed to remind the beneficiaries that it is she whodunnit. Prof. David preferred to view this act as “blackmail” rather than “good governance.”

“In a modern state, the president of the country does not possess authority in her own right,” Prof. David mused. “Her powers come from her office. The resources she gives away do not personally belong to her. The citizens do not receive the benefits that come their way as private favors but entitlements under a system of law defining the relationship between public authorities and citizens.”

I am not sure how many politicians in Davao City or in the entire Philippines are cognizant of this, but I am sure that Mayor Duterte has a grasp of this so basic a principle.

Prof. David also prescribed: “There ought to be a law prohibiting billboards that proclaim public programs and projects as the personal achievements of public officials. This practice is not only dishonest; it is also a regression to a form of patrimonial governance that allows the personal exploitation of the means of administration.”

To Prof. David, “this political habit infantlizes our people by treating the fulfillment of their basic needs as conditional on the personal benevolence of elected officials.”

Look around. You can tell among the city’s public officials who are infantilizing the people. You can tell whose name you always see while playing basketball, while under the waiting shed, while passing by a concrete road. You can tell who’s guilty of infantilizing our people when the waiting shed you’re using is built “Thru the initiative of Cong….”

You may not like his iron hand way of dealing with outlaws. You may call him Dirty Harry. You may link him with the notorious Davao Death Squad. Human rights advocates may call him a human rights violator. You may call him condescending names, to your heart’s content. But the seriousness and conscientiousness with which he takes his job as mayor of Davao City, Mayor Duterte is one public official who truly deserves the three letters—Hon.—that precede his name.