Thursday, July 12, 2018

Duterte and Pacquiao in Mahathir’s Malaysia



President Rodrigo R. Duterte is expected to be at ringside as Senator Manny Pacquiao slugs it out against the Argentine WBA welterweight champion Lucas Matthysse at Axiata Arena in Kuala Lampur, Malaysia on Sunday, July 15, 2018. As far as I could remember, this will be the first time a sitting Philippine president will sit among the crowd and see his fellow Filipino fight in a foreign land.

The SenaPac (pretty odd but this is what I call Pacman since he became senator) is aiming for his 9th title in this bout dubbed “Fight of Champions”. As of press time, both Pacquiao and Mathysse already arrived in the land of Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad. Though President Duterte’s presence in KL is a “private” visit, there is a scheduled meeting between Duterte and Mahathir after the boxing match if we are going to believe Harry Roque, the president’s main mouthpiece.

Pacquiao as a boxer should learn a lesson or two from Mahathir in some ways and Duterte from the fall of the former Prime Minister Najib Razak.

Who are Mahathir Mohamad and Najib Razak, by the way? Mahathir, Malaysia’s longest-serving prime minister for 22 years, who defected to the opposition to take on former Prime Minister Najib Razak’s party, again voted to power a couple of months ago. Mahathir’s political alliance Pakatan Harapan (Alliance of Hope) won at least 112 of 222 parliamentary seats in May polls that made a pivotal shift for Malaysia as a nation.

Like Mahathir’s winning moves, Pacquiao has to show that he still knows how to unleash solid blows and be dominant in the ring. Like how Mahathir swept traditional government strongholds of Johor, Kedah and Negeri Sembilan and neutralized Najib’s advantage in the Borneo states of Sabah and Sarawak. In such a win, Mahathir showed that age doesn’t matter. Mahathir is 92 and Pacquaio is 39. In this brawl in Malaysia, Pacquiao must be, as alleged by Najib on Mahathir during the campaigns, “obsessive about control, calling the shots.” And that is the only way to win against Mathysse and grab the belt. Like Mahathir, Pacquiao has to show the world that he is not done yet as a pugilist. Like Mahathir, Pacquiao need to be the time-tested and thinking dictator in the ring.

Not unlike Duterte, Najib met increased public anger over so many issues. In the case of Najib, according to reports, it’s the goods-and-services tax that boosted prices and a money laundering scandal involving hundreds of millions of dollars siphoned from state investment firm 1MDB that nailed his coffin. Mahathir called Najib, his protégé-turned-rival, a “thief” during the campaign.

Duterte on the other hand fell short in delivering his nation not only from the perils of criminality and drugs but from economic chaos and large-scale trampling of human rights. His government is expected to look or focus more on the economic condition of the people and the fiscal health of the country rather than pushing an allegedly red carpet to totalitarian rule disguised as “Federalism”.  

Surely, the Filipino people will temporarily forget about the P500% in the Office of the President’s expenses for 2017 for the cost of the ASEAN Summit, financial assistance to soldiers, maintenance of presidential choppers and billions of intelligence funds. Why the maintenance and other operating expenses (MOOE) of the Office of the President zoomed up to P14.9 billion in 2017, up 534.24 percent, according to COA annual audit report. The bulk of funds, or P8.19 billion, went to “other MOOEs” allotted to expenses such as advertising, printing and publication, representation, transportation and delivery, rent/lease, membership dues and contributions to organizations. The dangers of Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas or BSP’s expectation that inflation will settle in at 4.6% this year, above its 4% upper target. This means we can expect inflation to further increase till the third quarter of 2018 before it subsides, among other issues involving the national coffer including that dreaded TRAIN Law and the memorandum of understanding (MoU) between Asian Development Bank (ADB) covering an indicative 7.1 billion US dollars sovereign lending program to the Philippines from 2019 to 2021. Not to mention other evident issues of the day such as spate of killings of elected officials, our inaction to Chinese military build-up in West Philippine Sea and Duterte’s “stupid God” remark which Pacquiao downplayed by saying “we all have different beliefs.”  Lately, though he didn’t had a chance of selfie with the Almighty, Duterte finally apologized (to God) for calling God “stupid.”

As expected, come Sunday, Filipinos will once more cheer and rally behind the Pambansang Kamao together with Duterte including those in the human rights movements and the Catholic Church even if they are Duterte’s favorite punching bags of late!

Momentarily, we will be forgetting the hardships and the ills around us as a nation especially when the president himself is there to witness our boxing legend’s ring greatness, whether it’s his swansong or not. Along with other celebrities from all over the world, from the entertainment and the boxing circle itself, Duterte, controversial as he is, would certainly add drama to the fight or color to the bout’s media coverage.

Win or lose, Senator Pacquiao, and this time with President Duterte, will in a while send this impoverished country to La-La Land, a speculative state of mind mainly characterized by blissful lack of touch with reality….

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(Postscript: Pacquiao won via 7th round TKO)

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Photo: ABS-CBN News


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