By Gabriel Bernales
Got Challenged. Pushed Back. Made Excuses.
While the country drowns literally with flash floods swallowing neighborhoods and two more typhoons on the way, our leaders are too busy performing in the circus we call Philippine politics. The physical climate is in crisis, but the political climate? Utter clownery.
Instead of concrete plans or decisive action, we’re told once again to “adapt.” President Marcos Jr.’s recent statement, encouraging Filipinos to toughen up whenever the nation hits rock bottom, reeks of the same old elitist detachment masked as optimism. We don’t need motivational speeches we need infrastructure, disaster preparedness, and leadership with a plan, not a shrug.
And just when you thought the week couldn’t get more surreal, Davao City’s Acting Mayor Baste Duterte steps into the ring. He challenges the Philippine National Police (PNP) Chief Gen. Nicholas Torre III to a fistfight isn’t just immature, it’s a new low in the already testosterone-drenched swamp of local politics.
Baste’s reason? A long-standing grudge. Torre, back when he served as Director of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG), oversaw the enforcement of an arrest warrant for Baste’s father, former President Rodrigo Duterte. So, in true action-movie logic, the solution is not due process or dialogue but a fistfight. As if masculinity and governance are the same thing.
This is not a scene from a late-night satire show. This is real life, in a nation currently being ravaged by both natural and man-made disasters.
We are governed not by statesmen, but by schoolyard bullies who confuse ego with authority and perform rage instead of reform. And while they flex on social media and grandstand on the news, ordinary Filipinos are left to wade through waist-deep floodwaters literally and metaphorically without so much as a lifeline.
When the seas rise and the systems fail, our leaders throw punches instead of policies. And they wonder why the country is sinking.
