The Taiwanese can surely be forgiven for skepticism about the Philippines.
For all its resources, it has missed chance after chance to build a stable and prosperous republic. Back in the 1950s it was going to be the next Japan, but it threw away those chances in the corrupt politics of the 1960s.
Marcos's early martial law years in the 1970s briefly brought tiger-level rapid growth, which dissipated in his excesses and greed of the 1980s. The deliverance at EDSA, the "people power revolution" of 1986, turned into weak governance under Corazon Aquino -- and seven attempted coups. Tiger money -- especially Japanese, after the 1985 Plaza Accords -- went elsewhere. Only the six years under Ramos (1992 to 1998) showed great progress, but his term was too short and his successor, Joseph Estrada, was a simple catastrophe.
But consider: the Philippines now has a smart, efficient and noncorrupt president probably for the rest of the decade. That's time enough to get her country on the virtuous road to rapid growth, time enough to add its weight to stability in the region. It gives pause.
The simple point is constitutional.Gloria Macapagal Arroyo gets to serve out Estrada's 1998 to 2004 term, meaning more than three full years. The Supreme Court has now ruled, for the third time and again unanimously, that her presidency is legitimate -- in rebuffing Estrada's recent and final attempt to undercut her judicially.
But then there's a term that goes to 2010, and she is constitutionally eligible to run. Until Marcos's reelection campaign of 1965, no Filipino president had been reelected for a full term, but politics in the archipelago have changed, and there are abundant reasons for assuming that the 2004 election is Arroyo's to lose. She'd have the entire decade to get the Philippines up and running.
Why assume this? The precedent of a woman president in the Philippines is not, after all, reassuring. But Arroyo is no Corazon Aquino. She has moved fast and impressively to consolidate power, appointing a tough and tempered cabinet and staff. Her executive secretary, the "little president," is General Rene deVilla, a former defense secretary and armed forces chief, who is highly respected, honest and efficient. She rewarded the former military chief, General Reyes, with the defense cabinet slot; he came over to her side at a critical moment. But no one denies his qualifications for the job, and he guarantees stability of a kind Corazon never enjoyed: the armed forces trust him.
But it's not her people that reassure one -- it's Arroyo herself. She barely reaches five feet, but as an old timer in Manila said, "When I think of her I think of someone nine feet tall." She is street-smart. When she was a senator, she used her "pork barrel," the several million dollars a year worth of benefits each senator gets to dish out to the provinces of her choosing, in areas that had supported her father, President Macapagal, in his losing reelection race against Ferdinand Marcos in 1965. She was building a base, successfully.
And, she's an economist, a real professional. She studied at Georgetown University (when Bill Clinton was there) and went on for a graduate degree. People who have worked for her in the government -- she was an undersecretary under Ramos before running for the Senate -- speak of her decisiveness and untiring ability to handle huge workloads. When this reporter interviewed her at her vice presidential offices a year ago, what stood out was her crisp style and authoritative voice on a wide range of issues, from development options to combating corruption. Philippine politics is known for its tough, garrulous male politicians, a long way from transparency and clarity.
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