Think symbols

What to think about President Aquino’s visit to the flooded provinces in Central Luzon beyond that it’s better late than later? The Wednesday visit to Tarlac, Pampanga and Bulacan comes across as an afterthought, at any rate, or a mere concession to comments that as President, he should have touched base with his suffering constituents much earlier. Per initial reports, those constituents, who in the not too distant past when he was viewed as the country’s best hope for change, pushed and jostled just to catch a glimpse of him, were less than ecstatic this time around. Or perhaps their happiness was just too deeply tempered by their misery.

More than a year after the inauguration of the Aquino presidency, Malacañang appears not to have learned how to seize the moment. Even in this age of cynicism, the impact on the desolate people of Central Luzon cannot be gainsaid had the President made haste to be with them, and not waited a week after the fact. Too harsh the weather? There was a window between “Pedring” and “Quiel” to make a short visit. Too high the waters? That’s a problem a 6×6 truck could have easily solved. Too big a dent on resources that could otherwise be used for relief and rehabilitation (as Malacañang mouthpieces have been saying)? There’s no quantifying the comfort felt by a desolate people at seeing their leader in the flesh.

Mr. Aquino could do worse than take a leaf from Bill Clinton, regarded as the master of empathy during his long term as US president, who was unerringly swift in giving aid and comfort to victims of disaster or families of the war dead, and was not above letting a tear or two fall while at it. Or, if not Bill Clinton, then Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo (granting, of course, that Malacañang can get past its fixation on drawing clear distinctions between the incumbent and his predecessor).

Arroyo liked to make public appearances, if nothing else, and made it a point to descend on calamity areas and wakes to offer her condolences in a variety of languages to the devastated and the bereaved. (She also liked attending the birthday celebrations of her courtiers, and even the presentations of perpetrators, whether alive or dead, as when she traveled to the badlands of Cavite so she could view the remains of some notorious criminal, swathed in banana leaves and borne on a makeshift cart, with her own eyes. But then that’s neither here nor there.)

On his visit to Calumpit in the hard-hit province of Bulacan, Mr. Aquino made the briefest of touchdowns at a chapel serving as shelter for the displaced families.

It is said that he shook hands with a number of evacuees and posed for photos with them before making a quick exit and proceeding to a conference with local government officials. An evacuee told the Inquirer reporter: “Ganun lang (That’s it)?” Another said it was good that Mr. Aquino came, so he could see for himself their dire straits. (The mother tongue expressed it better: “Para makita niya ang aming kalunos-lunos na kalagayan.”)

The President’s spokespersons say that the condition of the people in the devastated areas of Central Luzon is not unknown to him, and that the government agencies in charge of rescue and relief operations have been and are present at the scene. Rightly so, given the enormousness of the calamity that not only wiped out a potentially bountiful rice harvest but also now promises a bleak holiday season for those who lost loved ones, their homes, and much of their earthly belongings to the unprecedented floods.

As dreadful as this disaster was and continues to be, it could have been mitigated by an early decision on the President’s part to personally rally his troops and tell them to hang in there. He cannot have forgotten how he claimed the presidency as a symbol of change, and the power of symbols cannot be forever lost on Malacañang.

Remember El Cid, killed in battle, whose corpse was mounted on his horse to galvanize his troops to win the war. The President is alive and kicking, but he now has to make a mighty effort to rouse the flood survivors and show them the way out of the depths of despair.