A generation of Young Turks enters Senate

The results of the May 13 elections gave President Aquino a mandate to consolidate his control of both houses of Congress in the midterm of his office.

But the more far-reaching consequence of the 9-3 result in the Senate election is that it heralded the entry into the upper chamber of a younger generation of members who could form the potential nucleus of policy initiatives for the next half of the Aquino administration.

Administration officials celebrated the capture of Fortress Senate from the siege of Team PNoy, calling the party machine the invincible “juggernaut,” flattening all opposition on its path.

But political control, or obliteration, of the political opposition, is a dirty word in liberal or plural democracy—a result that must be avoided at all costs.

The results of the Senate derby are not all that bad.

The entry of the generation of the Young Turks—mostly at ages ranging from 40 to 50—has infused into the Senate fresh blood to generate new initiatives and has opened the way for “third force” dark horses breaking the lock of a face-off between Vice President Jejomar Binay, leader of the opposition United Nationalist Alliance (UNA), and Interior Secretary Manuel “Mar” Roxas II, heir presumptive of President Aquino, in the 2016 presidential election.

The opening of the field is what makes the results of the 2013 polling a game-changing event that has dramatically changed the landscape for 2016.

Three days after the May 13 polls, the New-York-based think tank, Global Sources, came up with a commentary, listing four “viable” contenders from the presidential coalition who could challenge Binay, touted by UNA a week before the election, as the “man to beat” in 2016. (See Inquirer story on May 18, “Poe seen as viable bet vs Binay”).

In its May 16 commentary titled “Vote of Confidence,” Global Source named Roxas, Senators Francis Escudero and Alan Peter Cayetano, and senatorial race topnotcher Grace Poe as the “four potential standard-bearers within the Liberal Party.”

Vote of confidence

According to the report written by economists Romeo Bernardo and Marie-Christine Ang, the results “are a vote of confidence on the highly popular President, which means that Mr. Aquino will continue to have tremendous political capital going forward.”

“This is very important as (President Aquino) will need to hit the ground running when the next Congress convenes and show results quickly to enable the economy to build on current momentum and translate the high business optimism into investments in hard assets that will sustain growth,” it said.

Global Source said key pieces of legislation, such as fiscal reform that affects all sectors, would be difficult to pass, but may stand a better chance with Mr. Aquino’s “election clout still fresh in the winners’ minds.”

The four names cited by the commentary as potential opponents of Binay comprised a short list, all coming from the administration’s side, but it ignored the underlying change that has taken place in the recruitment of senators.

A number of the winning administration senators have come from the ranks of experienced legislators, such as Representatives Juan Edgardo Angara of Aurora and JV Ejercito of San Juan, and reelectionist Senators Loren Legarda, Antonio Trillanes IV, Aquilino Pimentel III and Gregorio Honasan. Poe, a complete newcomer, comes from the government sector.

A number of them are highly educated professionals, such as Angara, who took sixth place in the Senate results, and are exposed to the vocabulary of economic growth and poverty alleviation.

High expectations

They bring to the Senate, through their experience in multidisciplinary fields, a rich source of ideas for legislative initiatives in the next State of the Nation Address (Sona) of the President to revitalize the exhausted reform agenda in the first half his administration, which struggled to boost the so-called “inclusive” economic growth. Anyone among the politically talented Young Turks can be a third force option in 2016.

How Mr. Aquino will use his new mandate to boost economic growth is unclear. That will be known in his next Sona. But he is under pressure from the business community to put forward a more dynamic agenda.

According to a research report of the British banking giant HSBC, after consolidating power in the last election, now is the time for President Aquino to “sink his teeth” into substantial reforms to raise productivity and efficiency of the economy.

The report said the outcome of the elections, in which the administration was poised to take control of both the House and the Senate, raised expectations that the President would use his stronger mandate to push forward decisive steps  to tackle the country’s structural challenges: low investment and jobs growth.

“Raising public investment, loosening FDI (foreign direct investments) restrictions on foreign ownership and improving business environment are all required reforms to address the economy’s structural weaknesses,” the report said.

While reforms during the first half of the administration have made gradual progress to lift the profile of the Philippines as the administration raised the efficiency of public spending and closed tax loopholes to raise revenue collection and instill confidence in governance, the report said these “are not enough.”

Biting the bullet is another thing.