Presidential candidates face off without taking gloves off

POLITE ATMOSPHERE | While the candidates are allowed to rebut each other, they refused to throw punches. Doctor and lawyer Jose Montemayor Jr. tried to spice up the “polite atmosphere” by confronting some of his rivals on certain issues. (SCREENGRAB COURTESY CNN PHILIPPINES)

MANILA, Philippines — Nine of the 10 presidential candidates faced off for the first time on Sunday, fielding questions on government corruption, pandemic response, foreign policy, and their plans for economic recovery, and scrambling to set themselves apart from the competition with two months left in the campaign.

The night was largely bereft of fireworks as most of the contenders avoided taking swipes at each other, except for a few tense exchanges initiated by one of the lesser-known candidates, doctor and lawyer Jose Montemayor Jr., who challenged his rivals at various points, and even criticized the debate for the polite atmosphere and lack of a “contrarian approach.”

The only no-show, former Sen. Ferdinand Marcos Jr., whose absence was marked by an empty podium on the stage, drew fire from some candidates after they were asked pointedly about how important debates were in an election.

“You show up in the most difficult times. Otherwise, you are not a leader. Even when it’s difficult, you need to be there, ready to face questions. You should not cower,” Vice President Leni Robredo said, without naming Marcos.

Manila Mayor Francisco “Isko Moreno” Domagoso also alluded to the late dictator’s son and namesake by comparing the debate audience to a company’s human resources department interviewing a job seeker.

“Will you hire an employee you never saw, whose experience you don’t know about, and whose contributions you’re not aware of?” he said, adding that he was speaking “metaphorically.”

Overall, the candidates—minus survey front-runner Marcos who has avoided critical questions from the media—were careful to project an air of civility during the first round of televised debates officially sanctioned by the Commission on Elections, hosted by CNN Philippines and held on the University of Santo Tomas campus.

As the debate progressed, the TV network’s website became inaccessible after it was hit by a “Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS)” attack, a type of cyberattack in which hackers take down a single service by flooding it with traffic from many different sources at once.

Few punches thrown

The format allowed the debaters to rebut each other but most refused to throw punches, instead using the opportunity to showcase their strengths, lay out their platforms, and pander to the crowd.

But there were some confrontations, including one between Montemayor and labor leader Leody de Guzman, after the former asked why the latter was pushing for a P750 daily minimum wage for Metro Manila workers.

“Aren’t you biting the hand that feeds you?” Montemayor asked as De Guzman fired back: “Are we saying we should continue making lives difficult for our workers who are earning a slavery wage?”

“Why not give our workers the right to a livable wage? Let us not keep our workers’ lives miserable. We need to give them concrete help,” De Guzman said, eliciting cheers from the live audience.

In another tense exchange, Montemayor challenged Domagoso to explain what happened to the “$15 million donated to you by [Microsoft founder] Bill Gates,” leading the latter to protest vehemently and say it was a false report.

With the exception of Domagoso, all the other candidates raised their hands to signify that they were in favor when asked if campaign contributions should be returned to the donor. Explaining his answer, Domagoso said he felt he didn’t have the “moral ascendancy” to say yes to the question, considering his past actions.

He had earlier admitted keeping more than P50 million in excess campaign funds for his losing Senate bid in 2016, for which he said he paid the proper taxes with the Bureau of Internal Revenue.

Stance on corruption

On the topic of corruption, all candidates, except Sen. Manny Pacquiao, named the Bureau of Customs as the agency they intended to cleanse of fraudulent and dishonest dealings. He said he would target the Department of Health first.

Asked about their personal experiences with bribery, former presidential spokesperson Ernesto Abella recalled getting an offer of money in exchange for a favor he didn’t specify.

“He said, if you do this for me, I’d do this for you. I was taken aback. It was the first time I was confronted with this situation. It is a serious problem,” he said.

Former Defense Secretary and National Security Adviser Norberto Gonzales said that in his “many years in government, nobody tried to offer me anything. I don’t know why.”

But he added that he felt it was time to explore corruption as a systemic problem instead of a mere problem in the government systems.

Sen. Panfilo Lacson said he never accepted bribes in his long years in the government, including his time in the police force where he faced offers of money from the families of rescued kidnapping victims.

“When I was appointed provincial director in Laguna, the initial offer was P1.2 million, which was raised to P1.8 million … So during our first flag-raising ceremony, I told my men, if you hear about me receiving bribes, tie me to the flagpole and shoot me,” he said.

As a senator, Lacson noted that he never accepted his share of the pork barrel, or unlawful discretionary funds or kickbacks given to lawmakers for their pet projects. “My hands remain clean when it comes to corruption,” he said.

For federalism advocate Faisal Mangondato, corruption was an endemic problem in the country’s political system, necessitating reforms in the government structure.

“We cannot solve corruption while we are in this system … this is a cancer in our society, and we need to pass a new system,” he said.

Pandemic efforts

On the question of where they were and what they were doing when the government first enforced a hard lockdown in many parts of the country, especially Luzon, in March 2020, Pacquiao recalled donating face masks, face shields and personal protective equipment (PPE) sets to front-line workers using his own money.

He also claimed to have donated P2 billion to the government, but it was not clear if he meant only his personal funds or other people’s contributions.

Robredo used all of the 90 seconds allotted to her as she rattled off all the pandemic response efforts of her office in the first quarter of 2020, from provisioning locally manufactured PPE sets, arranging shuttle buses and temporary shelter for health workers, as well as swab tests, and electronic medical consultation services for the public.

When asked how long it would take for their leadership to be felt upon their election into office, their answers varied while some said they did not believe in a time frame.

Mangondato said he would let the government run on autopilot, allowing experienced professionals in civil service to address the country’s problems. He added that he believed a change to a federal system of government was key to solving poverty and corruption.

Abella said the participation of civil society in governance would make his presidency felt by the people in the first 100 days.

Lacson, for his part, said the first 100 days of his presidency would be marked by an internal cleansing of government, ridding it of the corrupt and undisciplined. He vowed to waive his rights under the bank secrecy law on his first day of office.

For Montemayor, his presidency would focus on COVID-19 pandemic relief that would be felt a year into his leadership while Pacquiao said that in his first three months in office, he would initiate the construction of a megaprison to jail all crooks in government.

On her first day as president, Robredo said she would issue an executive order requiring full disclosure, and for all government offices to make public all public transactions.

Gonzales said he would push for charter change in the first year of his presidency while De Guzman said he would put in place a labor-first policy and get rid of capitalist-focused policies.

Domagoso, on the other hand, said that he would prioritize life and livelihood in the first two years of his administration.

—WITH REPORTS FROM JEROME ANING AND JEANNETTE I. ANDRADE