duterte’s covid politics

it’s the day after president duterte made us wait almost 8 hours — four o’clock p.m. daw pero halos hatinggabi na nang umapir, pre-recorded pa — for a first report on how emergency funds and powers are being used to address the covid crisis, but shared nothing remotely significant (because still in the realm of promises, except perhaps that tidbit about china warning him the virus was coming and two days later it was here) other than that list of donors, sponsors, led by china, of course, and a lot of generous friends, business magnates, with chinese-sounding names. did he really want us to sleep on that?  so it was good to wake up to this from the ateneo’s poli-sci department.

During crisis moments, the challenge to governments, including our own, is to direct citizen participation towards critical thinking, innovation, and cooperation — not to suppress it. Change will not come from those who govern alone. Crisis governance also requires governments and citizens to be guided by data and not by alarmist or baseless assumptions. Moreover, governments must be strategic in communicating concerns and decisions to its various publics.   

that’s from the 1st of an 8-part Discussion Series Framing the Crisis Conversation: COVID-19 CRISIS AND STRUCTURAL CHANGE / Each crisis carries the potential for structural change published by BusinessWorld. 

it would help the national conversation if government were transparent, and people knew what’s going on behind the scenes.

we all who have nothing better to do would really benefit from knowing what the president and his men are thinking, what’s being planned, short- and long-term, to meet the nation’s needs, the better for citizens to navigate this new world and find our own little lockdown ways of contributing to credible and appropriate efforts.