Philippine Elections 2010

It has been more than 10 days since the last elections and so far we had a relatively good one. Except for the country's Vice President, I think everything is clear who will be our leaders for the next 6 years. For the President, Noynoy Aquino got more than 4 million votes compared to the second placer Joseph Estrada and in my opinion, Erap should be a gentleman and should concede and accept his loss. In fact, for the vice presidency, even though I am not a fan of Jojo Binay, I think Mar Roxas should start accepting that it would take a miracle to overtake Binay's lead of more than 700,000 votes and just concentrate on being a good senator and an adviser to Noynoy Aquino.

The country's first automated election is a 90% success and we should commend Comelec and Smartmatic for doing a good job (not great, but a passing mark). We should be thankful that we did not have several areas and provinces that had a failure of elections and this may be considered birth pains since it was our first time to had an automated one. A lot has to be learned from this year's experience and we must be more vigilant and be better to the next automated elections we will have in about 3 years. We may still experience a few errors on our second try but if we correct our mistakes and be more efficient, I can see that our elections will someday be as clean and efficient as the US elections.

Having a second Aquino as our president will indeed have a lot of expectations from the people. Just by watching and listening to his campaign ads in TV and radio, people expect him not to be corrupt and avoid committing the same mistakes as the Arroyo, Estrada and Marcos administration. Gloria Arroyo has been a good senator and a vice president but when she assumed the highest position, the temptation was too big for her not to notice. Her accomplishments as an economist was overshadowed by corruption cases and allegations thrown to her which were often supported by witnesses who got the sympathy of the public. Her husband, being the center of controversies was always implicated which added the public's distrust to the first couple. Now, after running and winning a congressional position to her hometown in Pampanga, people are saying that she will push for a charter change which will eventually bring her back to power as a prime minister. The Arroyos have been addicted to power and money that they do not know when to stop and try to exit properly.

Noynoy Aquino has a big hole to fill and 6 years is such a short time to help recover a third world country. A lot of issues has to be prioritized and he needs all the help he can have. I sincerely wish he avoids appointing traditional politicians as cabinet members and focus more on the youth and civil society. I pray that self serving politicians will be kicked out from their positions and deserving ones will be appointed. Since 6 years is a very short time, I think the president should try not to solve everything at the same time and focus on the most obvious. Poverty and population is the main problem and he should focus on the cause of poverty. Education and health is the key and if people are well educated, all other problems will eventually be solved.

Good luck and God Bless to our new leaders and let us all do our part to help make our country a better place to live in.