Was Benigno Aquino III's One-Term Presidency Enough to Go Beyond Rising Tiger Philippines?

GMA News Online

Today is the fifth year of Benigno Simeon "Noynoy" C. Aquino III's demise. The Philippines can be too easily divided. Honestly, I can admit that I didn't vote for or support Noynoy, or that I actually got caught in between one-sided political debates. As always, I will confess there would be biases, and I'm not free from them. Now, to make an assessment, it's easy to see tributes for Noynoy can go from what deserves credit ot actually crediting him beyond his power. Whether we want to admit it or not, Noynoy's legacy should be viewed as a complicated legacy. Even good kings made terrible decisions too! We must give credit where credit is due. In fact, even former Singaporean prime minister Lee Hsien Loong actually wrote this on his X account:

Saddened to hear of the passing of former Philippine President Benigno Aquino III yesterday. Had the pleasure of meeting him many times over the years, including when he visited Singapore in 2014. His passing is a great loss to the Philippines. 

I thought about reading Third World to First sometime after Noynoy died. It was because I wanted to think about the late great Lee Kuan Yew. Some people often think, "It's just the system, it's just the people." or they keep pointing back at Noynoy again as if he "magically altered economics". The real truth again: Noynoy, or any politician, is just human. The fact that Noynoy died too soon is also proof that he was just human. As I thought about From Third World to First, some people often feel that all the Philippines needs is a leader like LKY, under the severely flawed 1987 Constitution of the Philippines. However, the reality is that hoping for a LKY-type leader under the severely flawed 1987 Constitution is as stupid as trying to expect an excellent quality long-form essay written on a typewriter, due in a matter of a few days. The typewriter was such a paper-eating monster that it's best only for filling up blank sheets, not writing long-form essays in this day and age!

The complicated legacy of Noynoy: why the real problem was systemic in nature, not him, not any president 

Right now, I hope my assessment here is less biased. I can't expect 100% to be free of biases. Right now, we just need to assess Noynoy's ups and downs, together with the 1987 Constitution of the Philippines. Bear in mind that Article XVII doesn't make the same constitution as closed to change or closed to revision. 

The presidential system's term limits vs. the parliamentary system

We need to think that Noynoy only had six years. It's easy to say, "Come on, he did so much in six years." I could easily point out that LKY actually took as many terms as possible to stabilize Singapore. In fact, LKY served as Singapore's prime minister from June 5, 1959 up to November 28, 1990. That would be a staggering 31 years in office. People often argue that term limits are necessary. However, remember that the late Ferdinand E. Marcos Sr.'s real problem wasn't ruling for 20 years but how he ruled for 20 years. Again, let me remind people that the first Marcos Administration, aka the Marcos Years, was never under a parliamentary system. Cesar Virata was someone whom LKY called a first-class administrator but no leader. In short, Virata's role as prime minister was akin to a prime minister in presidential systems. The late Benigno Simeon "Ninoy" A. Aquino Jr. even said it famously, "We had a parliamentary form of government, without a parliament."

I'm referring to a couple of projects that Noynoy secured late in his term but only finished during the term of former president Rodrigo R. Duterte. Honestly, I still think the Duterte administration, for all its flaws, should be credited for finishing what Noynoy's term was unable to finish. If one must think of projects like the Second Mactan Airport and CCLX in Cebu, they were procured late during Noynoy's term. If Noynoy decided to hastily have them built before 2016, you can expect CCLX to collapse and the Second Mactan Airport to collapse, killing people in the process due to poor infrastructure. That's where the weakness of the 1987 Constitution starts to show up. The term limit limited the projects that Noynoy secured as the President of the Philippines. Noynoy had 2010-2016, and with projects that came close to the end of his term, you can't expect him to magically make them work!

As we look into the real issue, the presidential system is focused on term limits, not the scope of powers. In fact, it's incredibly difficult to hold presidents accountable in general. One can always say "Noynoy walked the talk." However, we need to think that these controversies also happened. We also need to take into account that the same Philippine Star that gave a recent tribute to Noynoy didn't shy away from his controversies too:

Controversies

The first controversy that Noynoy Aquino grappled with happened just months after he assumed office when Rolando Mendoza, a disgruntled cop, hijacked a tourist bus in Rizal Park on August, 2010 that carried mostly tourists from Hong Kong. The incident dubbed as the Manila Hostage Crisis resulted in the death of Mendoza and eight hostages after negotiations broke down during a 10-hour standoff. Aquino received criticism for the failed negotiation with Mendoza, and also for smiling during the press conference. Aquino apologized and said his smiling was only due to his exasperation.

But a couple of natural and manmade disasters in the latter half of the PNoy administration eventually sullied the popularity of Noynoy Aquino.

In November 2013, the administration received much flak for its slow and inadequate response to Super Typhoon Yolanda, which barreled through Eastern Visayas, left over 6,000 dead, and displaced millions in its wake. The issue led to Noynoy Aquino issuing a rare apology months after the tragedy.

In a famous soundbite that has since been weaponized by PNoy's critics but the palace that time said was being taken out of context, the president was reported to have admonished a businessman crying for help in Tacloban, "Eh buhay ka pa naman, di ba?" (Translation: "You are still alive, right?")

A major blackeye for the Aquino administration also happened in the early morning of January 25, 2015 in a tragedy that has been since called as the "Mamasapano massacre," where 44 members of the Special Action Force (SAF) of the police died in a bungled attempt to serve an arrest warrant to the high-profile terrorist Zulkiflie Abdhir alyas Marwan.

The tragedy led to a string of investigations on who should be implicated in the debacle. It also heavily bore on the image of Mar Roxas, who was then the Interior and Local Government secretary during that time but who maintained that he was kept out of the loop for the operation.

In one striking incident that made a mark on the public psyche, Aquino skipped the arrival honors for the slain SAF personnel at the Villamor Air Base in Pasay and instead attended the inauguration of a new car manufacturing plant in Sta. Rosa, Laguna.

Aquino’s no-show at Villamor calcified the public’s perception of him as out-of-touch and uncaring to the public plight, even as he explained that he only wanted to give the families space to grieve.

The aftermath of the crisis eventually dogged Noynoy Aquino and the Liberal Party until the end of his term and caused his shrinking popularity to wilt further.

The parliamentary system is focused on reducing the powers and extending the terms. The big difference between the Philippine president vs. the Singaporean prime minister is the accountability mechanism. If the Philippines were under a parliamentary system and Noynoy became its prime minister with the Liberal Party of the Philippines occupying the government seats, I believe controversies with Noynoy may have greatly lessened. It's because under the parliamentary system, if Noynoy were actually Prime Minister Benigno Simeon C. Aquino III, he would be under this format:

1. Noynoy would've had to prove himself through study and the like before the Liberal Party of the Philippines could thrust him as their prime minister.
2. Under a parliamentary system, the prime minister is backed by his entire party. In the hypothetical case where Noynoy is the prime minister under the hypothetical Philippine Parliament, he would be backed by the entire Liberal Party. The Liberal Party may have had Prime Minister Aquino and Deputy Prime Minister Manuel "Mar" A. Roxas II. The cabinet would probably have the following as examples:
• Finance Minister Atty. Florencio "Butch" Abad
• Justice Minister Atty. Leila De Lima
• Health Minister Janet Garin
• Human Rights Minister Loreta Ann "Etta" Rosales
• Urban Minister Atty. Maria Leonor "Leni" Gerona-Robredo
• Transportation Minister Joseph Emilio Abaya
3. Meanwhile, I might want to imagine PDP Laban as the Opposition Cabinet. For example, this might've set the late Atty. Aquilino Pimentel as the Opposition Leader. For every appointee from Noynoy straight from his own party, Pimentel has his own appointees to mirror Noynoy. The parliamentary system sets two different parties instead of personalities. Noynoy would be forced to face off against the Opposition Leader, which may have prevented most of his controversies.
4. At every move, Noynoy and his party would need to defend their stance on live camera. Noynoy shouldn't just remain composed but also give out good answers and accept criticisms from the Opposition live on-air. This would've probably made issues mentioned earlier easier to solve in the long run, because it would go to the root cause, rather than just one shot, done, and repeat. The one shot, done, and repeat is the very system that holds back anyone in power from accomplishing anything better. 

If Noynoy were a prime minister instead of a president during his first term, this may have happened after he managed to survive the first term:

1. "Daang Matuwid" or straight road Phase 1. The Philippine Parliament under the Liberal Party-led Government is still in session, facing off against the PDP-Laban as the Opposition. As long as Noynoy keeps the confidence of the Parliament up, there would be zero reason to lose confidence and vote him out. By then, Noynoy would've probably resigned over getting voted out if ever he lost the confidence of the parliament. Two, if Noynoy refuses to resign, he could've experienced the humiliation of being voted out of the Philippine Parliament. 
2. Phase 1 results in the dissolution of the Philippine Parliament. For two possible scenarios: 
• If the Liberal Party wins and Noynoy is still favorable, he can have another term as the Philippine Prime Minister; that's until his health gets so bad he has to step down. Noynoy can proceed to continue the projects that were left hanging during his first term as the prime minister. Noynoy may continue to face the PDP-Laban-led Opposition and prove himself capable. 
• If the Liberal Party loses but has enough votes, it becomes the Opposition. For example, if PDP-Laban won the Government seats while the Liberal Party came in second, Noynoy could serve as the Opposition Leader until his health wouldn't permit it. Noynoy could've shuffled the Opposition under law, and let's just say Mar becomes the new Opposition Leader. The Liberal Party continues to implement Daang Matuwid even if indirectly. They would question the PDP-Laban-run government and provide alternatives. If their alternatives are better, theirs would naturall get mixed into the winning proposals of the PDP-Laban-led government. 

Is Noynoy's GDP really just all there to it?

 However, we need to realize that GDP alone doesn't truly measure the overall well-being. Investopedia also says this:

Limitations of GDP as an Economic Indicator

GDP can increase after a car accident or a major flood. It can grow rapidly during a war or after a terrorist attack. For example, if Chicago caught fire once again, the rebuilding effort just might boost GDP. This is because GDP is very susceptible to the broken window fallacy—false signals of rising prosperity when obvious destruction has taken place.

From the perspective of a citizen living with the day-to-day realities of life, GDP can be misleading. It doesn't take into account externalities such as crime, pollution, inequality, depletion of natural resources, and other negative (and costly) social and environmental aspects of existence.

This is why the genuine progress indicator (GPI) was created in 1995 by a think tank called Redefining Progress.6

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The number of economic, social, and environmental adjustments made to GDP by the genuine progress indicator calculation. This number can change depending on the cost categories that individual U.S. states choose to include in their particular calculations.7

It's not to dismiss the GDP during Noynoy's term. Instead, we just need to think about the problem that the 1987 Constitution of the Philippines' Article XII is the biggest hurdle. In fact, despite his GDP, there was also the problem of jobless growth. Remember that Noynoy alone couldn't actually just liberate the sectors. This statement from the Philippine Daily Inquirer should also prove that while we can learn from Noynoy's budgeting, jobless growth was also a reality that needed to be fixed:

Economists’ take

Economists said it would take a while before the country’s economic growth would translate into significant drop in unemployment and poverty.

When an economy takes a high-growth trajectory, businesses do not immediately hire more workers. They only do so when they are convinced that robust economic growth is sustainable, said Victor Abola, an economics professor at the University of Asia and the Pacific.

“Initially, they (businesses) will just require existing workers to work overtime,” Abola told the Inquirer.

Benjamin Diokno, an economics professor at the University of the Philippines, said economic growth did not always equate to a drop in the unemployment rate. In the case of the Philippines, he said, many recent investments were capital-intensive but not labor-intensive.

“Most public and private construction can be characterized as large-scale, capital intensive. Even the multibillion-peso school-building program was implemented by big-time contractors using capital intensive or labor-saving technologies,” Diokno told the Inquirer.

Diokno said the Philippines needed to invest more in sectors that were labor-intensive and job-generating in order to see a drop in the unemployment rate.

In short, just think if Noynoy actually pushed for economic charter change during his term. If he did, there might be significantly more than just GDP. Noynoy might've left a huge amount of money. However, money sitting idle can just be easily manipulated or misused by successors. In reality, even longtime Liberal Party supporter, economist Andrew James Masigan dared to write this truth in Business World:

The restrictive provisions of the constitution have held back the country’s development for more than 30 years. From the 1980s up to the close of the century, countries like Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand leapfrogged economically on the back of a deluge foreign direct investments (FDIs). During that period, the Philippines share of regional FDIs was a paltry 3% in good years and 2% in normal years. The flawed economic laws of the constitution are largely to blame for this. Lately, Vietnam has taken the lion’s share of FDIs, leaving the Philippines in the dust.

See, embedded in the 1987 constitutions is a list of industries in which foreigners are precluded from participation. These industries include agriculture, public utilities, transportation, retail, construction, media, and education, among others. (For those unaware, these industries are collectively known as “the negative list”). Apart from depriving the country of forex investments, technology transfer and job opportunities, the lack of competition from abroad has created monopolies and oligopolies owned by a handful of families. These families earn scandalous profits even though they are inefficient.

Our flawed economic laws are the reason why our agricultural sector has not industrialized and why food security eludes us. It is why our manufacturing sector has not fully developed. It is why we lost the opportunity to be Asia’s entertainment and production capital despite our Americanized culture (Netflix located its Asian headquarters in Singapore, Disney in Malaysia, MTV in Hong Kong, and Paramount Studios in Taiwan). It is why our education standards have remained embarrassingly behind the rest of the world.

The constitution limits foreigners from owning more than 40% equity share in corporations. In addition, foreigners are barred from owning land. These provisions have caused us to lose-out on big-ticket investments which would have made all the difference in job and revenue generation. Not too long ago, we lost a multi-billion dollar investment from a US auto manufacturing company which instead went to Thailand. We lost a multi-billion smartphone plant by Samsung which went to Vietnam. Limiting equity ownership to a minority stake and prohibiting land ownership is a great disincentive for companies investing in large manufacturing plants with a useful life of more than 50 years. Land is used as equity for business financing and to take this away from the business model is enough reason for investors to take their business elsewhere.

Just imagine if in 2010, Noynoy actually pushed for economic charter change and the whole Liberal Party pushed with him. Sure, Noynoy wouldn't get a term change yet. However, it would've been a stepping stone for economics. Some countries that are actually better economically aren't parliamentary systems but under a presidential system, like South Korea, Taiwan, and Indonesia. However, I'm in for a parliamentary Philippines instead. Although, as said, I'm going to fight for the economic aspect first because system overhaul requires lots of money too. 

If Noynoy actually pushed for economic charter change, these problems would've been solved already:

1. Slow, expensive Internet would be much less of a problem. It's because instead of just a duopoly, the invitation of other Internet Service Providers, starting with nearby investors from the ASEAN would've already helped fill the gap between two companies (Globe and PLDT) vs. the entire Philippines that needs Internet services now. Internet should no longer be treated as a luxury but a necessity in this digital age.
2. Jobless rates would've significantly dropped. If there were more FDIs that came than what Noynoy intended, the jobless growth rate would be much lower. Can you imagine if Noynoy's reform pushed for economic charter change? The Philippines would have more jobs and lesser need for OFWs, an ongoing problem that LKY cited in From Third World to First.
3. Food shortages may have been solved because Philippine agriculture would've modernized. Instead, the Philippines is still stagnating to a certain extent. Filipino farmers learning new techniques and technologies would've left more than just GDP, but also better food security chains. 
4. With more FDIs because of getting rid of the ridiculous 60-40 scheme would mean FDIs get to keep 100% of their net profits after taxes. There would be more taxes paid to the Philippines. Although we must also make sure taxes are neither too high (which encourages evasion) nor too low. The TRAIN law helped lower taxes, but excise taxes may have also created unintended effects too. 

Hopefully, I made a fair assessment for Noynoy. I didn't vote for Noynoy,, and he can be a complicated figure. Life isn't black and white, there are gray areas and Noynoy is no different. Just because Noynoy wasn't known to steal public funds, doesn't mean he's perfect. Just because Noynoy also had failures, doesn't mean we should dismiss the good he did either.