The Friday of 2011 before National Heroes’ Day, I had a chance to witness Yahoo! Pitong Pinoy awards, an event that once again showed we don’t literally need another Cry of Pugad Lawin, death of Jose Rizal, or death of Ninoy Aquino to produce heroes.

More photos on my Flickr gallery.

The Philippines declared its first independence on this day 113 years ago. Here are some good reads:

• Freedom and honor
• Unfulfilled dream

Answers to all these questions should be given not only for the purpose of appeasing the Hong Kong public, but for the integrity of the new Philippine government and for its own people. After all, it is the people of the Philippines who must rely on its government and police for effective law enforcement on a daily basis. Tourism figures, diplomatic relations and stock market fluctuations pale in significance compared to the most basic responsibility of any government: protecting its citizens and its guests.

The opinion came out 2 days after a tragic ending to the hostage crisis in Manila. Discharged police officer Rolando Mendoza, 55, seized a bus carrying mostly tourists from Hong Kong. At least 8 people were killed after the 12-hour drama.

A manual tally sheet of the 2004 Philippine general election. (This is from my old Flickr account.)

The election that I joined on May 10, 2004 as an election inspector was ancient. I remember posting one big manila paper on my assigned precinct’s front board to prepare for counting immediately after the voting period. Ballot per ballot, a public school teacher would announce the names of each candidate written by the voter for various positions. Everything was manual. The election tally sheets (returns) and the manila paper were to be filled-up with someone’s penmanship. On the candidate’s particular row, each vote would correspond one vertical manual stroke then a diagonal stroke would mark each fifth vote. Our precinct finished counting past 3am, 9 hours after polls closed. We personally delivered our tallies to municipal canvassers. Police as our escorts, we were transported to the municipal government grounds a few kilometres away from our precinct. With us were election materials contained in a padlocked yellow box.

Another body also received our election returns. Perceived to be independent of any of the political parties and the government, they would total votes besides the Commission on Elections (Comelec). It was dubbed a “fast count” but their counting would take a week or so before anyone can figure who were likely to win the national election. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, an incumbent, won that presidency but it was not clear as her win was marred by massive cheating allegations.

Fast forward to the first computerised election in the Philippines, May 10, 2010. I was a plain voter. I went to my designated room. I went inside, presented identification, received and shaded the ballot and fed it to the tray of Precinct Count Optical Scan (PCOS) machine. I spent twenty minutes to vote, ten of them was my walk from and back to home.

My experience was contrast to what’s reported on TV though. Long lines in polling centres hogged the news coverage, which was primarily blamed on the clustering of several precincts to just one room. Add the unfamiliarity to the new voting process. The Comelec was prompted to extend voting period by 1 hour. Add the hot May weather. Add the humid May weather. The public was unprepared.

What’s history came past 7pm. Data started to trickle to Comelec servers followed by surprising increments of precinct counts. By 10pm, they already unofficially tallied 25% of precincts nationwide. Past midnight, before the Comelec called its last press conference that day, tally report accounted 50% of the precincts. Liberal Party’s candidate Noynoy Aquino was leading. Morning after the election day, we all knew Aquino will be the country’s next president.

The quality of the politicians elected on various positions is another story but if success is measured against the perceived integrity of the counting that preceded this election, the best election in the Philippines had just been told.

One candidate speaking in front of the audience at a highschool auditorium in Ayala, Alabang.

I had rarely stepped into an education institution since I graduated from college four years ago. But yesterday I went to De La Salle Zobel, home of the junior archers, when it hosted “Kilalanin”, a presidential forum. Four candidates vying for the top Philippine post in the 2010 elections were present: Noynoy Aquino, Richard Gordon, Gilbert Teodoro and Manny Villar. News anchor Mike Enriquez moderated the 3-hour event.

Full audio of the forum was posted by its media partner here and below are four media reports about it.

• 4 presidentiables face off at Alabang forum (video)
• Frontrunners Aquino and Villar trade barbs on ads, records
• Presidential campaign gets more pointed
• LP: Survey timed with Villar ads

What’s interesting about recent forums like this is that candidates now use relatively less motherhood statements. There are less of these broad yet good sounding phrases like the ones used by Estrada during the 1998 campaign. Again, they’re still there but spoken less and I’m assuming exaggerated misuse of this deceptive element of political prose would be left on staged rallies.

The stage of Kilalanin has none of the flashy effects and sometimes phony grandiose employed by TV forums. There were some technical troubles but the moderator’s purposive candidness made up for lapses in organisation. There were no timers which made the responses from the candidates casual. Except to one boorish shout that was heard throughout the auditorium in the middle of the event, the audience was participative and civil.

While the presence of fundamental character questions means that our country is still a long way from focusing on platformed governance and we’re still searching a leader of character, with a forum like this, we had a step (however small) forward.

Now, when Escudero realises he can’t really win without traditional resources, he can surprise further and play the Noynoy-endorsement card, while not running for 2010 elections. I’m not sure though if the positive effect of playing with the ‘sacrifice’ word will last until 2016 elections. This is after all I can’t imagine him being adopted by anyone at the vice-presidential slot.

Seen here are yellow flags with the face of Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino, Cory’s husband, along Manila streets. Senator Ninoy was a staunch critic of President Marcos.

Mrs. Aquino died of cardio-respiratory arrest after 2 years of battle against colon cancer, just 20 days before the 26th anniversary of Ninoy’s assasination.

The death of Corazon Aquino on August 1 made us realise that she was the best president the Philippines ever had.

The stories that were told since Saturday last week reminded me that I must have not listened to my history teachers or, more so, I must have taken the former president’s legacy for granted. She was the mother who helped us claim that this country is a nation of free people. In her 6 years as president, she started the monumental ‘chore’ of bringing back, if not to create, democratic institutions that were destroyed for 20 years under Ferdinand Marcos.

I’m not sure if we Filipinos are as free as today if the then widowed housewife did not transform herself as leader, a credible and inspirational leader along with Cardinal Jaime Sin.

Her funeral on Wednesday displayed the mourning and soon longing of a nation for a president that lives in love, honesty and faith.

He is a Filipino intellectual yet he never had arrogance to push ideas to his readers; However good or bad the result was, he celebrated the instances when the Philippines decide as a group of people, as nation. This is the source of respect to him as a media personality and more so as an academic.

He can cite Marx, Nietzsche, Kant and other great thinkers with full credibility. He can discuss when their thoughts are reflective of current events, without the vagueness and quixotic sense, like traps, young activists can fall into when it’s them who discuss.

As a sociologist, he knows the strength and weakness of Filipinos as a nation and as political system. As a columnist, and at times as TV host, he relays it and makes sense of cause-and-effect in a manner that his readers and viewers can understand. Being a professor, he describes the Philippines more often as if he’s outside the picture, but no doubt he can describe it in an insider’s perspective. Amidst the presently sad political state, he is a proud Filipino. He sees the high hopes of Filipinos and writes the packets of potentials to realise those hopes.

And he also knows he is part of the society he studies. He joined calls that ousted President Marcos. He again joined in a major rally 20 years after where he was arrested on a crackdown later that day when Proclamation 1017 was issued.

Now there’s the news about him running in the second district of Pampanga as a congressman. He has not declared his candidacy but he essentially told that he may seriously think about it on two premises: President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, which he strongly criticises in his columns, will run as a Congressman and no legitimate opponent will fight against her.

The recent resolution for a constituent assembly by House of Congress, dominated by Arroyo-allied lawmakers, hope to change the Philippine political system from a presidential to parliamentary. It is rumoured that after her term expires in 2010, Arroyo hopes to become a congressman and eventually the prime minister.

My first thought upon hearing this news is that David could be running not for the best reason. This will be against of what seemed to me he believes. I recall he wrote about Mohandas Gandhi of India and mentioned about “self-rule”.

“Although he was an organizer and leader of the Indian National Congress, Gandhi shunned government, believing that the only real basis for social order was self-rule, i.e., every person learning to govern himself,” he wrote.

Yet David may be running with the best, however trivial, reason. He wants to stop the politics that Arroyo represents.

But after my surprise settled and read what he really meant, I found out that he is not really talking about politics as usual. He’s calling to individual Filipinos saying don’t take anything that’s against your values sitting down.

In a TV interview with ABS-CBN News, he says, “Huwag na nating dugtungan ang buhay ng ganyang klase ng pulitika. (Let us not continue that type of politics.)”

“Kung kinakailangan na ang isang karaniwang mamayang  katulad ko ay tumayo upang ialok ang sarili para hamunin ang ganyang balak, hindi ko tatalikuran yan (If a regular citizen like me needs to offer himself and challenge that plan [for Arroyo to run as congressman], I will not turn around from it),” he later added.

He is part of the only few that can say it and then the listener will seriously reflect. Certainly the professor is a child of science and not of day-to-day politics.

That is Randy David, the teacher and leader.

Motown Records founder Berry Gordy following the artist’s death was quoted saying, “Michael Jackson doesn’t just come along once in a century or a lifetime – he only comes along once.”

Jackson died on Thursday in L.A. after suffering a cardiac arrest.