Most Filipinos still support the presidency of President Aquino 3rd. Dissenters and critics remain in the minority , though you can’t dismiss the numbers and the enthusiasm .

The support is based on what the public truly rates as very important – the president has yet to be dragged in a corruption case . Considering the two previous administrations , the wheeling and dealing on Day One , the fact that President Aquino has yet to be tainted by a money-making scam is quite a feat, at least from the soft bigotry of our very low expectations .

Our expectation based on contemporary history of leadership is this : a president-crook is the norm rather than the exception.

And there is a monetary value to this perception of integrity . A real estate giant , remember, paid twice the tender of the second lowest bidder at the FTI land auction . The real estate giant knows its numbers , there is still money to be made even after paying more than P22 billion for the FTI land. The decision to quote a high bid to seal the land deal was, however , motivated by the faith in the current leadership. That PNoy wont mess up things and sabotage the current growth momentum. The high tender can be viewed as a solid vote for the Aquino leadership.

If the leadership were to continue on its steady course of not stealing , at least from Big Business’s point of view , the revenue stream of companies that justly paid or overpaid at public auctions will keep piling up. The absence of wariness over what the leader can plot up next for the next big kickback is an incentive to business.

And all the FDI and hot money wont be here were it not for the perception that the administration is bent on doing good , not raising the alarm bells at the anti-corruption monitors.

But because the news that the president has yet to steal is now boring to the editors after more than two years of currency , the question that most Filipinos want answered now is this: what was the president in 2012?

This is an answer grounded in realities – the president was the Decider in Chief in 2012.

Mar Roxas fronted for the president in the execution of some of the major decisions – suspending Gwen Garcia, removing Rico Puno from the DILG, voiding 489 Lazarus bus franchises , firing crooks at the LTFRB and other agencies. All of these , though, can’t be done without the go-signal from the president . We don’t know if the declared war on jueteng would gain steam after the initial fighting words . At the very least, the declaration of intent is there.

Let us all remember that Roxas has been making all these tough decisions with the full backing of the president . He does not act by his willful, determined self.

The president stood by Congress when it passed the RH bill , a law that would be bounced around until it were dead in the two previous administrations . Then promptly signed it into law. The powerful lobbies failed in the effort to subvert the passage of the six tax bill – a piece of legislation that would not pass under a meandering, wobbly president .

Before the big push for the RH bill, there was this belief that the president would turn into a jellyfish once the Roman Catholic Church turned on the full volume of its pressure . This belief was dead wrong . For practically putting the bishops and the powerful lay leaders into their proper places, the president did something different and unprecedented . Under Erap and under Gloria, the RH bill would be scuttled after so much wasted saliva.

On affairs external, the president stood by the DFA and its hard-line position on China’s territorial claims . The criticism that the president and the DFA are merely toeing the line of the US on the issue is dead wrong . The truth is the Philippines and the US are just on the same wave length on this external issue and the period of policy mendicancy on foreign affairs is already history .

Of course, being a Decider in Chief in 2012 also meant standing by programs that should have been reviewed . The conditional cash transfer program’s huge funding has better uses , such as energizing state colleges and universities, particularly the research and development work.

Imagine the number of new products and processes that could emerge out of the public research universities , once granted sizable R and D money . In the wake of a new theory , that economic depressions are more rooted on lack of innovation and breakthrough technologies rather than on the orthodox causes of depressions , governments should at least try to put more money into R and D.

If we want a quick fix on unemployment and underemployment, the CCT money can be spent training our young on BPO-related skills , or skills that are sought after in the overseas labor market. The employment rate of those trained under the language and voice skills program made possible by a P500 million fund released by the president to the TESDA is 84 per cent .

The CCT is not only a questionable approach to the anti-poverty program. It is a vote for dole-outs and perpetual mendicancy .

Warts and all, our Decider in Chief in 2012 was definitely better than the pandering, meandering leaders we re so familair with. Oh, his unscripted take on media and some highly-paid media windbags , was, to many, so timely and so presidential. Another plus : the president has been a straight talker, not a panderer .

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