Hanging in the balance

EVERY crisis necessarily poses a threat (or threats), but it can also offer opportunities. Or so says political analyst and elections expert Ramon Casiple about the political crisis now being faced by the presidency of Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. At any rate, he says, it “underlines the necessity for far-ranging changes in our political and electoral systems.”

In his piece that is part of i Report‘s current series on political predictions for 2010, Casiple says that before the “Garci tapes” scandal broke out last year, moves toward political and electoral reforms were taking place, with occasional major hiccups here and there (such as the botched automated-polls plan that was supposed to be implemented during the 2004 elections). But since mid-2005, he says, the Arroyo administration and its allies have been too focused on political survival while the opposition seems to have channeled much of its energies into questioning the 2004 presidential election results and fighting against charter change.

“Political and electoral reforms,” writes Casiple, “became the immediate casualty.”

He says that the prospects for these reforms beyond the 2007 elections depend on the outcome of the current crisis. “If the crisis is resolved by the elections,” he argues, “the reforms will be back on track.” But if it persists and the political situation worsens after the polls next year, “any reform would probably be set aside as its advocates would be addressing a more urgent need to defend a democracy that could be in near-collapse. This would be the scenario should extra-constitutional challenges are posed by either side in the political crisis.”

Read on at pcij.org.