Winston Churchill Won’t Be Happy But…

By Joey Salgado

The President’s State of the Nation Address (SONA) last July 22 opened strong and meandered in the middle. But boy, what a closer.

It was delivered with the proper pause between words to make it more compelling, with each word enunciated clearly, rhythm and body gestures to emphasize firmness and resolve. The voice control, gestures, and enunciation eerily resembled his late father’s. Boomers were having flashbacks.

And it was strong enough to make even his critics stand up and applaud.

He gave them what they wanted to hear - a ban, effective immediately, on the recently controversial POGOs (Philippine Offshore Gaming Operators). 

As expected, television primetime news led with the POGO ban. The dailies bannered the presidential directive the following day. The ban trended on social media.

It didn’t matter if offshore gaming is remotely related to inflation, the public’s most urgent concern. You try to get the applause and the money shot whenever you can.

Unbothered?

If the President was bothered by the recent Pulse Asia survey where his trust rating slid further, it didn’t show.

Released five days before the SONA, Pulse Asia’s second quarter survey showed that trust in the President  dropped to 52 per cent from 57 per cent in March (It has been dropping since the third quarter of last year, but I haven’t heard anyone describe it as a “free fall”). As with all previous surveys, inflation worries is causing the drop in public trust.

The President and his speechwriters did give the public what they wanted to hear. He tackled inflation at the start of the speech. Better to get the inconvenient part out of the way, and score points with the opening statement: 

“The hard lesson of this last year has made it very clear that whatever current data proudly bannering our country as among the best performing in Asia means nothing to a Filipino who is confronted by the price of rice at 25 to 65 pesos per kilo.”

Great! So far, so good.

“Totoo, pwersa ng merkado - sa ating bansa at maging sa buong daigdig - ang syang nagdidikta ng presyo. Bunsod ito, halimbawa, ng gyera, problema sa supply, at pwersa ng kalikasan, tulad ng El Niño na nararanasan din sa ibang bansa. Subalit hindi na ito mahalagang alalahanin ng ating mga kababayang nabibigatan sa presyo ng bigas.”

Translation: I can’t control prices. Blame conflict, supply woes, nature, climate change. Why blame me? 

What followed the strong opener was a narration, over 30 paragraphs by my count, of government efforts to boost agricultural productivity, included perhaps in the hope of boring the public out of their worry over prices. 

It’s all about headlines. A headline that says, “We are doing our best,” or “High prices beyond our control” won’t be flattering. That’s why inflation was pushed right at the beginning. No one will remember the opener, especially with a speech lasting more than an hour. Everyone will remember a strong closer.

To control the narrative, and get the money shot, the speech needed to end strong. Hands down, the POGO ban was the obvious choice.

Not perfect but…

Don’t get me wrong. It’s far from a perfect speech. It falls short of the Contrast-Rhyme- Echo-Alliteration-Metaphor formula, attributed to to Winston Churchill, or his admonition that a speech should be poetry,  written as “rhymeless, meterless verse.”

Of all presidential speeches, the SONA is the trickiest to pull off. Inaugurals are written for history, all soaring rhetoric before an adoring public. The SONA is of the moment, as boring as an annual report, delivered before the political and business elite but transmitted by mass media to a doubtful, if not hostile public. 

Given the political backdrop, the speech is more than adequate. It served its purpose: to draw a contrast between the President and his predecessor.

The tracking shot of the President walking alone from the holding room to the plenary hall sought to project youthful vitality, the fitness to carry the burden of office that is his alone to bear (He is not the first to use this visual device. Russian President Vladimir Putin used a long tracking shot on one of his many inaugurals). The image of a youthful looking, smiling President stands in contrast with former president Duterte, the de facto opposition leader, who appears in a viral video unable to walk without help.

There is also the contrast with the previous administration’s controversial legacies: the drug war, Chinese intrusion in the West Philippine Sea and POGOs. By invoking these three Duterte legacies at the end of his speech, the President framed the choice in the midterm elections: Do you want to go back to the way it was, or do you want to complete the journey with me?

Will he succeed? We will have to wait until May 2025.

This article also appears in Rappler