This year you celebrated the famous Dinagyang and Pintados de Pasi Festivals. Tourists flocked from around the world as these showcase the Ilonggos’ cultural offering par excellence.

The Illongo heritage as integral part of Philippine culture has enriched it immensely. We are all proud of this.

An underlying theme in most festivals in the Philippines is the marriage of the tribal traditions, animist and pagan beliefs with that of the Christian faith. Your festival is a microcosm of this – the colourful combination of the Ati-ati, the Santo Nino and your patron saint, San Guillermo.

REMINISCING THE PAST 

Iloilo/Passi has a rich historical background tracing back to the Spanish era. In 1855, due to shipment of sugar products from the neighbouring island of Negros, Iloilo became the second imperative port of call in the colony. It was started by a small group of fisher folk’s villages from the Iloilo River. Queen Regent Maria Cristina in 1896 even praised the city with the title "La Muy Leal Y Noble Ciudad de Iloilo" (in the name of her son King Alfonso III).

Furthermore, the first political structure of Spanish Colonial Power in the Philippine Archipelago was established in the town of Oton, Iloilo (the site of first “Encomienda System”). Molo District and Jaro are the most commonly referred to as the place of “Alcalde Mayor.”

Why do I start off with facts of history that even your grade school students, I presume, know by heart. There is a reason for this.

Our rich Malay heritage influenced by the 300 years of Spanish tutelage also inculcated in us a European culture that was just emerging from the dark ages into the renaissance period and some of the feudal practices that persisted to the present time.

The “encomienda” system employed by the Spanish crown granted a favoured personage large tract of lands which includes the natives therein whom he obligated to protect and educate in the Catholic faith. In return, he extracts tributes in terms of goods and services – basically their labor. The tenants and occupants of the encomienda were expected to be loyal to the “encomienderos”.

Over time, this relationship permeated political relationships and evolved into the present practice of patronage.

Let me refer you to an observation of the eminent former Chief Justice Renato Puno, in one of his speeches: “I like to stress the failure of our electoral system to excise the virus of the politics of patronage that has infected our so called elections…xxx…This vicious politics of patronage has allowed few oligarchs and bosses to rule us from colonial times to post-colonial times and their rule has brought us nothing but a facade of democracy, its mirage but not its miracle.”

Further he said that the dominance of the agenda of the oligarchy, those moneyed few, the political dynasties, clans and cabals who get their candidates elected allow legitimate capture of state institutions by these few. They build on this and perpetuate themselves in power, positions and wealth. Any threat is met by these dynasts using state institutions to protect their prerogatives.

The encomienda system first started here. I grandly propose that the driving forces behind the concepts that have for centuries propelled the system penetrating facets of our body politic be dismantled. We are planting the seeds today of an apparatus that will help us do it.

So let me continue by reminding ourselves that we are barely two months away from the Philippine National Elections. By May of this year, you have the opportunity to begin to change your lives here and perhaps fulfil the promise of your storied past. This is what elections are meant to do: usher in the possibility of changing the dynamics of governance; altering the relationships between us, the electors and those whom we allow to govern us.

This is a basic concept in democracy that is translated into reality every 3 or 4 years – the freedom to choose our leaders who can correctly address the issues and apply appropriate solutions.

At this point, let me introduce to you who we are and why I am here.

Last year, September 12, 2012, the Centrist Democratic Party was founded. This is the main instrument for us to begin our fight against these ills of our society.
We are an Ideology-based political party with a clear belief system anchored on our core value of respect for HUMAN DIGNITY, guided by principles of Christian and Muslim Social teachings, spelled down to concrete and credible political concepts and programs – all encapsulated in our CDP POLITICAL PLATFORM OF GOVERNANCE.

These guiding principles and agenda are:          

• The creation of a truly functioning Democracy and the Rule Law;          

• The establishment of a thriving Social Market Economy;          

• The building of strong and Sustainable Political Parties; and         

• Adoption and the practice of the Principle of Subsidiarity in all structures of governance towards a vision of a Federal Republic of the Philippines.

The main features of this party (differentiating us from the others) aside from our adherence to our Christian or Centrist Democratic Ideology are:          

• Members must undergo a Basic Orientation Seminar (BOS) and pay yearly dues (political education & enhancement are year-round);          

• The structure is built from the ground up – District Councils, to Regional Councils up to the National Congress;          

 â€¢ It practices internal democracy and strict observance of its rules & regulations; and          

• The Party exists and operates not only during elections but between campaign periods holding accountable our elected representatives.

This political party therefore is owned, funded and controlled by its dues-paying members and not by any single patron or groups of individuals out to assume political power. We abhor the POLITICS OF PATRONAGE.
A BLAST FROM THE PAST These Centrist Democratic concepts are not new and have evolved over time shaped by the exigencies of our history and experience. We are the proud beneficiaries and descendants of renowned thinkers, politicians, popes and technocrats – giants among men - who laid the ground-work 6for the eventual emancipation of our people. The root guiding principles of our Christian/Centrist Democracy go all the way back to the Papal encyclicals: Rerum Novarum of Leo XIII (1891); Quadragesimo Anno of Pius XI (1931); the Centesimus Annus of John Paul II (1991); and vignettes of the teachings of Islam. I will not today discuss in depth these source documents, instead, I will move on to a later period in Philippine contemporary politics.

Decades ago several of us were recruited by Raul Manglapus when with Manuel Manahan, the heirs of late President Ramon Magsaysay regrouped and formed the Party for Philippine Progress (PPP). The PPP was meant to be the third Political Force in Philippine politics, an alternative to the Nacionalista and Liberal Parties – faces of the same oligarchic coin. In 1965 Manglapus in a 3-way presidential fight was trounced by Marcos of NP and Macapagal of the LP who came in second. But that was not meant to be the last attempt at creating an alternative political force.
In 1967, Manglapus, Manahan, Johnny Tan of FFW and Jerry Montemayor of FFF organized the Christian Social Movement (CSM).

In Davao City, a colleague of mine Rey Teves and I were the early adherents, while Nene Pimentel (father of the current Senator) wasamong the original members in Cagayan de Oro. In 1972 a coalition of sectoral groups sympathetic to Centrist (Christian) Democracy was formed in the hope of forming a third force political party.
This was not to be. Marcos declared martial law and the Centrist (Christian) Democracy based political party was still-born. Our leadership went into exile, some were imprisoned, others were killed and some of us in Davao were emasculated. I decided to get married.

But the fires of passion for change burned within us. It didn’t take long for its embers to glow. In the late 70s and early 80s, the Centrist Democrats from Cagayan de Oro and Davao City met to form what was then known as the Partido Demokratiko Pilipino (PDP). We began the arduous task of creating a real dues-paying, ideology-based political party whose members must undergo a 2 to 3 day Basic Membership Seminar (BMS).

1983 saw the assassination of Benigno Aquino, Jr. This precipitated a political convulsion that impelled PDP to merge with the fallen hero’s party – Lakas Ng Bayan (LABAN) eventually catapulting Ninoy’s wife, Cory to power in 1986.

The leadership of the PDP–LABAN were conscripted into the government of Cory and some of us landed in cabinet – unprepared.

The rest is history. Who was it that said that the “…a revolution tend to eat its young.” We were eaten alive.

Now comes a full circle. The years 1986 to 2009 will not be a subject of my chronicle today. This will be a substance of a few chapters of a book yet to be written by a CDP author.

I will jump to the year 2009. Rey Teves, my partner in the world of the NGOs and politics and I decided to conceptualize the SUCCESSOR GENERATION. We felt we were advancing in age and we needed to leave a legacy of political technocracy – pass the torch, as it were to a new generation of Centrist Democratic political technocrats and operators who may have to carry on the task of lifting the Pilipino from the socio-political-economic quagmire we, the older generation have helped put them into.

But Rey decided to die in November of that year. Enter into the scene in late August 2009, Peter Koeppinger, the new Konrad Adenauer Stiftung (KAS) country representative. A member of the CDU, the leading Christian Democratic Party in Germany and our sponsor since Manglapus’ time, he understood the necessity of forming a real political party.

Thus, the creation of the Centrist Democratic Movement (CDM) –compose of young professionals who must first understand the uses, misuses, abuses and even non-use of political power.

In 2011, Peter and I brought along leaders of the CDM Federation to Germany to see first-hand how a country devastated by the World War II picked itself up from the ashes and through the Christian Democratic concepts of Social Market Economy elevated their people propelling their economy to no. 4 in the world today.
May 9, 2011, at the Maritim Hotel in Berlin, 13 CDM leaders drew up a document declaring their intentions to transform the CDM into a political party, as some future date.

The document is called the “Berlin Protocol”.

It took 2 years to midwife this political party but the incubation period goes back 4 decades. January of 2012, the Movement decided to convert itself into a political party and seek accreditation from COMELEC as a full-pledged National Political Party – The Centrist Democratic Party. Ang Partido ng Tunay na Demokrasya.

Today the CDP is faced with its first true test, the 2013 local elections.
But this is just one of the many. We need to experiment and try to do things differently. We are a small political party now just barely able to field one candidate here in your locality (mention the name…). We need therefore to us this opportunity not so much as to test our strength, butmore importantly to expand, grow and gain adherents for the next contest in 2016, and beyond. We need to think long term – no instant gratification and quick fixes for us. This puts our collective resolve into proper perspective. I must refer you to an ancient military thinker, Sun Tsu. “Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win.”

Your National Leadership has been sending you well-thought out guidelines for how CDP needs to survive and flourish. Study them carefully and apply them to your situation. Nothing can beat a well prepared and motivated army like who we are.
This will be a defining moment for the CDP. This will be the first encounter of a fledgling party that will strive for the modification of the political environment of the country. Indeed, we will be engaged in an electoral contest where our resolve will be severely tested. This will mark the beginning of strife towards ending the vicious cycle of Philippine traditional politics.

“When it comes to the future, there are three kinds of people: those who let it happen, those who make it happen, and those who wonder what happened.” - John M. Richardson, Jr. (United States Assistant Secretary of State for Educational and Cultural Affairs from 1969 to 1977)

Choose you may, but choose who will be for the greater good. Be the difference. Be the bulwark of your motherland. You, I hope, will be the new set of leaders. I want you to succeed. You fail and I fail, but the greater tragedy is that we will fail the Pilipino. They deserve better. That one, ladies and gentlemen, is a role you must carve for yourself.

LITO MONICO LORENZANA 

Passi City, Iloilo 

February 15, 2013