‘Now Jesus himself had pointed out that a prophet has no honour in his own country.”
John 4:44
CHICAGO (JGL) – Many people think, the twin surreal triumphs of foul-mouthed President Rody Duterte in the Philippines and anti-establishment President-elect Donald Trump in the United States elections are the most lasting legacies left to us by the year 2016. No. They were not.
It was the losing candidates, who left such legacies.
The losing presidential candidates in both the Philippines and U.S. elections nearly defied the odds that even Jesus Christ faced during His living period on this earth, when He said, “Only in his home town and in his own house is a prophet without honour.” (Matt. 13:54-57).
Even Filipinos have a salawikain (traditional expression) for this oddity: Ang Pilipino ay matapang sa kapwa Pilipino pero maamo sa dayo. (Filipinos are mean to each other but not to a stranger.)
Because the Philippine Constitution was patterned after the U.S. Constitution, any candidate running for president in either country are barred from running for president if they are not “natural-born” citizens of their homelands.
As a result, before the 2008 U.S. elections and before the 2016 Philippine elections, no winnable candidates had staked their “natural-born” credentials on the line until then Sen. Barack Obama and Sen. Grace Poe ran for office in the U.S. and in the Philippines, respectively.
The objection to Mr. Obama’s presidential candidacy was anchored on wild allegations that he was born outside the U.S. – in Kenya. But it turned out Mr. Obama was actually born in Hawaii to an American-born mother and a Kenyan father.
The uncertainties, however, lingered because although, Mr. Obama has already been serving as president and son of an American parent, his critics could always mount a court challenge.
But now that Mr. Obama is winding down his eight years of administration, any challenge would be moot. The challenge became even academic when Mr. Donald Trump declared near the end of the campaign period in September that he was wrong when he claimed that “Obama was not born in Hawaii.”
Raising the questions of presidential candidates’ qualification on “natural-born” is not new, of course. When Sen. John McCain ran for president in 2008 against Mr. Obama, the initial objection to McCain’s qualification was that he was born out of the U.S. – in Panama Canal Zone.
But it was McCain’s Democratic opponents – Obama and then-Sen. Hillary Clinton, who co-sponsored a Senate resolution, declaring McCain’s eligibility to run for president. The Senate resolution said, “John Sidney McCain, III, is a ‘natural born Citizen’ under Article II, Section 1, of the Constitution of the United States.” The resolution was adopted unanimously. McCain was born of two American parents, who were both U.S. citizens.
McCAIN’S CASE WAS NOT ALONE
Before McCain, citizenship questions were also raised against other candidates. Barry Goldwater, the 1964 GOP presidential nominee, was born in Arizona before it gained statehood. George Romney, the father of Mitt Romney who ran for president as a Republican in 1968, was born in Mexico of both U.S. citizen parents. They went ahead with their presidential runs for president, unchallenged.
In the Philippines, the candidacy of Sen. Grace Poe was questioned because she ran for president of unknown parents and was a former U.S. Citizen.
By overcoming both grounds — nationality and foreign citizenship — of disqualification, Ms. Poe gave hopes to overseas Filipinos, who adopted foreign citizenships, that they too can run for president, by simply renouncing their foreign citizenships, reacquiring their Filipino citizenships and returning to the Philippines and staying there for at least ten years immediately before the next presidential elections.
But her overconfidence and inexperience got the best of Ms. Poe when she refused to humble herself to slide down as vice presidential candidate to losing bet Mar Roxas although the vice presidency was hers for the taking. Ang naghahangad ng kagitna, san salop ang nawawala. This Filipino expression might have escaped Ms. Poe as its import is similar to an English expression, “a bird in hand is worth two in the bush.”
When Texas Sen. Ted Cruz ran for president this year in the U.S., he was unchallenged despite the fact that he was born outside the United States as he renounced his Canadian citizenship. Cruz, who was born in Calgary, Canada, grew up in Texas and graduated from high school there, later attending Princeton University and Harvard Law School.
Cruz’s mother was born in Delaware while his father was born in Cuba. Cruz’ case was similar to Obama, whose mother was born in Kansas and his father was a Kenyan.
Cruz’s run for U.S. presidency should buoy hopes of other foreign-born Americans with U.S. parentage. This includes Philippine-born three-time California Assemblymember Rob Bonta (18th-District), whose father, Warren Bonta, is an American (born in Oxnard, California) and his mother, Cynthia Arnaldo, a native of Dumaguete City in the Philippines. The 44-year-old Mr. Bonta, a native of Quezon City, is a lawyer and graduate of Yale University law school.
On the other hand, those Filipinos, who adopted U.S. or other foreign citizenships, in search of greener pasture, can always return to the Philippines, by renouncing their foreign citizenship first, reviving their Filipino citizenship, by being at least 40 years old and staying in the Philippines for ten years immediately preceding a presidential election and run for president!
The razor-thin (263,473) margin of votes collected by Rep. Leni Robredo over Sen. Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos to win the vice presidential race during the last Philippine presidential election is an indication that if majority of overseas Filipinos of 1.38-M will register and vote in the 2022 elections, it will not be a surprise if the overseas Filipinos will dictate the winner in a close presidential or vice presidential race, especially if the candidate is one of their own.
If they win, I’m sure, they are Jesus’s Chosen people.
Happy New Year! (Contact columnist: jglariosa@hotmail.com)