I am still pondering on the dismal performance of Ang Kapatiran Party. These are my observations.
Ang Kapatiran party is virtually unknown as a political party until J. C. de los Reyes ran for President. J. C. de los Reyes may be one of the most qualified to become the president of the Philippines, but the jump from City Councilor to President is a huge leap. It is too soon. To many, de los Reyes is just a boy who wants to knock down a giant with a single stone. But I think it was a big gamble on the part of Ang Kapatiran party: they may lose this elections, but they have successfully rallied many bishops to their side. Their next task is to rally the people to their side. J. C. de los Reyes has made an impression. If 1000 of the 30,000 people who voted for him decide to run for government positions under AKP, then AKP would be a stronger force in the next elections. The important thing is for AKP to retain its core ideology: a government founded on the principles of Catholic Social Doctrine. This is product positioning. No other political party has these clear core values. AKP must never abandon this core ideology by merging with other political parties, as what happened to Sen. Raul Manglapus’s National Union of Christian Democrats (NUCD) when it merged with Pres. Fidel Ramos’s Lakas ng Tao: the Catholic Social Vision was diluted.
The AKP must prepare for the next national elections starting today. In management parlance, AKP must formulate the following BHAG (Big, Hairy, and Audacious Goal): One AKP senator after 6 years. To reach the magic 12, an AKP senatorial candidate must be able to get 10 million votes. If there are 30,000 who voted for either de los Reyes or Chipeco, then each of those voters must convince 333 other persons to vote for AKP, which is the number of the Most Holy Trinity. To simplify the problem, if a family of three voters (father, mother, eldest child) votes for AKP, then each one only needs to convince 111 persons, which is the size of two fully packed classroom of 50 to 60 students. The AKP must ally itself with Catholic lay organizations like the Couples for Christ, Ligaya ng Panginoon, and Knights of Columbus, for example. The AKP must form a Catholic grassroots network. If this network is formed, AKP would be in a stronger position to have more AKP senators: the people who voted for one AKP senator would likely vote for another one because all AKP members share the same core ideology. The AKP members must never campaign individually: they must campaign that people would vote straight AKP.
In this 6 years of waiting, AKP must not only strengthen and expand its Catholic grassroots network, it must also redefine itself as the Catholic political think-tank. Even if no AKP member is in the Senate or in the Congress, the AKP can still help write laws that further the Catholic Social Vision. The AKP then presents its draft laws to one of the congressmen or senators or even the President himself. Even if AKP’s name is not in the authors of the bill, the AKP can still campaign for the adoption of the Bill in TV or radio. In this way the people will know AKP’s position and they will know that AKP helped draft the bill. At present the Catholic Church is still a reactionary force, in the language of the Political Left. The Church waited for the Reproductive Health Bill to be drafted before it reacts against it. This is because the Church has no politician to craft laws are grounded on the Catholic Social Vision. AKP can fill this need. AKP must recover the word “militant” from the “Church Militant”, which was appropriated by the Political Left. This elections 2010 politicians have courted the Quiboloy vote and the INC vote. They haven’t courted the Catholic vote because this voting bloc does not exist. The aim of AKP should be to awaken the Catholic vote.
Let us all try to help AKP in whatever way we can. There is a battle being fought before our very eyes between the forces of Life and of Death. We are not only fighting against politicians who are for reproductive health bill and gay marriage: we are fighting the United Nations offices and International Business Groups who support such ideologies. The Philippines is just a battleground in this global cultural war. Let us never back down in this battle. Let us keep the Faith.
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