Have you heard of the Joson’s of Nueva Ecija?

How about the Garcia’s and

Osmeña’s of Cebu? And the Duterte’s of Davao City? These families are the most
powerful in their respective cities as the members of their clan hold some or even most
of the top positions in their cities. Since then, even their ancestors already hold power
and pass it by generations. This is what we call, Political Dynasty. What is a political
dynasty? Political dynasty is where some of the family members are in politics and
holding positions in the government. Political dynasties here in the Philippines are very
rampant. As what I have seen, almost all of the cities even in the provinces here in the
Philippines are run by Political families. This situation is alarming because it threatens
the political freedom of the Filipinos. Our country, The Philippines is a democratic
country. Democratic means you are free to choose what you want. Vote who you want
and we can even speak out our opinions. Our ancestors fought a lot for our freedom and
democracy against the colonizers. Right now the biggest threat of our democracy is the
political families as they put members of their family in order to attain power in a certain
place. Indeed, they are the silent killers of our democracy.

One of the things that made political dynasties is that it is very prone to
corruption. According to Representative Edgar Erice, 9 out of 10 poorest provinces in
the Philippines are ruled by Political families. What a coincidence right? With this
numbers, it can clearly say that corruption is rampant on places that were ruled by
Political Families. One of the examples is the Ampatuan family who ruled the ARMM
region for years; after the grueling incident of Maguindanao massacre in 2009 the
authorities found their hidden wealth while investigating in their houses. It was seen they
acquired millions from public funds by buying guns and armors for their private armies,
Properties that worth hundreds of Millions and some unexplainable wealth. Seeing those
made me wonder how they sleep at night knowing they steal money from public’s funds
and they are ruling one of the poor provinces in the Philippines? There are some of the
Ampatuan family members were jailed because of corruption but there are some who
are still free but still managed to run in the politics and yes they still have issues about
corruption. Secondly, Political families are abusive to the power and use violence. There
are big cases here in the Philippines about political violence. One of the examples is the
Maguindanao Massacre and the rampant media killings. As of the 2017 according to
Committee to Project Journalists, Philippines are 5th in the world for the worst in
unsolved media killings. Most of the reasons why media men were killed due to they
already expose or going to expose the anomalies of the politicians and their families. It
was a sad moment as media men who were innocent and just going to expose those
cruel politicians are going to be killed because they were about to say the truth to the
public. This political violence to media men bares us Filipinos to know the truth just
because this cruel people don’t want to be out of the power. Political Dynasty is
everywhere in the Philippines. There is a study by Professor Rolando Simbulan from
University of the Philippines stated that 73 out of 81 of the Philippines are controlled by
Political families. And another study by Dean Roland Mendoza et al. from Ateneo de
Manila University School of Government as cited by Cielito Habito, that Philippines is
unusually more prone to political dynasties compare to other countries. As of 2013 also
according to Dean Mendoza, 75 percent of lawmakers belong in Political dynastic
families. This 75 percent is very big; imagine almost half of our politicians are from
political families? This situation is very alarming as I said earlier. This should be given a
look by the senate and even the lower house for our political freedom may be justified
and democracy here in the Philippines will be fully restored.

The Philippines is a democratic country in the paper but not in the reality. These
Political families who came from dynasties are the ones who bare us from getting the
political freedom we want. With these dynasties around the Philippines we can’t have a
proper growth as Filipinos always choose the generics and afraid to choose people who
had a better platform than those generic politicians from dynasties whose platforms are
always the same during campaign but never does the work when they win. Filipinos
should be open minded on the people whom they vote. In order grow, we should learn
on how to see and try other things. Don’t fooled once again. Filipinos should be practice
proper voting rights. If those dynasties trying to threaten us we should be firm on our
stand and not let them go on our way. It saddens me as Filipino seeing millions suffer
due to these selfish families. Hopefully that the Senate and the House of
Representatives will pass the House Bill no. 3587 or the Anti Political Dynasty. This will
strengthen the political freedom of the Filipinos. Let’s Take a hand and take a stand we
should be united as one to help ourselves for the future we want to our dear motherland,
The Philippines.