Philippine Elections

Elections: through the years, the youth has been strategically and sometimes corruptly used for electoral purposes from campaign ads to solicitations to school events and even during graduation ceremonies exploiting our national hero, Jose Rizal’s famous line, “The youth is the hope of our Fatherland.” Same stories, same strategies. But how is this year’s election on the hands of the youth any different? Are we still the un-empowered generation who, in the near future, will take over the nation? Fortunately, the youth was becoming more discerned, more involved, and more vigilant to the things that greatly affect most of the Filipinos prior to this year’s selection of our next leaders. There is progress in the decision-making mechanism of the youth as to what organizations to join, whom to support, and up to what extent do we allow ourselves to be used by aspiring candidates to become public servants.
We are more discerned. Common strategies of politicians before and during campaign periods were repairing faulty roads, giving T-shirts with their faces printed either in front or at the back part, inviting the youth to become a member of an organization and do a series of activities under their name, or sponsor a youth program where his name was acknowledged a hundred times. Whenever I get to ride on a tricycle passing through faulty and bumpy roads which looked like mini pools during rainy days, I have always asked the driver why those roads were not yet repaired for the longest time. I was always given the answer that it’s because it’s not election time yet. This makes me shake my head to the candidates’ desperate moves for public office at the expense of public safety.
I am affiliated with two community youth organizations and often times, we were invited to do volunteer works and sometimes get invited by other organizations under a certain name. In every activity, there were free snacks, free transportations to the venue, and free T-shirts which they expect us