Three headlines. Three different worlds. One unsettling thread.
“With Singson Out, Erice Says ICI ‘Is Now Dead’” — Manila Bulletin
“Bridge In Kalinga Collapses After Days of Rain” — GMA News
“VP Sara Duterte Top Contender for President In 2028: WR Numero Survey” — One News
What ties these stories together?
One word: foundation—or the lack of it.
Whether in institutions, infrastructure, or public trust, everything eventually rises or falls on what lies beneath. And in the Philippines today, what’s beneath is starting to show.
Let’s walk through these three cases—not as isolated news bits, but as symptoms of one national condition.
Weak Institutional Foundations: The ICI That Couldn’t Bite
Former ICI Commissioner Rogelio Singson’s resignation said it plainly:
“ICI, as it is today, does not have enough powers to execute as quickly as we can what we need to do.”
That single line is a full autopsy report. A watchdog with no teeth cannot protect anything.
It took 48 days before the broader public finally grasped what I wrote earlier in A Tale of Two Investigations: Why ICI Must Go & Ombudsman Must Lead. I argued then:
“If ICI can’t inspire fear—or even respect—then it’s not a watchdog. It’s a lapdog.”
And true enough, the headline that followed stripped the pretense bare:
“Paolo Duterte Won’t Appear Before ICI: No Jurisdiction Over Me.” — Inquirer
How can truth prevail if power can simply say, “You can’t touch me”?
In that same piece, I wrote:
“Let’s stop pretending it’s working. Let’s stop pouring hope into a vessel that leaks… The public isn’t just angry. We’re exhausted. We want thunder. We want truth. We want justice that doesn’t flinch.”
When the foundation of accountability is weak, corruption doesn’t tremble—it thrives.
Weak Structural Foundations: Bridges That Fall Like Metaphors
Foundation failure is not just a governance metaphor; it’s literally breaking our bridges.
The Makilo Bailey Bridge in Kalinga collapsed after days of rain—cutting off a lifeline between Kalinga and Bontoc. The usual suspect? Hydraulic scour: erosion around the bridge’s base. In short: the foundation was eaten away.
It hits close to home for me. As a civil engineering student, I nearly failed my Foundations class—something I still joke about with my wife, my college sweetheart then. She always rolls her eyes and says, “Oy, don’t blame me.”
But the recent collapses are no joke:
- The P1.225B Cabagan-Sta. Maria Bridge in Isabela lasted only 26 days.
- The Pittagan Bridge in Cagayan also gave way.
- Records show six more bridges collapsed between 2022 and 2024.
DPWH Secretary Vince Dizon has since ordered stricter monitoring—but monitoring cannot fix what corruption has already hollowed out.
As I wrote in Elephant In The Room: Corruption And Isabela Bridge Collapse, Baguio City Mayor Magalong revealed the brutal math:
When as much as 70% of government project funds are siphoned away before a single work is laid, only a meager 30% remains for the actual bridge. And with such a frail portion left to bear the weight, what kind of foundation and structure could ever hope to stand? The consequences are predictable:
1. Substandard construction
2. Inflated costs
3. Delays and dangerous shortcuts
And so, bridges fall—not only from rain, but from rot.
Weak Democratic Foundations: Surveys Built On Sand
Then come the political headlines that shot across social media:
“VP Sara Duterte Top Contender For President In 2028 — WR Numero”
“Marcos Satisfaction Rating Falls To Its Lowest Since Taking Office — WR Numero”
Published on the same day. By the same outfit. A perfect pair—too perfect, some say. But the deeper question: Do surveys themselves have solid foundations?
In my piece Kalye Surveys: Here They Come, I pointed out a hard truth:
“The dirty little secret of surveys is that many are junk science—designed more to sell a story than tell the truth. Statistical methods are often misused giving flawed results an air of scientific legitimacy.” (From Surveys and the Dirty Little Secret: Hidden Distortion, Bias, Illusion of Scientific Validity)
With polling’s global black eye—including the misses of the 2016 and 2020 U.S. elections—some critics now say bluntly:
• modern polling is broken, and
• pollsters and surveys sellers should simply be ignored.
In the U.S., RealClearPolitics cushions the damage by averaging the top ten surveys from a crowded field of pollsters.
Here in the Philippines, we throw all our eggs into the tiny basket of a handful of kalye survey outfits. No wonder filmmaker Darryl Yap could only shrug and say, “We are just stupid… I don’t care, I don’t get offended when people say, ‘O, nabudol ka.’”
Rigoberto Tiglao minced no words in his column:
“Our pollsters have become cheap, shameful propagandists… They ask questions people don’t fully understand, crafted in ways that lead to the answers they want.”
A democracy built on manipulated perception is like a house built on sand. It may look sturdy—until the storm comes.
The Storm Test That Never Lies
Early one morning, as I sat in quiet reflection on Matthew 7:24-26, a vivid image appeared on my laptop: two houses weathering a storm, each standing upon a different foundation.
One built on rock. One built on sand. Only one survived.
It reminded me that nations are no different
A house is only as strong as what lies beneath.
So is a bridge.
So is a survey.
So is a government.
So is a democracy.
So is the Philippines
And unless we fix our foundations—our institutions, our accountability systems, our public works, our truth-telling mechanisms—storms will keep coming, and collapses will keep repeating.
At the end of the day:
A nation, like a home, is only as strong—or as weak—as its foundation.
Content and editing put together in collaboration with ChatGPT
Head photo courtesy of Adobe Stock & Canva
Still photos courtesy of Bing image creator, Philstar, & Adobe Stock
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