ELECTION campaign tarps and posters take up so much space these days that it’s impossible to drive a kilometer without seeing one. Last Thursday morning, though, I saw two campaign tarps in the most unlikely place: in the middle of the sea, stretched across two poles of a fish trap.
Nearly 9,000 persons live on the three larger islands off Bantayan town in northern Cebu, and I can understand that candidates would want to remind them somehow of the choices that await them on May 13. But the sight of those campaign tarps in the middle of the sea at first amused and then bothered me. It was one of those perfect tropical mornings when the sea and sky show off various shades of blue, and I was watching some seabirds when the grinning faces of those two candidates caught my eye.
Now, I don’t know if campaign workers or some industrious volunteers came up with the idea of interrupting the view this way, but I hope they’ve also made plans for removing and recycling those tarps when the election season ends. We’ve already received so much criticism for being one of only five countries that, according to the United Nations Environment Program, generate half of all the plastic wastes that end up in oceans.
In the face of marine pollution, the lack of fresh water and other environmental issues that surround fragile island ecosystems, hanging campaign tarps in the middle of the sea seems out of touch. Or perhaps these issues don’t matter as much as they should in this campaign’s conversation. It reminded me of an old-fashioned idiom that people used to say about someone who was confused or at a loss about something: that person was said to be “at sea.”
What happens to campaign tarps after the votes are counted and the winners take office? A few years ago, I visited a community in Mandaue City that was then fighting a dengue fever outbreak. That week, two families who lived just a few shanties apart had placed, under borrowed tents in their small front yards, the caskets of children who had died of dengue fever. I remember seeing how they had used discarded campaign tarps to cover the outside walls of their homes. At least these were recycled, like some of the ideas we hear about during an election campaign. Unless these are responsibly removed, the campaign tarps off Bantayan’s coast could, after weeks of exposure to the elements, break down into tiny polyethylene bits that find their way into the food chain, from the bellies of unsuspecting fish to the mouths of some fisherman’s children.
A disconnect between what people want—like fish that’s safe to eat, for instance—and what politicians say or do isn’t novel. It’s crucial to remind political leaders and policymakers “to be responsive to local environmental issues and connect these to the bigger issues their constituents face,” Morgan Pinnell of the US-based Environmental Defense Fund said in March 2018. (She was a guest during an episode of The Election University podcast, which you can search for on Spotify.)
We’re in the homestretch now, just eight days away from the elections. But there’s still time to go over your choices and weigh what these candidates have promised to do in terms of environmental policy and its twin concern, public health. What have they pledged to do in our cities, towns and provinces to ensure, among others, smarter land use planning; more sustainable fisheries; food and water security; pollution abatement; support for low-carbon technologies; and climate change adaptation? Hold them accountable to these pledges if they win, or prepare to help raise their awareness if they’ve been silent on these life-changing issues. Some may be at sea, for now, but there’s always something we can do to help.