I used to talk with the late Tomas Garcia when I was still a SunStar Cebu editor. His favorite topic was politics because, as a Garcia, he was drawn into it when he was younger. That was when the father and namesake of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. ruled the land with an iron hand. Sir Tommy was wise enough to quit politics when he was ahead, which was not what politicians would do normally.
He would often joke about how politicians never quit even if they are already wheelchair-bound. I remember the late Raul del Mar also talk about it one time. His reasoning was the same reasoning held on to by politicians everywhere.
The Left would describe our form of governance as bureaucrat capitalism. Politicians would invest in it and eventually profit from it. When somebody gets a position in government after investing in it, profiting from the investment is the next logical move. That is why he or she wouldn’t quit and instead pass the “political business” to his or her descendants. Why waste all your “investment,” after you have won, by relinquishing the position?
I am talking about this because it looks to me like the old politicians will still play a part in the 2025 elections in Cebu City despite their age. For example, Mayor Michael Rama belongs to a generation where the father of acting mayor Raymond Alvin Garcia belongs to.
That was a period when the Tomas Osmeñas of the world and the Bando Osmeña-Pundok Kauswagan or BOPK ruled the Cebu City Hall. Raymond’s father, Alvin, is now obviously enjoying his retirement. I remember him talking about the possibility of him writing a memoir. When somebody does that, he or she has admitted to have finally grown old.
Why wouldn’t Rama and Osmeña retire, too, and leave the City’s governance to the younger ones?
The rule of nature is always about the old battling the new. One can see that everywhere, in sports especially. But voters, blinded by unfettered loyalty and an adherence to a hierarchical, meaning feudal, culture do not see any problem of old politicians holding on to a post reserved to the younger and more energetic politicians.
Old thinkers came up with the concept of elections when they introduced the idea of liberal democracy. Elections are supposed to ensure that politics would be dynamic, with the new politicians with newer ideas and better energy replacing the old ones, ensuring that governance would continue to be dynamic.
But the old always resists the new and always finds ways to hold on to the position. One way is to use nature’s concept of immortality. Men are mortal and die eventually. One can only live forever by having descendants who will continue to live your legacy. That is nature’s way of skirting the rule on mortality.
So too politicians live forever in the person of their descendants. Of course, no matter how much a politician wants his legacy to live forever, he no longer has a hold on that once he dies. Even the kingdoms of old eventually crumble. Meaning that, at the end of the day, there is really no skirting the rule on mortality.