THE COUNTRY WAS filled with greetings and shouts of “Merry Christmas & a Happy New Year” nationwide the last three months of 2025. The people are asking President Bongbong Marcos and VP Sara Duterte today, the first month of 2026, “What’s so happy about 2026, with a chaotic first month of 2026?!”
The P20/kg of rice in the market is still missing except for a few areas in Metro Manila.
The Chinese Coast Guard vessels are still preventing our fisherfolks from freely fishing in our own sovereign territory in the West Philippine Sea.
Charlie “Atong” Ang, the key person accused of dumping the bodies of more than 30 “sabungeros’ in the Taal Lake is nowhere to be found by the PNP in several of his known residences or properties. Seventeen others of his co-accused include police officers.
The recently created Investigation Commission on Infrastructure (ICI) has been left with only the Chair running it, as his two other members resigned within a few weeks. End result: the President’s promise to jail a “big fish” by December did not happen.
“There are eleven more months to go for this year of 2026, will the Filipino people somehow find a caring, compassionate, intelligent and pro-people … governing top leadership within at least the first half of this year, or even by December 2026? Or, hopeless?”
Millions of Filipinos are still jobless and badly in need of livelihoods, to ensure that they are able to own a home for their families, and enjoy a modicum of decency in their lives. Millions of workers, farmers and IPs are still waiting to have fair wages and appropriate assistance from the government to improve their lives to a decent level and enjoy the dignity of being productive and somehow helping the country progress as a nation.
The National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) is heartlessly hot on its red-tagging operations. The AFP recently carried out bombings in Mindoro, killing three Mangyan children and two youth researchers helping the Mangyan community.
Moreover, also during the strafing and bombing by the AFP, youth researcher Chantal Anicoche in Cabacao, Abra de Ilog, Mindoro, was arrested. There are still languishing in jail nationwide more than 770 political prisoners, not given the appropriate judicial attention since their arrest and incarceration.
The resigned Congressman Zaldy Co, found guilty of stealing billions of public funds by the congressional investigation bodies in the Senate and House of Representatives is now a fugitive safe in a foreign country.
The impeachment of the non-performing VP Sara Duterte, as validly initiated by the House of Representatives is still in limbo despite the overwhelming evidence of plunder, malversation of public funds, betrayal of public trust and clear violations of the Constitution and the Rule of Law.
In a nutshell, can the Filipino people still trust President Bongbong Marcos and VP Sara Duterte to be able to make 2026 a “Happy New Year”?
The problems facing the country have been there all along, especially from the time Sara’s father, ICC jailbird Rodrigo, became president in 2016. Sara Duterte is still the Vice-President, aren’t she supposedto help out her erstwhile teammate, President Bongbong, in solving the countless problems causing so much suffering, especially for more than half of the Filipino population, estimated to be more than 117million?
Sadly, the current Bongbong-Sara administration has so far failed miserably to help the country, as the Constitution demands, “to build a just and humane society.”
There are eleven more months to go for this year of 2026, will the Filipino people somehow find a caring, compassionate, intelligent and pro-people (instead of a dumb, corrupt, fascist, anti-people) governing top leadership within at least the first half of this year, or even by December 2026? Or, hopeless?
So, what?