Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos blasted “useless and crumbling” flood control projects in a state of the nation address Monday that focused on domestic issues after a months-long feud with his vice president.
Addressing a joint session of Congress after days of rain that left at least 31 dead, Marcos repeated his recent warning that the nation faced a climate change-driven “new normal”, while pledging to investigate publicly funded projects that had failed.
“Let’s not pretend, the people know that these projects can breed corruption. Kickbacks… for the boys,” he said, citing houses that were “swept away” by the floods.
“Someone has to pay for the grave damage and corruption,” he said, adding he would demand a full list of failed flood control projects and make it public.
After months dominated by a feud with his vice president that left many voters disillusioned, Marcos’s speech leaned heavily into bread-and-butter concerns.
“The people feel a sense of defeat and dismay at the government, especially when it concerns basic services,” he said, referencing disappointing mid-term election results in May.
“The lesson for us is very simple. We need to do better. We need to work faster.”
Marcos spent much of his 70-minute speech unveiling promises for the second half of his six-year term — from 40,000 more classrooms to new power plants and free dialysis treatments — though he offered little by way of detail.
Notably absent was any explicit mention of the rising tensions with China over disputed areas of the South China Sea that figured heavily into last year’s address.
After 12 months marked by violent clashes at sea and an increasingly close military relationship with the United States, Marcos said only that the country faced “new threats” to its sovereignty while adding “more allies who can help us in our time of need”.
– No shows –
Numerous high-profile allies of Vice President Sara Duterte, whose would-be impeachment trial was scrapped by the Supreme Court on Friday, skipped Monday’s address, including the president’s senator sister Imee Marcos.
The feud between the Marcos and Duterte political dynasties loomed large over the May mid-terms that saw the vice president’s camp outperform expectations.
The duo swept to power in 2022 in an alliance that began crumbling almost immediately.
Their feud exploded into open warfare this year with her impeachment and the subsequent arrest and transfer of her father, ex-president Rodrigo Duterte, to face charges at the International Criminal Court in The Hague over his deadly drug war.
The timelines of those two events coincided with a sharp dip in the president’s polling numbers.
Marcos had publicly stated that he was against the impeachment while consistently maintaining he was powerless to intervene.
– ‘New normal’ –
Last week, the Philippine president for the first time blamed climate change for storms which are hitting the country harder and more frequently, saying Filipinos would need to learn how to adapt.
“This is not an extraordinary situation anymore… This will be our lives no matter what we do,” he told a cabinet briefing, adding the country should plan for the long-term in addressing natural disasters.
“This is the way it’s going to be as far as we know for… many decades to come, so let’s just prepare,” he said.
Michael Henry Yusingco, a senior research fellow at the Ateneo de Manila University School of Government, on Monday praised Marcos’s pledge to tackle corruption around flood control projects but warned that follow-through would be everything.
“(To) have a really significant effect on his legacy,” Marcos will need to put people in charge that will “not be afraid to go after these politicians”, he said.
