Padilla vs Pacquiao: A study in contrasts
Watching the World Cup this year was a particularly dizzying experience. From the horrendous treatment of the Iranian football team and countless other participants from the Global South to the plethora of questionable referee calls and scandalous decision reversals, many struggled to reconcile the platonic image of the “beautiful game” with the revolting reality on and off the pitch.
Being a Filipino added a new dimension of surreal: many of us cheered, at least in the final game, for the victory of a former colonizer on the soil of yet another former colonizer. I have loved many Argentinians across the years—some as friends and colleagues, while others as great sources of intellectual and spiritual inspiration—but a confluence of factors made the latest version of “La Albiceleste” a tad harder to cheer for. Besides, Lionel Messi, whom we all in the Global South cheered for in the previous World Cup, had already solidified his position as the greatest player of the early-21st century—right next to Cristiano Ronaldo—well before the final showdown with La Furia Roja.
As intellectual descendants of Rizal, we grew up with mixed feelings toward “Madre España.” But today’s Spain is so radically different from what we read about in our history books. Just look at their national team: cosmopolitan, wholesome, disciplined, humble, and welcoming. They have a king who is tender and caring—and who has, crucially, acknowledged “much abuse” against indigenous peoples in former Spanish colonies. The country’s foreign minister has gone even a step further by recognizing the “pain and injustice” inflicted on conquered lands during the imperial age. The country’s prime minister, meanwhile, has emerged as a chief critic of modern Western crimes against the Global South, most notably the ongoing bombardment of peoples from Gaza to the Gulf.
During my trip to Spain last month, where I visited my cousin and friends, I found a newly prosperous nation that has not only come to terms with its past but has also embraced an inclusive and innovative vision of the future. Already richer than G7 members, such as Japan and Italy, in per capita income, today’s Spain is not only a tourism superpower (going head-to-head with France) but also an emerging industrial juggernaut: it’s the second-largest car manufacturer in Europe, only behind Germany.
The country’s economic dynamism is driven by, inter alia, a flexible labor market, a robust social security system, and a famously welcoming immigration policy, which has allowed countless folks, including many from the Philippines, to find a dreamy new home in the Mediterranean. And this is precisely why cheering for Spain in the finals wasn’t a heavy lift for many of us Filipinos. Now contrast this to our other former colonizer, which, inter alia, doesn’t even officially recognize its history of imperial conquest in the Philippines.
At this point, let me, dear reader, focus on another radical contrast before I get carried away with an analysis of our former colonizers. And this brings us to the curious case of Sen. Robinhood Padilla and the gigantic contrast with another celebrity-politician, former Sen. Manny Pacquiao. On the surface, the two are not too different. Both are known for their good intentions, immense self-confidence, and historically warm relationship with the Duterte dynasty. In many ways, they both reflect the type of personality-obsessed politics that has bedeviled our democracy in the 21st century. But this is exactly where the similarity ends.
Over the past decade, Pacquiao has steadily redeemed himself by not only maintaining his legendary boxing skills (a testament to his world-class self-discipline) but also becoming more of a statesman than a politician. Out of patriotic fervor, he broke ranks with former President Rodrigo Duterte due to contrasting views on the West Philippine Sea disputes and, crucially, embraced an anticorruption agenda. Above all, Pacquiao has, by all indications, constantly enhanced his communications and policy skills by drawing on a wide range of expertise in the country and beyond. In stark contrast, Padilla has not only shown little interest in self-development and self-discipline, but, even worse, he seems to revel in his cluelessness, inanities, and blind loyalty to a discredited despot, who is languishing in a detention facility in The Hague. The only good thing about Padilla’s term in office is how he serves as an Exhibit A of what “not” to vote into office.
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richard.heydarian@inquirer.net
