Duterte’s socialist experiment in the Philippines

As mayor of Davao City, Duterte staked his political career on accommodating the Communist Party’s New People’s Army, and backing a ban on US armed exercises in the metropolis. 

Duterte’s proposed coalition with the Left differs from the European norm where coalitions are formed by opposing political parties for lack of an outright majority. Forged by compromise, these power-sharing coalitions eventually turn fractious because of incoherent policies and strategies.

In this case, the cabinet posts are being offered even with Duterte’s knowledge that the Left’s agenda of revolutionary reforms seeks to alter the power structures in the country – dislodging the ruling oligarchs and the financial elite and building a people’s coalition government. The posts at stake are strategic and critical since they involve social services, employment, land reform, and protecting the environment from development aggression. In short, they serve as key platforms for initiating basic social and economic reforms with socialist paradigms – issues that previous pro-elite regimes failed to address.

Offering the “hand of peace” to the Left as well as other cause-driven rebel forces, Duterte anchors his incoming administration on a healing presidency with a programme of national unity, peace and development. He will lead and micromanage an iron-fisted anti-drugs and anti-crime campaign, but national security will lose steam without a peace agreement signed with the Left and capped by comprehensive social, economic and political reforms for a just and lasting peace. A negotiated political settlement that will accommodate a progressive agenda opens the possibility of an alliance between Duterte and the Left, which may even solidify his socialist orientation.

In fact, the offer of Cabinet posts to the CPP reveals a Duterte ready to embrace the party’s national democratic program with a socialist perspective. Others may interpret it as an attempt to coopt the Left by using the peace process as a ploy for capitulation. But the presumptive president-elect seems to know better than that.

It’s too soon to predict whether the mulled coalition government will work. However, Duterte’s planned first moves as president converges with the Left agenda – an end to labour contractualisation, rebuilding the national steel industry en route to industrialisation, and tax reform, among others.

The support that Duterte expects from the Left in government affairs can be enhanced by a broad progressive movement’s representation in the local governments. The basic social and economic reforms of a Duterte presidency should be grounded where community leaders have long been struggling for grassroots empowerment. These are the change forces that no cabinet secretaries or political and business backers of Duterte can promise. But the progressive movement can, and a reform agenda needs a strong and nationwide mass movement as a political backbone and development force.

Which brings us to the important questions: If the Left comes on board, how will Duterte be able to balance and rein in a government of opposing political forces – the Left armed with a progressive ideology and rightist groups representing neoliberal and pro-elite interests? How will basic disagreements on policies and strategies be reconciled to assemble a coherent six-year programme? How, indeed, will expected resistance from the elite and die-hard anti-communist elements be handled?

The answer lies in the outcome of the peace process. Negotiations with the National Democratic Front, which were stalled in 2013, promise to rectify past mistakes of not honouring 10 peace agreements, with both sides now expected to accelerate the process. The outcome of these talks will shape the final configuration of the coalition government and to what extent Duterte is determined to support it.

Both Duterte and the Left will need mutual support and cooperation to sustain what may turn out to be the country’s first socialist experiment. The coming weeks will be crucial.

 

Bobby M Tuazon teaches at the University of the Philippines.