Opinion: Jose Rizal’s novels and ending political dynasties

CEBU CITY, Philippines — While it would be interesting to study to what extent literature has shaped the personal philosophies of Filipinos who enter electoral politics, there is perhaps no better time than now — when we need a host of them to let go of power — for their good offices to read and apply the morals of the stories.

As of the first quarter of 2026, according to survey firm Pulse Asia, almost three-fourths of Filipinos in greater Luzon, in Metro Manila, and in the Visayas have registered their support for the enactment of a law that would ban political dynasties from effecting a chokehold on the elective offices of the government.

Across the country, over two-thirds of Filipinos manifested support for the immediate passage of such legislation. Even in Mindanao, the measure’s time has been demonstrated to have arrived, as indicated in support for it from close to a third of the population. They are no negligible minority.

Evidence that most people are sick and tired of elite political families is easy to find.

In Cebu, netizens burst former third district congressman Pablo John Garcia’s trial balloon, expressing their displeasure over his consideration of a run for the governorate in 2028. Comments, apparently from non-trolls, emphatically balked, to say the least, at a return of the Garcia clan to the Capitol. According to a blunt follower of CDN Digital, the old politicos should stop and give other citizens a chance to lead.

Members of Philippine political families and their supporters would be well-advised to revisit this month homegrown works of literature that urge withdrawal from power for the nation’s benefit. August, after all, is the month we remember statesmen and women including Corazon Aquino, Manuel Quezon, Benigno Aquino, Jr., and the rest of our pantheon of national heroes.

Insights from Jose Rizal’s novels

National hero Jose Rizal’s “Noli me Tangere” and “El Filibusterismo,” to begin with, both prove instructive.

At the end of the first book, a dying Elias tells a grief-stricken Basilio, who had just lost his mother Sisa, that treasure is hidden in the mausoleum that he can dig out and use for his education.

A similar image closes the second book, standing, as it were, as a diptych with its precursor’s conclusion: that of Padre Florentino casting Crisostomo Ibarra’s valuables into the sea, never again to be used until the day would dawn when a righteous people who would use them for just causes would be guided by providence to rediscover them.

One may interpret the concealment of treasure as symbolic of the safeguards against the abuse of power that our people have developed in the course of history and built into our basic law.

Concentration of political power

The 1987 Constitution’s mandate for the State to guarantee equal opportunities for public service and prohibit political dynasties is supposed to help keep power out of the reach of those who would hold us hostage in darknesses of their own making, opening it to those who have interests opposite to that of just being ahead of everyone else in everything.

As the Supreme Court en banc stated, “That 80 percent of the district seats in the House of Representatives and 75 percent of the country’s cities are ‘ruled’ by political dynasties is an affront to the Constitution.

“To be clear, the reasons behind the prohibition of political dynasties are not difficult to discern. Time and again, the concentration of political power to a few families or clans, long held to be the aim and effect of political dynasties, has been shown to ‘skew economic and political institutions to favour and protect the private interests of elites.’ 

When political dynasties thrive

“And perhaps more unfortunately, political dynasties and elite interests thrive and become even more predatory the more underdeveloped and farther their localities are from the national capital. The Constitution, to say the least, does not countenance this. As a nation, neither should We” (G.R. No. 279008, April 08, 2026).

If our senators and congressmen are wise, they will heed the signs of the times. Our people, especially our youth (any higher education teacher can tell you that), take no pleasure in a Senate that has two Cayetanos, two Tulfos, two Villars, two Estradas; a Congress that has at least one Marcoleta in each chamber; a legislature with a Senator Loren Legarda and a Congressman Leandro Legarda Leviste; a government that is shot through with Marcoses, Dutertes, Dys, and Romualdezes.

With foresight, lawmakers can realize: They would genuinely serve generations if they do an Elias or Padre Florentino, enact a solid enabling law to check political dynasties, and thereby empower our democratic experiment to be a solid mausoleum or deep sea for reserving the treasure of elective offices only for the best among the best.

Those who think that only their kith and kin have the capacity to pursue the nation’s best interests are, perhaps, among the worst.

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