Don’t blink – hold the line

By Herman M. Lagon

There was a moment during the November 30 Trillion Peso March 2.0 rally in Iloilo that has stayed with me. A parishioner from Jaro, sweat running down her neck, held up a cardboard sign that read, “Corruption is paid by the poor.” The crowd was smaller than the 5,000 who faced last September’s rain, but the stubborn hope in her eyes felt painfully familiar. These were still the same teachers, vendors, churchgoers, students, and workers who curse at collapsed dikes and flooded homes. Their indignation had not faded. Only the attendance had.

What changed between September 21 and November 30 says a lot about the country’s political pulse. Both rallies happened on Sundays. Both honored courage—one against martial law, the other in Bonifacio’s name. Both demanded accountability for ghost canals, padded budgets, insertion-charged lawmakers, and conniving contractors who forgot what honesty looks like. So why the drop? Heat, shifting venues, exhaustion, fear of scuffles, and a sense that “gumagalaw na ang kaso.” Psychologists call this the “delegation effect”—a quiet belief that someone else will take it from here (Putnam, 2000). Ironically, early progress can make people withdraw too soon.

But every teacher knows momentum can lie. A student who performs well early on often relaxes later, thinking the work is already done. Communities behave the same. After the first Trillion Peso March, public vigilance felt volcanic—people measuring dikes, counting culverts, and fact-checking budgets. When engineers stumbled over missing reports and a few contractors and government officials felt the weight of handcuffs, many felt relieved. Too relieved. Complacency doesn’t announce itself. It slips in when people unclench, trusting the fight to others.

Still, we must say this clearly: fewer attendees do not mean fewer patriots. Life gets in the way. A teacher edits modules. A parent shields a child from the heat. A student working on his thesis. A young activist recovers from laryngitis. Some are simply tired. Civic fatigue is real and documented (Barbera et al., 2020). What matters is not judgment but understanding—and the courage to keep the fire steady even when the crowd shrinks.

 

In fact, part of maturity in protest is guarding its soul. There was something dignified about the protests in Iloilo. No vandalized spaces, no messy aftermath, and no outsiders trying to stir trouble. Volunteers simply did their jobs—checking who joined, guiding the march, and picking up what needed picking up. It was proof that you can fight for something big without behaving badly—that order and outrage can actually walk together.

The real enemy is not the turnout—it is the cultural shrug. “Normal naman na ‘yan.” This phrase has cost the nation more than any rally ever will. Transparency International (2024) ranks the Philippines poorly, and IMF estimates say roughly one-fifth of the budget evaporates in corruption. That means every shaved slope protection or missing rebar is not merely theft—it endangers lives. A Grade 5 teacher once told me after her classroom flooded, “May kwarta naman para dira, pero indi gid matadlong ang konsensya sang iban.” She wasn’t angry. She was tired. And resignation is exactly the silence corruption feeds on.

Yet courage persists. Celebrities such as Catriona Gray, Elijah Canlas, Ben&Ben, Pinky Amador, Maris Racal, and Maki risk backlash to speak up. Nurses carry placards showing flooded wards. Farmers print tarps demanding fair procurement. Students—those dependable carriers of moral clarity—chant until their voices scratch. The movement may be smaller in bodies but broader in heart. Social scientists say movements thrive when people treat injustice as personal (Tarrow, 2011). And what’s more personal than your home flooding because someone pocketed the budget meant to protect it?

Still, emotion alone cannot sustain a movement. We need structural understanding. Our long history of political dynasties shows how power concentrated in families often leads to inefficiency and abuse. Research by Mendoza et al. (2016) even links “fat dynasties” to worse development outcomes. Supporting an Anti-Dynasty Law is not about punishing families—it’s about preventing monopoly, exploitation, injustice, and undue influence. When citizens grasp the structural roots of corruption, they become harder to lull.

And this is where the real work lies. Rallies spark awareness. But the harder labor happens after the placards come down—monitoring hearings, demanding transparent budgets, checking local works, and voting wisely. Corruption thrives in silence. Accountability thrives in routine. The crowd size matters far less than the consistency of a nation refusing to look away.

In the end, the message is simple: smaller crowds do not mean smaller courage. The Trillion Peso March 2.0 has already rattled systems, inspired whistleblowers, and put powerful people on the defensive. What it needs now is not louder voices, but steadier ones. As long as ordinary citizens continue to pay attention—to ask, to check, to question—corruption will never feel safe again. The streets may empty, but the conscience must not.

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Doc H fondly describes himself as a “student of and for life” who, like many others, aspires to a life-giving and why-driven world grounded in social justice and the pursuit of happiness. His views do not necessarily reflect those of the institutions he is employed or connected with.