Optical illusion

By Artchil B. Fernandez

Outrage and anger swept the nation after Trade Secretary Maria Cristina Aldeguer-Roque declared that a Filipino family could have a noche buena meal for just P500, based on the price guide of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI). The statement is not only out of touch with reality but is viewed by Filipinos as insensitive and condescending. If the DTI secretary were joking, it was a sick and insulting one.

After drawing flak for her tactless and tasteless remark, Aldeguer-Roque stubbornly stood her ground instead of expressing regret. She insisted that a P500 noche buena was “really possible for a family of four.” The P500 noche buena includes spaghetti, macaroni salad, and ham, Aldeguer-Roque asserted.

It appears the underlings of Bongbong Marcos (BBM) like Aldeguer-Roque are determined to weaken and undermine his administration. BBM’s satisfaction rating is already at 21 percent, a 14-percentage-point drop from the previous rating, his steepest decline. The survey was conducted Nov. 21-28, 2025, by WR Numero. His rating could further decline with Aldeguer-Roque’s cold and callous assertion.

As a sycophantic move, Aldeguer-Roque’s vile and fantastical noche buena is designed to produce an image that everything is fine under BBM’s leadership. She is trying to create an optical illusion that Filipinos at present are economically well-off, with food and basic necessities affordable and cheap.

This is similar to the “Golden Age” trickery BBM and the UniTeam pushed in the 2022 elections. Aldeguer-Roque assumed that if alternative facts and falsified history can win elections, perhaps they can also salvage the faltering standing of the current administration. If a fake past can sway voters, maybe a bogus present can also do the same trick. An optical illusion might be the solution to the present political woes of BBM.

In the 2022 election, BBM and the UniTeam sold to the public the lie that the dictatorial rule of Marcos senior was a “Golden Age” for Filipinos. The Philippines was the envy of Asia. Its economy was the most advanced in the region but was destroyed when the dictatorship of the elder Marcos was overthrown by Filipinos in a people power revolt. BBM vowed during the campaign to bring back the nonexistent “Golden Age.”

The “Golden Age” lie resonated with a significant portion of voters, especially those who were not yet born during the dictatorial rule of Marcos senior. Uncritical and unthinking voters detached from the past are gullible to deception and lies. They are easily swayed by distorted history.

Fake news/bogus history gained traction. BBM and the UniTeam cruised to victory in 2022. The “Golden Age” fiction played a significant role in that win for BBM and Sara Duterte.

It is understandable that the current administration is employing the same trick to survive the most serious political crisis it faces. If the “Golden Age” lie helped win the election, the “P500 noche buena” trickery might also do the same wonder, hence the attempt of underling Aldeguer-Roque to manufacture reality.

There is one problem with employing the same ploy. It is easy to deceive an unthinking and uncritical people about the past they are disconnected from and have not lived through. The present is a different story. People are living the present and encounter it in their day-to-day existence. Even the most stupid people experience the present reality.

Thus the bid of the administration to produce an optical illusion that it will only cost P500 for a family of four to have macaroni salad, spaghetti, and ham for a hearty and blissful noche buena grandly failed. The effort even backfired on the administration, for it only stoked public anger and ridicule. It collided with reality and was dashed to pieces.

Filipinos who regularly go to grocery stores and wet markets know the real situation on the ground. Inflation has eaten into their purses. They know the cost of living has gone up, which their income can hardly cope with. To tell Filipinos that prices are low, goods are so affordable that P500 is enough to have a decent noche buena is a gross insult to their experience and intelligence. Filipinos refuse to swallow fake reality.

By expressing anger and outrage over the P500 noche buena, Filipinos are rejecting the optical illusion and fake reality the administration is trying to impose on them. They are repudiating the lie while at the same time rejecting symbolic violence or the attempt to make them complicit in their deception.

Repudiation of symbolic violence perhaps accurately explains the universal anger and condemnation by Filipinos of the P500 noche buena. Aldeguer-Roque is coaxing Filipinos to participate in their deception by accepting her wild and wacky idea. The public is telling the administration that they will not take part in the charade.

A harsh lesson for BBM can be drawn from the strident public reaction to the P500 noche buena. It is easier to lie about the past than about the present. The past is detached while the present is attached to people. Making a horrific past look “good” is less challenging compared to showing the present as “nice” when it is awful.

Governing through optical illusion does not work. Fact can easily puncture fiction. The BBM administration would have earned some political points had it been honest with the public instead of attempting to convince them of an alternative reality that exists only in 1992 or 1993 (when a P500 noche buena is possible). Worse, rather than acknowledging the mistake, the administration sank further in public esteem by insisting its manufactured reality is the real, factual situation. Dumbing down the public has not helped the administration’s case.

BBM and his administration are struck with a bitter truth. Fantasy is no match for reality.