Speaking Filipino wasn’t enough to save the President

By Noel Galon de Leon

President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s decision to deliver his State of the Nation Address (SONA) in Filipino was, on the surface, a commendable attempt to speak directly to the people. Language is a powerful tool in public communication, especially in political settings. Using the national language can evoke a sense of unity, nationalism, and accessibility. It creates the impression that the speaker is addressing not just an elite few, but the entire nation, particularly those who are often excluded from policy discourse due to linguistic, educational, or class barriers. But despite the symbolic weight and cultural resonance of delivering the SONA in Filipino, the language itself proved insufficient to rescue the message. For many Filipinos, those not seated in the halls of Congress but rather watching from their homes, smartphones, or workplace break rooms the president’s speech did not resonate in the way he perhaps intended. Applause inside the chamber may have echoed with enthusiasm, but outside that space, public sentiment was marked more by skepticism than by trust.

The use of Filipino in the SONA was not accidental. It was a deliberate rhetorical strategy, one that sought to humanize the president and bring him closer to the people. This is particularly important in a political climate where trust in government is fragile, and many citizens feel left behind by policy decisions that appear out of touch with their lived experiences. Speaking in the vernacular, especially in a nationally televised address, is an attempt to break through that divide. It sends a message: I am one of you. But when the content of the message fails to align with that intimacy, the result is dissonance. The words become hollow. This is precisely what happened during the SONA. Despite the familiar cadence of the Filipino language, the speech was filled with abstract promises, selective data, and a tone that often seemed to dismiss or overlook the hardships that many Filipinos continue to face on a daily basis.

A large part of the disconnect stems from the overuse of vague generalities and emotionally charged yet unmeasurable promises. A line like, “Ibubuhos pa natin ang lahat-lahat… upang mapantayan, kundi mahigitan pa ang pagbibigay-ginhawa sa ating mga kababayan,” sounds noble and inspiring on the surface. But upon closer inspection, it lacks clarity and substance. What does “lahat-lahat” mean in practical terms? What percentage of the budget will be allocated to these efforts? What programs are included, and how will they be implemented? Without concrete details, such phrases become difficult to evaluate. They appeal to emotion, yes, but they leave the public with no tangible basis for expectation or accountability. A promise that cannot be measured is a promise that cannot be kept, and this undermines the credibility of the speaker.

Furthermore, the speech contained noticeable contradictions and oversimplifications that further weakened its impact. At one point, the president remarked, “Kung datos lang ang pag-uusapan, maganda ang ating ekonomiya… ngunit ang lahat ng ito ay palamuti lamang, walang saysay, kung ang ating kababayan ay hirap pa rin.” This line shows a rare and valuable awareness of the disconnect between macroeconomic indicators and the daily struggles of ordinary citizens. However, this self-awareness was quickly undercut by the rest of the speech, which leaned heavily on statistics and glowing economic summaries. The contradiction was never resolved. If the data does not reflect the lived experience of the people, then why continue to center the speech around it? This rhetorical inconsistency left the impression that the administration was more concerned with optics than solutions.

A particularly controversial example of oversimplification was the president’s assertion,  “Napatunayan na natin na kaya na natin ang bente pesos sa bawat kilo ng bigas.” This claim quickly drew backlash online and in public discourse, and for good reason. While ₱20-per-kilo rice has been made available in select KADIWA centers, government-run markets designed to offer subsidized goods, this is far from a nationwide reality. Most Filipinos continue to purchase rice at significantly higher prices in traditional markets. There is no widespread, sustainable implementation of this price point, and the logistical and agricultural reforms needed to make such pricing viable on a national scale have not been enacted. Presenting this isolated case as proof of national success is not only misleading but dangerously simplistic. It gives a false sense of progress and obscures the structural challenges in the country’s food security and agriculture sector.

Another issue that weakened the impact of the SONA was the inconsistent audience positioning throughout the address. While much of the speech was delivered in Filipino and clearly aimed at the masses, there was a notable shift to English whenever the president addressed the international business community. Lines such as “The Philippines is ready. Invest in the Filipino,” were delivered with the cadence of a corporate pitch. While this bilingual approach is standard practice in SONAs, acknowledging both local constituents and foreign stakeholders, it also creates a subtle disconnection. When the government continues to prioritize attracting foreign capital while domestic issues like inflation, underemployment, and poverty remain inadequately addressed, these English-language appeals can feel alienating to everyday citizens. The shift in tone, from inclusive to transactional, reinforces the perception that the administration is more invested in global perception than in local transformation.

Perhaps most concerning, however, was the near-total absence of meaningful engagement with the issue of corruption and governance reform. The president made vague references to punishing “economic sabotage,” but he avoided naming specific agencies or tackling long-standing inefficiencies and irregularities in key departments such as the Department of Agriculture (DA), the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), and various local government units (LGUs). These are the very institutions responsible for delivering the social programs, subsidies, and public services he outlined in his address. Without institutional reform, even the most well-funded and well-intentioned policies are likely to fall short. The failure to address these issues directly suggests either a lack of political will or a deliberate attempt to downplay the severity of institutional dysfunction. In either case, it weakens public confidence in the feasibility of the administration’s plans.

Taken together, these issues point to a speech that, while politically calculated and emotionally appealing in certain moments, ultimately fell short of providing the clarity, honesty, and depth that the current moment demands. The president succeeded in presenting a hopeful image of progress, but hope without substance can easily become disappointment. The overreliance on vague rhetoric, the selective presentation of data, the contradictions in messaging, and the silence on critical structural problems all contribute to a sense that the SONA was more performance than policy.

In today’s political landscape, the Filipino public is not as passive or uninformed as it might have been in previous generations. With the rise of digital platforms, social media, and widespread access to alternative sources of information, citizens are more equipped than ever to fact-check, analyze, and critique government pronouncements in real time. Many did exactly that during and after the SONA, pointing out inconsistencies, false equivalencies, and exaggerated claims. For a population that has endured repeated cycles of political disappointment, the bar for sincerity and accountability has been raised, and rightly so.

For me, no matter how fluently President Marcos Jr. spoke in Filipino, the use of the national language could not save the message. Language can create a sense of belonging, but it cannot substitute for truth, transparency, and genuine responsiveness to the people’s needs. The problem was not in how the president spoke, but in what he said, and more importantly, in what he chose not to say. Words, especially in the Filipino language, carry emotional weight and symbolic power. But when they are used to obscure rather than reveal, to placate rather than commit, they lose their force. In this year’s SONA, style took precedence over substance, and many Filipinos were not convinced.