The Sanggunian has been painted with many colors, a testament to the equally colorful history of political parties in the Loyola Schools (LS). The LS has seen conceptions and dissolutions of a number of political parties, and—as it should follow—the advancement of various ideologies as well. However, this has not been the case.
The story begins with Partido Agila and its merging with IsaBuhay IsaGawa (IBIG) to make IBIG-Agila. Once the dominant political party, IBIG-Agila occupied majority of the posts in the Sanggunian and held the president’s seat for a number of years. The party disbanded in November 2011, nine years after its inception. “IBIG-Agila neither had an ideology nor did its members believe in ideology,” read The Ateneo Assembly’s statement on the party’s dissolution.
From the disbandment came the birth of two new coalitions: Partido League of Atenean Youth for Liberal Advocacy (Loyola) and Ignatian Initiative and Transformative Empowerment (Ignite). Partido Loyola highlighted liberal ideology, or the idea that a democracy could determine the formation of its values, with regard to liberty, equality and fraternity. Ignite focused on transformative empowerment, with emphasis on Ignatian values.
Others from IBIG-Agila decided not to join Partido Loyola or Ignite, and instead chose to support another ideology: That of the Christian Union for Socialist and Democratic Advancement (Crusada), which advocates advocates social democracy and politicization on campus. Crusada became the only remaining accredited political party in the Ateneo until Ignite was accredited earlier this year.
Political parties exist to foster involvement in and awareness of particular ideologies. However, it has become an age-old adage that while parties exist in the Ateneo, some fail to behave as such. Candidates running under the same party, for example, may have different platforms, failing to push forward a single ideology in a concrete, cohesive way. Membership in a political party now guarantees neither students’ participation in their activities, nor their understanding or support of their ideologies.
This lack of ideology—or lack of belief in a common greater good—is what makes some parties (and, ultimately, the Sanggunian) and political entities devoid of genuine political thought. When candidates run under apolitical political parties, what kind of politician does that make them?
Moreover, in the Ateneo, there is talk of candidates running under parties or coalitions for reasons other than sharing their ideologies—candidates may want to take advantage of a party’s reach and market, for example. This is worrisome because the Ateneo’s campus politics is indicative of the national political condition. Philippine politics has seen candidates move from party to party—sometimes parties of dramatically different ideologies—election after election. It seems that politicians are comfortable with using political parties as mere vehicles to garner votes without actually identifying with their beliefs.
There is also no denying that most Ateneans do not understand how party politics works. For the vast majority, party discipline is widely disregarded, devalued and not practiced. Worse, there are candidates running for office, claiming not to be politicians.
The national lack of understanding party politics indeed precipitated the current condition of the Ateneo’s campus politics. However, because the Ateneo sires the nation’s future leaders, the Ateneo’s current campus politics also is an alarming picture of the future state of Philippine politics.
In the past, the apolitical IBIG-Agila had failed because it fostered politics that did not believe in politics. Today, IBIG-Agila’s problems are still realities in the Ateneo.
The question is simple: What is the point of political parties, if candidates, parties, and constituents alike ignore their very purpose? And what is the purpose of the Sanggunian if it is a government composed of people who do not believe in something?
