The catchphrase “okay na ‘to” has taken social media by storm lately. Memes and short videos on TikTok and Facebook reels with this line from a cooking vlog have been spreading quickly and capturing public attention.
Video creator Grace Tanfelix, housewife and mother of a budding actor, popularized “okay na ‘to” to end her cooking vlog, which has gained 3 million followers to date, from 1 million in September 2024.
In the last few weeks, social media posts ending with “okay na ‘to” in an often witty tone have been gaining traction. Some candidates in the May 12 elections have jumped on the trend, obviously to attract the attention of young voters.
While Tanfelix uses the term “okay na ‘to” to mean that the dish she is cooking is ready to be served, the phrase may imply something else, such as mediocrity. It can be equated to “pwede na,” to indicate acceptance of something less than what we really want.
“Okay na ‘to” or “pwede na” seems to be a choice left to many of us in the next balloting. It’s like choosing the lesser evil. Aren’t there good choices among the 66 names that make it to the Commission on Elections’ final list of senatorial candidates for the upcoming midterms?
We should not consider candidates “okay na ‘to” or “pwede na” only because they give away 5 kilograms of rice or bags of groceries during the campaign; they promise to provide jobs or build roads and other infrastructure as if they were spending their own money.
“Okay na ‘to” or “pwede na” should never be a consideration, particularly in positions that allocate trillions of pesos in public funds, formulate policies and programs, and implement these supposedly for the majority of Filipinos, not for their partisan and personal interests.
The top 14 preferred candidates in pre-election surveys, who supposedly have the “statistical chance” to end up clinching the 12 Senate seats for the 20th Congress, are mostly far from being “okay na ‘to” in terms of competence as legislators.
Let’s widen the choice to the top 20 likely winners in the surveys. Most of them have experience as a senator: seven are incumbents seeking another term, six were former senators vying for a fresh mandate, the seven others would be first-time senators, that is, if they win. Of the seven new aspirants, four had occupied other positions in government, and the three others made a name in the media through entertainment or public service programs.
The reelectionists are Pia Cayetano, Ronald “Bato” De la Rosa, Bong Revilla Jr., Lito Lapid, Christopher Lawrence “Bong” Go, Imee Marcos and Francis Tolentino. The “comebacking” senators are Tito Sotto, Manny Pacquiao, Gringo Honasan, Bam Aquino, Kiko Pangilinan and Ping Lacson.
From the list, we can’t say they go beyond the “okay na ‘to” standard based on their experience as legislators as well as academic and family backgrounds. Sotto and Honasan are vying for their fifth term as senator, but what significant laws can you attribute to them? Sotto was Senate president from 2018 to 2022, but more than the laws he had filed and sponsored, he is more remembered for his alleged involvement in the 1982 Pepsi Paloma rape case and accusations of plagiarizing parts of a 1966 speech of the late U.S. senator Robert F. Kennedy.
He was also sharply criticized in 2017 for saying that then social welfare secretary Judy Taguiwalo, a single mother to two daughters, was “na-ano lang” (just knocked up), and later tried to dismiss it as a joke.
Honasan’s four terms in the Senate, totaling 21 years, were uneventful compared to his popularity as a reformist soldier. He is remembered more for leading the two most serious and bloodiest of seven coups d’etat against then president Corazon Aquino and as a military rebel for seven years.
Lapid is seeking a fourth term, along with Cayetano, Lacson and Pangilinan. His attendance in committee hearings and participation in plenary discussions are so infrequent, if not forgettable. He has been more active in his roles in television action series “Probinsyano” and “Batang Quiapo” than crafting pieces of legislation.
Revilla, who ranks high in the pre-election surveys as a preferred candidate, is on his way to his third term, claiming to have filed at least 2,000 bills and resolutions, of which 343 have become laws during his first 12 years in the Senate. More than the bills he claimed to have passed into laws, Revilla wooed voters not by expounding on his legislative agenda but by his “budot” dance steps that have become a viral sensation.
Diligent legislators cannot be judged by the number of bills filed. We have to consider the substance and relevance of the bills filed and how they justify and fight for those bills. To have so many bills in your name, you just need to sign as co-author or to hire someone good at copying bills previously filed.
Congress is a collegial body. One member cannot claim ownership of a legislative measure unless he worked hard defending it in the committee and in plenary until it becomes law.
Competence is not inherited. Nor is diligence passed on from one family member to another.
Two-thirds, or 13, of the top 20 preferred senatorial candidates belong either to well-entrenched political families or have started forming their own: Cayetano, Lapid, Marcos, Revilla, Tolentino, Aquino, Pacquiao, Sotto, Abalos, Binay, Erwin and Ben Tulfo, and Villar.
Can we say “okay na ‘to” for them to join those elected in 2022: Robinhood Padilla, Loren Legarda, Raffy Tulfo, Sherwin Gatchalian, Francis Escudero, Mark Villar, Alan Peter Cayetano, Migz Zubiri, Joel Villanueva, JV Ejercito, Risa Hontiveros and Jinggoy Estrada?
If only Filipino voters would think beyond their own interests and believe that things can still get better by choosing the candidates’ competence over popularity and dedication to public service over political gain, we can have more qualified candidates in the succeeding elections.
We should never be content with “okay na ‘to” or “pwede na” in electing leaders of our communities and the country.
The views in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of VERA Files.
This column also appeared in The Manila Times.
