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BACK TO THE PEOPLE: 'I accept the challenge to bring back hope to the people,' said Estrada (centre) in October while announcing his bid for the May 2010 presidential election

In the run-up to next year's elections a familiar name has joined the ranks of those vying to lead the country: former president Joseph Estrada. That might be unremarkable but for the fact that he left office in disgrace and served a six-year jail term for corruption. The little matter of a criminal conviction alone might seem to disqualify him but then politics in the Philippines is like nowhere else.

Estrada was a highly successful movie star in the 1970s and won five best actor awards, the Filipino equivalent of the Oscars, but his career became known as much for his womanising and high living as for his talent.

His tenure as president became known for kickbacks and illegal gambling payoffs somewhat at odds with his on screen persona where he would play the tough guy with a soft spot for life's losers — roles that brought vast public support from the poverty-stricken masses in the Philippines who voted for him in the belief that art would be imitated by life.

At his presidential inaugural in 1998 he promised to deliver 'the greatest performance of my life.

'In the event he was to last less than halfway through his term before being replaced by his vice president and constitutional successor, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. Now he says he must run for office again because of her corrupt ways and neglect of the poor and promises, this time, 'this is the last performance of my life and I will not fail you.' Anticipating the expected legal challenges to his standing, Estrada said that the voice of the people was the voice of God and the voters should be the final judge.

The former actor says that he will not be violating a constitutional provision that forbids second presidential runs because he did not complete his first one and was 'illegally' removed from power. 'I was demonised then unconstitutionally removed,' said Estrada.

But if he really does offer a new start it is hard to detect from his projected senatorial slate which reads like a time warp to 25 or 30 years ago. He starts with his son Senator Jinggoy Estrada and continues with the Senate president, Juan Ponce Enrile, the one-time defence minister of the late president Ferdinand Marcos; Ilocos Norte governor Ferdinand Marcos junior who guards his father's political heritage in the province, which has always been a family stronghold; Representative of Makati, the wealthy business hub of Manila, Teodoro Locsin, junior, also the son of an ancient regime politician; detained rebel leader Danny Lim and Aquilino 'Koko' Pimentel, the scion of yet another Filipino political dynasty.

More business as usual than betraying any sign of a new approach to Filipino politics there. But then Filipino politicians, with the possible exception of Cory Aquino, have always had a tendency to stick with the elitist status quo than try and institute real reform.

The elitists are among Estrada's targets, a man who identifies strongly with the poor. 'During the lowest point in my life, the poor did not abandon me,' he says. 'Vox populi, vox Dei. The voice of the people is the voice of God. But the elitists are not listening to the voice of the people, that is why we are here now,' he said. 'Are we better off than in 2001?'

The sad fact is that the last thing the Philippines needs is more of the same having suffered from a series of leaders who were closely identified with the land-owning, industrial and banking elites but somehow managed to do very little for ordinary people.

All might have made greater efforts to re-align the economic policies of the country to counter the perennial difficulties caused by its dependence on exports to developed countries and the historic need to export labour to foreign countries whose remittances have become like a drug on which the exchequer depends.

Through sheer good fortune the nation has been lucky enough to continue to enjoy modest growth rates even as the downturn has bitten into economic activity. Remittances from the 8 million Filipinos who work abroad continue to underpin the $118 billion economy which has to support one third of the 96 million population who have to exist on less than $1 a day. Slowing consumer spending has affected the Philippines economy just as similar slowdowns have affected most economies around the world.

But an increasingly real concern is the increasing cost of keeping the country supplied with its staple — rice. The Philippines is the world's largest importer of rice, an amazing reality in itself given the obvious fertility of the land. It is facing problems not only of price but of supply. In the early part of the year Manila was unable to buy sufficient for its needs while facing a 40 per cent increase in the price.

As the supply has tightened the world's largest exporters, including Vietnam, India and Egypt, have imposed foreign sales restrictions to keep their domestic markets supplied. More curbs are likely in the coming months as world rice stocks are set to fall to about 70 million tonnes, the lowest level in 25 years and less than half the level held in the year 2000.

In the March auction the Philippines had hoped to buy 550,000 tonnes of rice but was offered only about 325,000 tonnes. The price ranged from $618:50 to $745 a tonne, a 43 per cent increase in the price paid in January. Worldwide prices for Thai rice, the global benchmark, have broken through the $500-a-tonne level for the first time since 1989.

Manila recently took the unprecedented step of asking Vietnam to guarantee rice supplies of about 1.5m tonnes in a government-to-government deal. But Hanoi could supply only about 1m tonnes of which 700,000 tonnes represented previous contracts.

The Philippines clearly faces some serious questions both as a society with the resurgence of Muslim separatism in the south and the problems raised by the recent flooding, especially in Manila itself, not to mention the overhanging storm cloud of poverty.

Estrada is already on record as saying he would step up the fight against Muslim separatists rather than seeking a peaceful settlement but for the rest he seems to rely almost entirely on sentimentality. As the poor over the years have learned to their cost, sentimentality does not fill stomachs. The country needs a full-blown reform of agricultural production geared to meeting the real needs of the nation with a sector which addresses fundamental domestic needs. Then, once the economy of the country meets the needs of those millions of poor, Estrada and his ilk can start thinking again of the luxuries such as drinking and gambling of which they are so enamoured.

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