One of the saddest, but funniest, things I’ve heard recently was the story of a Barangay Chairman who was so exhausted from the work thrust upon him by the quarantine that he blurted out, “If I had known that being Punong Barangay was going to be this much work, I would never have run!”
This tale is, in all likelihood, apocryphal but it contains enough echoes of reality that it drives home the point: the work of an elected official—especially a local chief executive like a Punong Barangay—isn’t easy, and how that fact might conceivably come as a surprise to someone who entered into politics thinking that an elected official’s life is all power, privilege and play. Interestingly, almost as frequently as you hear people griping about how inept their barangay officials are, you also hear them considering a run for office themselves. And so the cycle goes on.
If you’re one of those people considering a run for office, here are the top 3 things you need to answer truthfully—to yourself if to no one else—before throwing your hat into the ring:
1. Why are you running for office?
If you’re running because you need a job or have nothing better to do, forget about it. Go apply at a call center instead. If you’re running because you want to “help people,” volunteering for a charity or NGO will probably be a better use of your time and energy. And if you’re in it for the money, the power, and the privilege, have pity on your country. If you’re going to run for office, do it only for the right reasons. Do it to serve the people, rather than yourself; do it to effect meaningful positive change in your community, your city, or your country.
2. What position are you running for?
When asked this question, people usually just respond with the title: “Barangay Chairman,” “Mayor,” “Councilor” or whatever. But ask them what’s expected from the people occupying those positions, and they start floundering. The truth is that many people don’t really comprehend the work of elected officials, much less understand how one elected official fits into the grand scheme of government. Which is why, sometimes, people who end up in office seem to have no idea what they’re doing. If you’re running, take the time to learn everything you can about the position you’re aiming for. Only then can you have a clear and well-defined vision of what the position you are running for truly and realistically represents. If you take this step, then you can avoid being that legislator who ignores the work of making laws because you’d much rather run relief operations.
3. Can you afford it?
As a practical matter, you must accept that running for office costs money. For many candidates, running for office is a full-time job. Can you afford to lose your source of steady income? Do you have a funding source to fuel your campaign activities and support your family? If not, then you might be making yourself vulnerable to people who seek to “acquire” themselves an elected official via generous campaign donations that come with unbreakable strings. You don’t want to do that.
Recently, people have taken to saying that social media can replace money as the driving force for a campaign. Reality check: social media can help, but it can never be all you have. Social might be free to use, but to use it effectively requires far more than a spunky can-do attitude. Quality content is not cheap to consistently produce, for example, and without good content, you will not get the social media traction you need to power you all the way to the finish line.
It’s become trite to say that public office is a public trust. But it is, and because of that, whoever seeks to occupy public office must be held to higher standards of competence and accountability – not just by the public but by that very person who seeks the office himself. Do not go into it lightly, and make sure that you truly are ready to serve, rather than with the expectation that you will be served.