The Supreme Court hearing that began yesterday on whether or not opposition presidential candidate Fernando Poe Jr. is a natural-born Filipino should never have taken place. The accusation that Poe is not a natural-born Filipino, and thus not qualified to stand for president, is a highly political one being made by partisan supporters of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, namely Victorino Fornier, Maria Jeanette Tecson and Zoilo Velez.

The whole case revolves around Poe’s parents and whether or not they were married when he was born, and whether or not they were Philippine citizens at the time of the actor’s birth on Aug. 20, 1939. According to papers submitted by Poe’s lawyers themselves, his parents were married on Sept. 16, 1940, more than a year after Poe was born. The petitioners who are calling for Poe to be disqualified claim that Poe should be considered an American citizen, since under the 1935 Constitution, he would have followed the citizenship of his mother, who was American, and not of his unmarried father. They are arguing that Poe became a Philippine citizen only when his parents married, which occurred after his birth.

To make a splitting hairs issue even murkier, the petitioners against Poe are also placing Poe’s father’s Philippine citizenship in doubt by claiming that he didn’t follow provisions in the 1899 Treaty of Paris that allegedly required all Philippine residents to apply for citizenship when the Philippines were ceded to the United States by Spain following the Spanish-American War of 1899.

This seems ludicrous to me, and I’m sure that the majority of Philippine residents did not in fact actively apply for Philippine citizenship. If one were born in the Philippines from 1899 until independence in 1947, I’m sure that one was not automatically a US citizen. If that had been the case, then I’m sure many more Filipinos would have immigrated to the mainland United States.

In my mind Poe is as Filipino as anyone else born and bred in the Philippines. He was born in the Philippines and grew up there his entire life. He speaks Filipino, is highly nationalistic, and does not hold the citizenship of any other country. To my knowledge, he never lived for extended periods of time abroad, and is not a spy for the US, Japan or Spain.

So where is the problem? Perhaps it lies in the fact that President Arroyo and her cronies are bent on her being elected in May by any means necessary, and this means that every dirty trick in a campaign to get Poe disqualified is being used.

First it was doubts about his intelligence, critics harping on the fact that Poe is a high school drop out. Then it was doubts about his citizenship and birth, and then of his illegitimate children. Poe bit the bullet on the last issue, promptly coming clean when an interviewer asked him if he had any children out of wedlock. His honesty won him many points in public opinion, and promptly neutralized an issue that the Arroyo administration had tried to use against him. Score: Poe 1, Arroyo O.

Poe unveiled an impressive economic and policy team this week comprised of 19 experts on economics, governance, international relations and education. It includes the dean of the University of the Philippines School of Economics Bernardo Villegas; the dean of the UP College of Law Paul Pangalanan, and former Education Undersecretary Victor Andres Manhit.

Anti-Poe doomsayers have been moaning about what a disaster it would be if Poe were elected president on May 10, but hey, shouldn’t we give the guy a break? Sure he is a friend of former President Joseph Estrada, but that doesn’t mean he is the same as Estrada. This whole guilt by association argument has been taken too far and is ludicrous.

Those who quake in their boots with indignation over the possibility of the Philippines being led by yet another actor should double-check their assumptions. What has the Philippines gained being led by Arroyo, the ultimate technocrat and politician? More jobs are being lost every day, as foreign companies choose to invest in other Asian countries because of the Philippines’ crumbling infrastructure, high costs and precarious law-and-order situation. Corruption in government departments is at an all-time high, and thousands of Filipinos are actively being encouraged by the Arroyo administration to work abroad. Is this the blueprint for a prosperous future? Hardly!

In the meantime, the Supreme Court, after hearing from the petitioners, the friends of the court and Poe’s lawyers, should refuse itself from the case, declaring it a political decision that should be made by the people and not the court.

Let Filipinos decide at the ballot box in May whom they want to be president. Frustrating their wishes now through the Supreme Court would not only be deeply undemocratic, it could possibly light the fuse of a rebellion.

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