Complements, Not Substitutes: Hope and Resilience in the Face of Flood Politics

On September 1st, the streets of Quezon city disappeared below swollen currents of murky water as rain began to submerge the city. Amid the rising waters, a stillness took hold; people sifted through the fetid currents, their faces carved with quiet resolve in search for their belongings: sodden shoes, shivering pets, and trembling children. Emergency assistance—food, shelter, and hygiene kits—were lost from sight, while billions of pesos from the national flood relief fund resurfaced through the radiance of private jets and the opulence of those untouched by the storm. 

In Bicol, the sound of raindrops echoed across the living room of the Altavano Co home, as towering glass windows framed the downpour like a passing spectacle. Christopher S. Co, chairman of the Sun West Corporation and member of the Ako Bicol Partylist in the House of Representatives, beamed as he held a Sony camera in one hand, and a ring light in the other, for his daughter Claudine Co. Claudine strolled backwards, chippering exuberantly at her camera as she gestured to the family’s many conspicuous amenities; a food elevator, figurines from Greece, a remote controlled gate, and a sauna among many others. 

To Claudine’s dismay, her Youtube video, titled “HOUSE TOUR VLOG,” was met with nothing short of bitterness and disgust. Floods of tweets and emails containing death threats bombarded her inboxes, and the politician’s daughter, in a rush to preserve the family’s increasingly contentious image, began to deactivate all her social media accounts. 

“People are drowning while you’re drowning in designer bags. You deserve to be dragged into the same waters you’ve caused.”

“We are paying with our lives in the floods while they pay for Birkin bags with our taxes. Shame isn’t enough, jail them.”

“Normalise public shaming of these motherf***ers”

It was becoming increasingly evident that the rage of the Filipino taxpayers had spilled beyond words. Lists of corrupt politicians and their families, linked to missing relief funds, circulated on the internet with the caption, “Walang forever sa nepo babies!” (No one forever in Nepo Babies), before struggling mothers carrying their infants through the overflown streets occupied the next scroll. 

For the first time in decades, perhaps even since the exile of former dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr. in 1986, the narrative of Filipino resilience had ruptured, and the enduring remnants of hope, long dispersed across the nation, had finally crystallized. 

The Edsa revolution in 1986 demonstrated the culmination of resilience and hope as a tool for accountability when years of political violence and corruption induced a collective demand for immediate democratic reforms. The People’s Power Revolution, otherwise known as the Edsa revolution, exercised the conduit for resilience and hope in coexistence: the concept of Kapwa. 

Decades later, the flooded streets of Manila and its surrounding provinces convey a comparable image, with missing relief funds revealing the complicity of political dynasties and their affiliates that gave rise to widespread public outrage. In this context, resilience is not imposed by those in power but rather exerted by the people’s own volition. When compounded with the moral indignation and endurance for the sake of true democracy, a parallel emerges between the convergence of resilience and hope that facilitated the People’s Power Revolution in 1986, and the convergence of such on contemporary efforts to hold president “Bong Bong Marcos” and his associates accountable; accordingly incorporating the exposure of poor disaster relief against the implications of entrenched political dynasties throughout the nation’s provinces. 

Reclaiming resilience requires reconceptualising such as a tool for agency and hope, particularly in moments of crisis like these. Especially in moments of crisis like these. Resilience without hope risks mere survival; hope without resilience risks mere dreaming. Together, they are complements that can carry a nation forward. Filipino conceptions of Kapwa, understood as the recognition of shared humanity, offer a framework in which resilience extends across communities through hope, mobilizing networks of relationships in the cultivation of skills, resources, and mutual support. 

It’s only when resilience is combined with hope can citizens endure not merely the status quo but more so the pursuit of a more equitable society. The integration of these complementary values disentangles resilience from its instrumentalization by political powers and instead anchors in solidarity, accountability and aspiration. In this way, the next generation may rise not only above the floods but also above a system that has long tested their persistence.