The Road to Malacañang
He did not have any inkling that seven years later, he would become a congressman of Capiz. From 1986 onwards, he visited the Philippines more frequently.
“It got to a point where it was just crazy. I would come here and when I got back there, I would read a lot of stuff, newspapers like the Wall Street Journal and The New York Times that I hadn’t read while I was home just to get up-to-date on what had been happening. Wala pang Internet noon. I remember a fax machine then was as big as a refrigerator. At that time, we were still using telex. I was lucky because my bosses were all kind to me, and invited me to their homes during Thanksgiving. They took an interest in making sure that I progressed and developed as a professional. Maybe they thought I was a refugee or something, and they kind of felt sorry for this brown kid who must be some kind of a political refugee.”
But work he did, sometimes for as long as 18 hours a day—the coffee gone stale, the hunger pangs stilled by pizza or croissants that had gone cold because work had to be done, now, in that corporation on Wall Street. He worked his way up and became its assistant vice-president. It looked like one of those scenes from American T.V. shows.
“Because of my comings and goings to the Philippines, finally I proposed to the company that we set up shop in Asia, since there was really an opportunity there. My only request was that it be in the Philippines. They agreed. So around 1991, I was permanently stationed here, in North Star Capitals, Inc. We took Jollibee public. We did the financing for them to get them a hundred stores. Now they have more than 500 branches, and I am happy about that. In the U.S., we participated in the first financing of Discovery Channel and Tri-Star Pictures. So those are my early successes, if you are looking for things that you can really call your own successes. I am grateful for my parents for giving me that chance to find myself, to define me for myself in the States. I think it gave me an additional dimension. It gave me the ‘walk-away’ concept, which is an important part of my character. If you don’t like the situation, then walk away. That’s your ultimate safety net, especially when it comes to ethical issues. When you don’t like something, walk away.”
“I am aware that people are asking when we would get married. I know marriage is important. I think both of us have waited this long and if marriage comes, when it comes, then it will come.”
Another defining moment for him was martial law. One day, his father Gerry was one of the brightest minds in the Senate. The next day, he was jobless. “Within 24 hours, I saw my father go from being a political celebrity—senator, head of the opposition, possible President after Marcos—to becoming jobless. Before, he would go to golf clubs and everybody would want to play with him. Then during martial law, we would go and nobody wanted to talk to him. He made phone calls but they were not returned. People shunned him. I was then in second year high school. I saw that. But I also saw how he never gave in. He never bought in to what Marcos was selling, whatever the cost was. He never did. Right then and there, you saw what he really was. I admire and respect him for that, and I aspire to be as strong as him.”
How was the father-son relationship? “My father was articulate, but he wasn’t very expressive. He was an old-school father. He didn’t say anything. He just raised an eyebrow. That would already speak volumes about what he thought. I was at home where there were several entreaties from my father’s friends, acquaintances, brods, and emissaries from the Palace. There was even a time when there were telephone linemen who came to our house and installed a direct line. They were from Malacanang. And the entreaty was: This is a direct line that gets you to the Malacanang operator. Parang gusto lang ipaalam ni Pangulong Marcos to my father that there was a direct line to the President, that any time he wanted to call Malacanang, he could. But my father never used it. He never gave in.”
But still, until now, even if he is of good political stock, some people are of the impression that he is not so politically oriented. He is not just reluctant but also shy, and seems to dislike political pow-wows, especially with traditional politicians with greasy faces and greasier morals.
Mar concedes some truth to that impression. “My training, my experiences, my first successes, my first taste of victories as a professional was in the business world. The experience of standing up on the stage and waving, the satisfaction from that, is of recent vintage. So it’s not something that I thirst for. I told myself I would work in the private sector until I am 50 or 55, then near my retirement, I would do something for our country. That was my plan.
When I was very young, I was, in Visayan, upod-upod, sama-sama, of my maternal grandfather who was in business. So I saw Farmers Market and Ali Mall being built. I was the one who was carrying his attaché case, who was driving him around, his all-around messenger.”
But the palm of one’s life is crossed with destinies unseen. When Mar was 35 years old and already used to 18-hour work days in Wall Street, there was a vacancy for the congressional seat in the 1st district of Capiz. His younger brother, Gerardo Jr. or “Dinggoy,” was the congressman, and he passed away because of cancer. A special election was held, and Mar was asked to run.
“All the leaders told me why not give it a try? If you really don’t like politics, then after finishing the remaining one and a half year terms of Dinggoy, don’t run again.” My thinking is, if I go into politics, then it’s not feasible to be there for only one and a half years. Sayang naman kasi. How could you give it your best efforts if you would be there for only one and a half years? I did not harbor any ambition to stay long, I just told myself to be open-minded about the whole thing. It’s not good to work with one foot in, one foot out. The work will just turn out to be shoddy. So I ran for the special elections and I won. I was also lucky that in my first term, I was able to pass a law, Republic Act 7880. The Department of Education calls that the Roxas Law—the Fair and Equitable Access to Education Act. This law stipulates that the Education Department’s budget for classrooms should be pro-rated according to student population. Thus, the more shortage, the more classrooms should be built. And finally, ten percent of the Education Department’s budget should be in the discretion of the Secretary so that he or she could fund emergencies when they arise.”
Some circles say that the departed Dinggoy had more political flair. Even Mar concedes Dinggoy was the better politician. People in Capiz and Iloilo remember Dinggoy with fondness. Dinggoy never left the country and studied here (Ateneo; UP), while Mar went to an Ivy League school and worked in Wall Street. Thus, when Mar returned, he carried with him the virtues of punctuality and efficiency which, until now, he expects of everybody he deals with. No half-measures for him. Everything must be, in his favorite phrase, from “soup to nuts.” In short, everything is planned so well as if there is a matrix inscribed on stone. That is why, one man tells me in Iloilo, during the early days of Congressman Mar, when they arrived one hour late for a 7 A.M. meeting, Mar would be irritated. “Sana, nag-shave man lang muna ako ng maayos kung alam kong one hour kayo male-late!” He once scolded a governor in the south, in public, for starting a program two hours late—and this governor even belonged to the Liberal Party!
The same sense of purpose and efficiency he carried into his DTI work, where he focused on the palengke as the index of economic prosperity for the country and for his senatorial run. How did Mar Roxas find Senate work as compared to the get-up-and-go work as a DTI Secretary visiting public markets every week?
“The nature of the job in the Senate is very different from my four-year stint as a DTI Secretary. The output here is in the nature of policy prescriptions, advocacies, and support for or against the position taken by others. In the senate, we try to shape the public agenda. At DTI, the nature of the job is problem-solving, making a decision, and then implementing that decision. So it’s two different jobs altogether. Each has its own pluses and minuses. Each has its own attractions. But here, the frustration is that you can only advocate a policy; you cannot implement it. If somebody decides not to implement it, or to implement it differently or at a different pace, then you are just on the sidelines trying to effect a change. You are not a decision-maker. On the other hand, in the executive, you are the decision-maker. You implement it. But you are not in control of the agenda.”
