When politics goes beyond reality and finds it locus in the realm of the illusory, then the looming disaster is levied upon the political subjects of governance as the people wallow in the mire of their elected leader’s incompetence.

A glaring example was former President Noynoy Aquino who, despite his inexperience in governance and public service, was seated to the topmost executive position in the country.Those who catapulted him to the presidency were fed with the illusion that his mother, the late former President Cory Aquino, would automatically pass on to her son the charisma or the innate abilities of running this country.

Of course, that too was an illusion of the so-called EDSA I miracle, as peddled by the church and her handlers.

And so, what did we get? A President who neglected one of the most essential needs of his constituency. Sitting on hindsight, Sen. Richard Gordon, with statistics on hand, revealed that vaccination was unmindfully set aside by PNoy’s administration.

From 91 percent vaccination activity of the government in 2013, the immunization program went down to 75 percent in 2014, then 69 percent for 2015 and down the drain to 39 percent in 2018, according to Gordon.

However, as the presidential elections of 2016 were in the offing, PNoy and the Department of Health (DoH), headed then by a politician rather than a medical practitioner, Janette Garin, hurriedly implemented the Dengvaxia mass vaccination. This program had been exposed as one deadly fiasco of the past administration.

To date that presidential neglect created mass paranoia and is now pinpointed as the main culprit for the measles outbreak now spreading havoc, not only in the metropolis, but even in the countryside. Poor little kids are dying by the hundreds.

The senatorial electoral campaign has kicked off and the fever has set in. Again, the tragedy of illusory choices is setting in, probably replicating the mistakes that would eventually take its toll on the people because of incompetency.

Even alternative choices that drift away from the traditional politics of “guns, goons and gold” or the dynasty transitions could be illusory since they may be giving false hopes. We cannot confuse sincere advocacies with administrative skills in public service.

And what could be worse than in the senatorial ratings slate a prospective winner is well entrenched in the sixth slot, simply because he was cast as a good guy in that popular and long-standing evening action telenovela, Ang Probinsiyano?

In fact, a comebacking congressman in San Juan City is jittery these days as his opponent is also a denizen of the popular evening telenovela!

In public service, competence begins with experience, especially in the executive functions of government and sustained by the natural charisma and a relational affinity with the real constituents such as the majority of marginalized members of society.

PNoy at the beginning of his presidency ignored the plight of some 150,000 overseas Filipino workers (OFW) in Hong Kong when all he had to do was say “I am sorry” to the family of the victims of that infamous carnage of Hong Kong tourists back in August 2010.

It took former President now Manila Mayor Joseph Estrada to break the impasse when he took it upon himself to bring to the Hong Kong authorities the three magic words. Erap had the experience, being a local executive, identified with the poor masses and a natural charisma for public service.

President Rodrigo Duterte bested the two other top-rated presidential aspirants, namely, Grace Poe and Mar Roxas, for reasons we do not need to guess what.

That overwhelming people’s choice for Duterte was real, not illusory.