Pascual Racuyal

[[File:Pascual Racuyal 1949.jpg|thumb|right|165px|That one president the Philippines never had.]]
{{politics}}
'''Pascual B. Racuyal''' {{lived|1911|2004}} was a [[Perennial candidate|perennial joke candidate]] who is best known for having sought the presidency in the [[Philippines]] for most of the 20<sup>th</sup> century,<ref name="lacierda">[https://twitter.com/dawende/status/1050982706190802944?lang=en Edwin Lacierda: We have seen a handful of clowns filing their COC’s before the Comelec.]</ref> all despite having next to no political experience and with his political platform being either an utter joke at best or [[crank]]ery at worst.<ref>[http://web.archive.org/web/20040414164228/http://www.inq7.net/opi/2004/jan/14/opi_arocampo-1.htm Pascual B. Racuyal]</ref> Despite this, his "campaigns" were seen by Filipinos as an amusing diversion to an otherwise tense electoral atmosphere, and he actually made a bit of a dent in the polls, scoring third place after {{wpl|Ferdinand Marcos}} and {{wpl|Sergio Osmeña Jr.}} with 778 votes&nbsp;– and even getting more votes than other relatively serious candidates by a wide margin&nbsp;– during the 1969 presidential elections.

==The man, the myth, the legend==
Little is known about Racuyal's life, apart from growing up in Barangay Tinago in Cebu City and taking up blue collar jobs{{efn|Sources vary on whether he was a mechanic or a garbage collector<ref>[https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1985-12-12-8503260038-story.html "IT'S NOT JUST A 2-WAY RACE"]. ''Chicago Tribune''. Retrieved 21 February 2023.</ref>}} at an early age. For some strange reason, he had an urge to run for the presidency, first mounting his bid in 1935{{efn|During the Commonwealth era, the Philippines was transitioning from American colonial rule, if not for the Japanese [[World War II|crashing the party]] less than a decade later.}} up until 1986 when the {{wpl|Commission on Elections (Philippines)|Commission on Elections}} (COMELEC) eventually put a stop to his [[bullshit]] and deemed him a "nuisance candidate", i.e. a [[troll]] seen as someone sending the otherwise sacred elections to disrepute.

His political platforms and promises brimmed with [[crank magnetism]] and a healthy dose of trolling over the years: he pledged to have roads and highways paved with plastic to prevent deterioration,<ref name="ocampo">Ocampo, Ambeth R. (23 October 2015). [http://opinion.inquirer.net/89633/president-pascual-racuyal "'President' Pascual Racuyal"]. Philippine Daily Inquirer. Retrieved 21 February 2023.</ref> (road decay is honestly quite a common occurrence in the country; the plastic roads idea is also [[stopped clock|ahead of its time]] if not for its infeasibility at the time he made that claim) promised to have the whole of Manila air conditioned to spare its citizens the trouble of being subjected to sweltering tropical heat,<ref>Teodoro, Luis V. (22 October 2012) [https://cmfr-phil.org/inmediasres/luis-teodoro/nuisance-candidates-all/ Nuisance candidates all]. ''Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility''.</ref> and later in his electoral career, claimed that he would govern the whole country "by satellite and remote control" if elected.<ref name="tribune">[https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1985-12-12-8503260038-story.html "IT'S NOT JUST A 2-WAY RACE"]. Chicago Tribune. Retrieved 23 February 2020.</ref> And if that wasn't enough, he recited [[Abraham Lincoln]]'s famous Gettysburg Address as what Filipino lawyer and former presidential spokesperson Edwin Lacierda recalled on [[Twitter]].<ref name="lacierda"/>

However, despite the obvious crank magnetism Racuyal exhibited, one author opined that he was a product of circumstance considering the context of the American colonial and later Commonwealth period where Filipinos were for the first time exposed to the concept of democracy: "Racuyal grew up in a time when a generation of young Filipinos trooped to public schools to learn for the first time the processes of an electoral democracy, the duties of modern citizenship, the bright promise of a ‘government of the people, by the people, and for the people,’ and of equality under the law, such that any young Juan de la Cruz (a symbol of the common citizen invented in the American period) can aspire and dream of becoming President of the Philippines." As cranky as Racuyal was at the time, there was at least [[stopped clock|some basis]] to his rather ambitious political platforms.<ref name="Suralta">{{Cite web |last=Suralta |first=Bryle B. |date=2024-01-04 |title=The Story of Pascual Racuyal, the Eccentric Presidential Aspirant Who Became a Folk Hero |url=https://www.esquiremag.ph/long-reads/features/pascual-racuyal-profile-history-a00007-20240104-lfrm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240109141854/https://www.esquiremag.ph/long-reads/features/pascual-racuyal-profile-history-a00007-20240104-lfrm |archive-date=2024-01-09 |access-date=2024-05-30 |website=Esquire}}</ref>

Racuyal sadly went under the radar since 1986 and died in obscurity in 2004.<ref name="ocampo"/>

==Nuisance candidates in the Philippines==
Racuyal and his antics are far from the only occurrence of nuisance candidacies in the Philippines, as it has been a {{wpl|Nuisance candidate|recurring phenomenon}} in the country for the past century, with [[fringe]] candidates ranging from [[cranks]] who sought to earn a trillion dollars for the Philippines,<ref name="tribune"/> wannabe comedians,<ref>Marfil, Martin (March 17, 2004). [https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=b1c1AAAAIBAJ&sjid=iSUMAAAAIBAJ&pg=1895%2C14355402 "Gill declared a nuisance candidate by COMELEC"]. ''Philippine Daily Inquirer''. Retrieved 21 February 2023.</ref> neo-colonialists who sought to have [[United States|Uncle Sam]] subsume the Philippines as a 51<sup>st</sup> state<ref name="Suralta"/> and even crackpots such as a certain Andres Calamunggay Ugboc who unironically ran on a "[[horoscope|horoscopic]]" political platform.<ref>[https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=897150057629272 BALIKAN: Taong 1992 pa sumubok maging kandidato sa pagkapangulo ni Andres Calamunggay Ugboc.]</ref>

While any (natural-born) Filipino has the right to run for public office in the interest of [[democracy]], extralegal restrictions imposed by the Commission on Elections were codified under section 69 of the Omnibus Election Code, declaring aspiring candidates as "nuisance" if they are either determined to be sending the electoral process to certain mockery or if the candidate has no ''bona fide'' intention to run for office.<ref>[http://www.comelec.gov.ph/?r=References/RelatedLaws/OmnibusElectionCode/OECArt9#sec69 "Omnibus Election Code - Article IX - Eligibility of Candidates and Certificate of Candidacy"]. COMELEC. Retrieved 21 February 2023.</ref> Being unable to have the financial means to mount a campaign was previously grounds for a nuisance candidacy, though the Supreme Court ruled in ''Marquez v. COMELEC'' that the lack of capability to fund an election campaign is not a reason for the commission to declare someone as a nuisance candidate.<ref>[https://businessmirror.com.ph/2020/07/30/marquez-v-comelec/ Marquez vs. COMELEC]</ref>

The main takeaway here&nbsp;– and a rather unfortunate one at that&nbsp;– is that these crank candidates whom the COMELEC routinely dismiss as jokes are small potatoes compared to ''actual'' candidates who have done ''far worse'' for the country than someone with either an apparent mental condition or are seeking public office just for the hell of it, further exposing the Philippine electoral system as little more than a farce susceptible to ridicule.<ref name="Suralta"/> And it speaks volumes on how the Filipino masses have become so utterly ignorant that they'd vote [[Appeal to celebrity|on the basis of popularity or clout]],<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20060324035039/http://www.philippinenews.com/news/view_article.html?article_id=41019a7445e567319d347f901ee222ec Looking for Racuyal]</ref> or longing for the [[good old days]] (or simply because a crooked candidate cynically bought votes from desperate masses who see peso signs in their eyes), all while failing to see the bigger picture and eventually complaining or taking their gripes to the streets and demand for the president's resignation [[Philippines#People Power Revolution|EDSA]]-style. Racuyal and his successors may have provided the country with cheap lulz to add some comic relief to an otherwise tumultuous electoral scene, but he (along with countless other crackpot candidates) are a symptom of an even bigger problem in the Philippines.

==See also==
*[[Vermin Supreme]], the American equivalent

==Notes==
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==References==
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Racuyal, Pascual}}
[[Category:Crank magnetism]]
[[Category:Comedians]]
[[Category:Perennial candidates]]
[[Category:Philippines]]
[[Category:Trolls]]

Categories: Crank magnetism, Comedians, Perennial candidates, Philippines, Trolls