The Trillanes Shakedown: A Blockchain use-case opportunity

Carljoe Javier
Sep 7, 2018 · 2 min read

The hullabaloo around arresting Senator Trillanes (which, if it happens, would make him the second senator openly opposing the president to be jailed) has brought me around to seeing a great opportunity for applying blockchain in the day to day.

Very briefly, I want to express that I’m surprised that I’ve fallen on the same side as Trillanes on a number of issues. I have absolutely no affinity for the mutiny that brought him into the public’s attention, and I’m surprised that since this administration started, it’s his voice that has been leading the charge in defending democracy and freedom.

At present the assertion is that he never filed a plea for amnesty or pardon, and as a result, the president’s goons are saying that they can arrest him for it now. While Trillanes asserts that he did file the right documentation, it seems to be “missing” or “can’t be found.” This is, either oddly or chillingly, very similar to the inability to find the now-ousted Chief Justice Sereno’s filing of documents, which was used as an unconstitutional basis for her removal.

So where does blockchain come into this whole mix? With the promise of NFTs and the possibility of filing documents onto the blockchain, we can imagine what public records could look like and how this situation would not even exist. I’m no expert, but discussions on using blockchain for land registry, blockchain for documenting medical records, and this great piece on use cases for blockchain in government show that there’s a lot to be gained by putting important documentation in a truly public and decentralized ledger.

What we fear from centralized power, like government, is its ability to abuse that power. And because it is centralized, there’s nothing that we can do. If you think about it in video game terms, if the game developer suddenly changes the rules and nerfs your character, or jacks up prices, or closes down their servers altogether, you can do nothing. Well, if your government starts changing up the rules, or starts doing things that are against what you stand for, particularly if your government has a strongman at the helm and lacks strong institutions and principled people who will defend democracy, well…you’re screwed.

Which is where we find Trillanes at the moment.

But now imagine that all documentation were required to be on the blockchain. I am well aware that at this point the government struggles to even digitize everything, but if we were to put everything there, as a public ledger that everyone has access to, then we would be able to verify the claims of each side much more easily. What’s even more exciting is the accountability that we could hold people to if their records were up on the blockchain. As someone who is incredibly frustrated by the government and its insistence on undermining the principles and practice of democracy, I can see that the blockchain, with its promise of open information, could be a powerful tool for holding officials accountable and protecting our rights and ourselves.

Carljoe Javier

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I try to write about something interesting every day. Will post thoughts on work, art, tech, and anything else I'm up to.