Why Yesterday’s “Great Debate” Fell Short of Being a Real Debate

In my view, yesterday’s event did not live up to being called “The Great Debate.” A debate, by definition, requires direct rebuttals, clear positions challenged by equally clear counterarguments. What we witnessed instead felt closer to parallel presentations than a genuine clash of ideas.

The most concerning gap appeared in the first round. The Pro panel failed to surface or directly confront the core issues surrounding their position. This is precisely why I found myself leaning more toward the Anti side, particularly in light of the undisclosed grant support reportedly offered by Polygon to the Pro blockchain panel. When financial backing exists, transparency is not optional. It becomes even more critical when the proposal involves placing the Filipino people’s national budget on a public blockchain.

Round One was labeled Infrastructure, and I expected it to be the most technically grounded segment of the discussion. Instead, it avoided the hard questions. There was little examination of custody models, expanded attack surfaces, phishing risks, recovery or rollback mechanisms, and, most importantly, how institutional control is preserved when code becomes final. These are not edge cases, they are foundational concerns when public funds are involved.

As part of the audience, I raised questions that directly targeted these issues. Unfortunately, they were not acknowledged by the facilitator. That silence mattered. A debate on public finance and national accountability should not filter out discomfort, it should invite it.

That said, credit is due where it is earned. I genuinely appreciated Jason Torres for what I would call a silent punchline toward the end of the discussion, specifically in calling out the branding of “BayaniChain.” The clarification landed quietly but powerfully, BayaniChain is not an independently owned blockchain, but an implementation built on a third-party public network, Polygon, a chain fundamentally optimized for decentralized finance. That distinction matters, especially in a conversation about sovereignty, control, and public funds. Kudos for that, sir.

Ultimately, the organizers did not fully maximize the platform they had. With the stakes this high, the conversation required sharper moderation, enforced rebuttals, and a deliberate focus on unresolved risks rather than surface-level consensus.

If we are serious about using blockchain in government, particularly for budgets funded by taxpayers, then the bar for public discourse must be far higher. Transparency, technical rigor, and accountability are not optional, they are the minimum requirement.