No More EDSAs?

By Antonio C. Abaya
Standard Today
February 24, 2009

President Arroyo was emphatic. Said she on Feb. 22, on the 23rd anniversary of the start of the Edsa People Power “revolution”:
 
“The world embraced Edsa I in 1986. The world tolerated Edsa II in 2001. The world will not forgive an Edsa III, but it will instead condemn the Philippines as a country whose political system is hopelessly unstable……”
 
Speaking at a wreath-laying ceremony at the Libingan ng mga Bayani in Taguig, President Arroyo asked the Filipinos “not to relive the four days in 1986, but instead “to learn from it and refresh our spirit against the new challenges of today.”
 
She noted that the financial crisis had driven two thirds of the world into recession while the Philippines remained relatively unscathed. “Our political stability today is one the reasons why we have escaped thus far the worst effects of the global recession.
 
“It is boldness that we must exercise to prevent the world crisis from becoming a Philippine crisis and to protect those among our people from hurt from the global downturn.” (Philippine Daily Inquirer, Feb. 23, 2009)
 
It is obvious that the reason why President Arroyo does not want an Edsa III to happen in 2009 is because she would be the object of its anger, she would be the target of its militancy, and her premature fall from power – like Ferdinand Marcos’ in 1986 and Joseph Estrada’s  in 2001 - would be the measure of its success.
 
Would the world “condemn the Philippines as a country whose political system is hopelessly unstable”? Highly unlikely. The world is so caught up in the struggle to survive the raging global recession that it would hardly skip a beat if Malacanang Palace and the Batasang Pambansa were both invaded by aliens from outer space and all their occupants abducted and beamed off to Andromeda, their brains to be examined by alien scientists to better understand the Chemistry and Psychology of Greed of Filipino earthlings..
 
Such a bizarre incident would earn sound bytes in CNN and the BBC as a monumental  diversion from current mundane concerns, as a lively sequel to the Roswell Incident, not as a commentary on the instability of political systems.
 
There will always be time-space for Edsas, not just in the Philippines but also in other cultures and climes, as long  as people feel aggrieved because their leaders have betrayed and are betraying them, and all other avenues of legitimate protest and dissent are being closed and denied to them.
 
There will always be time-space for Edsas as long as the electoral process is co-opted by Big Money from vested interests who buy the results through massive PR and advertising campaigns in favor of candidates who will protect their interests, through systematic manipulation of the process, through commercial trafficking in votes (especially in Muslim Mindanao) as has happened recently, especially in 1992, 1995, 2004 and 2007.
 
There will always be time-space for Edsas as long as the judicial processes are corrupted by the very same manipulative malevolent geniuses who have also corrupted the electoral and the political processes, in their megalomania to preserve themselves in power indefinitely.
 
Will the world accept or condemn another Edsa? The world couldn’t care less as it has more pressing concerns to attend to. The more relevant question should be: Will the Filipinos – especially the crucial middle-class - accept or condemn another Edsa?
 
My sense is that the Filipino middle-class will accept or condemn another Edsa depending  on who will be the major players in it. In 1986, the unseen but very palpable major player in what became Edsa 1 was the memory of the beloved Ninoy Aquino. His widow, Cory Aquino, became the rallying focus of the incipient uprising. It was the sense of outrage over Ninoy’s assassination that impelled the middle-class to come out in their tens of thousands to attend the weekly street demos in Metro Manila.
 
But the tipping point came when the military – led by Defense Secretary Juan Ponce Enrile, Constabulary Chief Gen. Fidel Ramos and Army Col. Gregorio Honasan and the Reform the Armed Forces Movement (RAM) – staged a mutiny on Feb. 22, 1986 against President Marcos.
 
The vastly outnumbered mutineers could have been crushed by the Marcos loyalist military if it had acted fast enough. The mutiny was saved by the arrival of hundreds of thousands of middle-class Filipinos, who, rallied by Jaime Cardinal Sin on Radio Veritas,  embraced the mutineers’ camps with their presence and thus prevented the Marcos loyalists from crushing the mutiny.
 
Could a similar scenario repeat itself in 2009 or 2010? Most certainly, Yes. It is true that most middle-class Filipinos have pointedly stayed away from the many street demos and aborted military mutinies from 2005 to the present. But the anger and disgust over the Arroyo government in 2009 is as real and combustible as that against the Marcos government in 1983-86.
 
What is missing in 2005-2009 has been a prominent civilian figure around whom the middle-class could rally. The middle-class have largely stayed away from the many street demos and aborted mutinies in this period largely because a) these protest actions were seen as attempts to restore to power the convicted plunderer Joseph Estrada; and b) the presence of red flags at these demos indicated the active presence of Communists, out to manipulate popular discontent to promote their Maoist revolution.
 
In the coming denouement between now and whenever, a prominent civilian figure must stand out as a rallying figure for the middle-class. There must also be no room for the trapos and political dynasts who want to restore to power the convicted plunderer Joseph Estrada, or for the Communists who want to install an archaic Maoist dictatorship of the proletariat with monopoly of power for Joma Sison’s CPP.
 
If such a political environment can come about, then a military mutiny can and will prosper, with the active participation of the middle-class, and it will be Edsa all over again.
 
And there should be no fears about world public opinion condemning another Edsa. What world public opinion are we concerned about anyway? The Hong Kong-based Political and Economic Risks Consultancy Ltd has ranked Gloria’s Philippines as the most corrupt country in East and Southeast Asia for the past two years.. The Berlin-based Transparency International has continuously downgraded Gloria’s Philippines as one of the most corrupt countries in the world.
 
The Washington DC-based World Bank and the Manila-based Asian Development Bank, both prominent multinational agencies,  have in recent weeks lamented the level of corruption in the Philippine government of President Arroyo.
 
Last year, the government of Sweden suddenly and without explanation closed its embassy in Manila. Since Sweden is one of the richest countries in the world, as well as one of the least corrupt, one can only conclude that the Swedes were not trying to save money, but were expressing in a diplomatic way their disgust at the corruption in this country under this government.
 
Philippine and world public opinion would in fact welcome another Edsa if the right elements are present and the wrong elements are absent. *****
 
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