IT’S THE 30th
anniversary of the EDSA Revolution.
But more than that event, it is Martial Law – chalking
its 43rd year of infamy this coming September 21 yet – that is
getting the greater remembering, public memory stoked by a media feeding
frenzy.
No Marcos loyalist here,
in fact a martial law victim myself, but I sense method to this madness, and malice
to the method of this upsurge in Marcos denunciation: The glare of the
spotlight on martial law abuses blinds the nation to the utter failures of
EDSA, as well as its own excesses.
Nunquam iterum! So we raise our voices hoarse at martial law. Terrified as we are now
at the specter of its resurrection in Marcos Junior. So, rightfully, should the
sins of the father be visited upon the son?
Never again! So we may
equally shout at EDSA. Given where it has led to – from the tragedy that was
Ninoy to the farce that is Noynoy.
And the farce goes on.
Just look at the buffoonery in the five-ring circus that is the presidential campaign. Which makes me think
all the more of Marcos. Not so much for his tyranny, as for the breadth and
depth of his keen understanding, if not mastery, of Philippine politics. Thus:
MORE OFTEN the politician
neither legislates nor administers so much as he intervenes and mediates.
He achieves a personalized
relationship with his constituents as individual persons, more anxious about
doing things for each of them rather than for all of them. A bridge, a school,
or a rural development project, although
important, is not enough.
Has he been approachable? Has he managed to place a son in a Manila office?
Where was he when a fire
broke out or a typhoon came? How personally generous has he been with the needs
of certain influential leaders? If he fails in these personalist tests, he
fails as a politician.
Are the people to blame
for this state of affairs? Hardly, for conditions are such that the majority
depend on the government. But are the politicians, who are simply responding to
the situation as they see it? I would say Yes.
Within the undeniably
practical limits of political survival, politicians can and should try out some
innovations that will transform the political culture from being populist,
personalist and individualist to being more nationalist, institutional and
socialist, in the strict meaning of being more conscious about the needs of
society and the national community…
One reason for the
pervasiveness of corruption is that in being part of the system, everyone it touches
seems to benefit…The corrupt politician who is at the same time accessible to
his constituents has more chances of staying in power than an honest one “who
has not done anything.”
He probably takes his
legislative or executive work more seriously, concentrating on collective goals
to the detriment of political “fence mending,” but he is more often judged by
the populist, personalist and individualist standards of the political culture.
A true politician should
be able to lead his constituency in a precarious present toward an uncertain
future, but he dares not initiate or innovate unless he can be sure it will not
cost his position.
It is easy to condemn him
for lack of moral courage, but what good is a businessman without a business, a
politician without policy? “I must see where my people are going so that I may
lead them,” an Athenian politician
was supposed to have said.
There are certain conditions, however, in which this attitude cannot be a
useful principle of democratic leadership.
AS TRUE today as 42 years
ago when penned in Today’s Revolution:
Democracy.
Populist. Personalist.
Individualist. Marcos distilled the essence of all that is wrong, aye, the very
evil of politics in the country. Proof positive once more of the Great
Ferdinand’s mastery of political domain.
Even more – testament anew
to the persistent prevalence of politics as plunder in the Philippine praxis.
EDSA Uno no matter. EDSA Dos, whatsoever. BS Aquino III, no bother.
Indeed, Santayana, by our
disremembering, we are nation deserving of our damning.
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