“HINDI NAMAN (Not really), because people change and
circumstances change, especially in politics. We should not close doors or burn
bridges unless absolutely called for or warranted.”
So was Senate President Aquilino Pimentel III’s response
to Rappler.com on former president
and outgoing Pampanga 2nd District Rep. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo
joining PDP-Laban which he heads.
It is not too distant to completely recede from public
memory that Pimentel once accused GMA of electoral fraud in the 2007 polls –
rising out of his electoral protest against GMA ally Senator Juan Miguel
Zubiri, whom Pimentel successfully unseated in 2011.
In the wake of that victory, Pimentel filed an
electoral sabotage case against GMA and then First Gentleman Jose Miguel Arroyo.
And burn bridges too, Pimentel did with long-time
friend Vice President Jejomar Binay in 2013, when he found his name alongside
Zubiri’s in the senatorial slate of Binay’s United Nationalist Alliance.
Somewhat discordant is Pimentel’s new tune now –
with GMA -- given his “principled” stand at the time of his electoral protest, no?
But then, has it not been so trite for so long
that it has become a truism that politics does make strange bedfellows?
In this instance, politics transposing to
federalism. Thus, Pimentel: “If someone wants to help the cause of federalism,
then why not accept him/her with open arms?”
GMA publicly champions the cause of federalism.
Furthered Pimentel: “But she must be the one to
change by embracing the PDP-Laban’s core principles of belief in God, human
dignity, love of country, equal opportunities for all, consultative and
participatory democracy, and federalism.”
Yeah, GMA publicly champions the cause of
federalism. So, she has sworn her loyalty to its principal advocate, the
PDP-Laban. It naturally follows.
It cannot help though that some hidden agenda are
seen, not without malicious glee, by a number of netizens and coffeeshop analysts
in GMA’s party switch.
On the short term, her return to the Senate where
she sat from 1992 to 1998. (Her first election as sampay bakod, her second as valedictorian, thanks to the Nora Aunor
imagery.)
And from there, the enactment of legislation
changing the form of government to federalism.
In the not-so-long-haul, under a federal system,
GMA easily winning a seat in parliament and on to becoming prime minister.
Yes, that is how far into the future GMA’s fluttering
butterfly act has gone, in the minds of not so few. Taking a life of its own in
the public discussion. Like:
It is exigent – not to say expedient too – that all
this change to federalism has to happen not only within the term of President
Duterte but at the time that: 1) he is enjoying the “high” trust of the public;
2) he controls both Houses of Congress; 3) the “yellow stain” has been excised
from the guardian of the electoral system; 4) the Supreme Court is being
battered to submission to the presidential will, or will-not, as the case may
be; and 5) the Armed Forces of the Philippines and the Philippine National
Police are at his beck and call.
Yes, there obtains even a short cut – verily a
short circuit – to the process: RevGov.
No, not Reverend Governor that was the title of
my book on Among Ed Panlilio, but
Revolutionary Government as currently mouthed by Duterte and dutifully amplified
by his minions.
Indeed, what tangled web we weave when we know
that we are being deceived.
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