MANILA, Philippines -- The opposition plans to hold a big rally this Friday, where it aims to get a million people in the streets to push President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo out of Malacańang, reminiscent of the EDSA People Power I and II uprisings. The two big groups that traditionally deliver the crowds won?t be there: El Shaddai and Iglesia ni Cristo. The Catholic Bishops? Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) has not made an official stand on the rally and remains deeply divided over whether or not to exhort the faithful to march in the streets, with a handful of bishops calling for all-out street action while many more are against the ouster of Ms Arroyo.
An emergency meeting was reportedly called by the CBCP to clarify what it means by ?communal action? but reports say its president, Archbishop Angel Lagdameo, is not waiting for it. Reports say he and Bishop Antonio Tobias have been campaigning in parish priests around Metro Manila, exhorting them to each deliver at least 3,000 people for the rally.
I?m frankly skeptical about this target. To deliver 3,000 people means loading them in 60 buses, as they may not want to be stuck in traffic with their cars. With bus rentals at P5,000, parish priests would each have to raise P300,000 for the rally. Tall order.
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Some schools are also reported to be planning to join Friday?s rally and will bus their students rain or shine. This has drawn protests from many parents who don?t want their children to be used and involved in the politics of hatred. So concerned have some parents become that they have set up two blog spots where other parents can air their sentiments: www.pulitikangpinoy.blogspot.com and www.8sallpolitics.blogspot.com. Anonymous bloggers are welcome.
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The politics of hatred is nowhere more apparent than in the Senate. For instance, as Philippine Star columnist Federico Pascual lamented last Sunday, Sen. Jamby Madrigal had threatened at the Senate hearings to divulge all the unsavory things she knew about Commission on Higher Educaiton Chair Romy Neri if he refused to testify. This is blackmail. While Madrigal bears a name fabled for its wealth, her manners are worse than those of the least educated jeepney driver.
Equally sad is that Cory Aquino now likens star witness Jun Lozada to Ninoy Aquino and Bishop Teodoro Bacani compares him to Jesus Christ. As Pascual noted, thanks to adoring media, every utterance of this witness, whose stewardship at government-controlled Philippine Forest Corp. was marked by graft and nepotism, is swallowed by the public as gospel truth, even though he has not presented a shred of evidence. To paraphrase Shakespeare, many have lost their reason. We must all pause and pray until it comes back to our society.
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The end game of the rally is to force President Arroyo to resign, but political pundits such as Fr. Joaquin Bernas, S.J., know she won?t do that. This realization is one reason many citizens do not want to take to the streets. Many from the middle class also refuse to contribute to the chaos that will surely engulf us in an extra-constitutional move, especially since this is going to hurt our economic recovery. Still others say, why not wait until 2010? Those who believe a corruption case against Ms Arroyo can prosper can file it the moment she leaves office and sheds her immunity, and then she?ll have to face the music.
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I?ve been asked about my stand on the current conflict. I do not subscribe to any extra-constitutional attempt to oust the President as it would only worsen the situation, especially since those who are after Ms Arroyo?s blood are also calling for the ouster of Vice President Noli de Castro for having been supportive of her. There?s now an orchestrated campaign to discredit De Castro as well as Senate President Manuel Villar, who has been hounded by those controversial Pag-IBIG Fund loans. What?s foreseeable is that a few politicians who cannot win election as president or even vice president and a sprinkling of rightist and leftist elements could end up grabbing power through a junta. This is unacceptable.
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There?s another possibility of resolving the crisis that was opened, perhaps unwittingly, by President Arroyo herself when she recently revealed over radio that she agreed to witness the ZTE national broadband network (NBN) deal even after being advised of some irregularities on the eve of her departure for China in order to preserve Philippine-Chinese relations. This stunning revelation is now regarded by Villar and other senators as strong ground for her impeachment.
This process is much better than people power as it is legal and orderly and constitutional succession is guaranteed. If the House opposition, in tandem with former Speaker Jose de Venecia, works hard, they might be able to muster the 80 votes needed to dispatch a resolution to the Senate. Oppositionists argue that Ms Arroyo would just buy off the House members, but in 2001 few thought a move to impeach Joseph Estrada would prosper.
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There?s inaccuracy regarding the ZTE document signed in Boao, China, last April, and peddling it shows the opposition?s intellectual dishonesty. President Arroyo went to Boao mainly to deliver a speech before the biannual gathering of international leaders there. Afterwards she planned to spend a week in China, but First Gentleman Mike Arroyo?s condition forced her to cut her visit to only 12 hours. Before flying back, Ms Arroyo witnessed the signing of several agreements by various government officials, among them the ZTE deal.
What was signed, however, was not a contract, but only a memorandum of understanding on a supply contract, which is only Step No. 3 in a 17-step process that includes multi-department reviews. The Department of Finance late last year circulated an enlightening graph showing this long process. The many steps could be the reason the cancellation of the deal took five months. But this graph was ignored by the media, which chose instead to strengthen the perception that the ZTE ?contract? was consummated at Boao.
