Author Topic: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?  (Read 11475 times)

Way Nada

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #40 on: March 04, 2010, 01:48:14 PM »

edsa I was a nation's effort to effect change.  after 21 years, we have bent backward too long.  the process may have had its failings.  there may have been puppeteers who held the strings.  (well, who says revolutions don't have manipulators?)  the results may be disappointing as we are disappointed now.  but edsa uno at least assured us that power is still in the people. 

let the new generation learn better and effect change better.  best of all, let the new generation be better politicians than their elders.  (by the way, is jinggoy better than erap?)   



I agree with you partly that edsa One is an effort to effect a change but I think not the whole nation agree with Edsa. This is not a simple case of changing your shirt when it's dirty. This has something to do with politics. So if we are talking here about change... is it not the declaration of "Martial Law" was also an effort by Marcos to effect a change?

What were the reasons why Marcos was interested for Filipinos to live in a "New Society"? And what are the reasons of the late Ninoy, Cory and Cardinal Sin, the Manila elite and owners of big business to backslide to the old society?

I think we can draw here a comparison. The notion that Marcos declared Martial Law because he wanted to extend his power is too unreasonable an alibi, but he declared Martial Law because he believed the country was in danger of rebellion, which is in my opinion his declaration was legal and within the confine of the constitution.

Your idea that Edsa One as an "effect of change" was actually staged, orchestrated and manipulated is a clear admission that it is not truly from the people but caused by people who were sworn enemies of Marcos politically.
   
During the time of Marcos he signed more than 8,000 decrees, letters of instruction, executive orders and presidential proclamations for the good of the country and if they were really for change and they think Marcos is wrong and he is bad, they should have repealed all these laws... but the truth is; they did not repeal the laws Marcos signed because it works for the Filipino people until now.

Your question; "is jinggoy better than erap".... is one also of the reasons why Marcos changed our system of electing our nation's leaders. This is dealing more on the personality of the person rather than the issue of governance and its party's platform. When Marcos introduced the "New Society" he changed our electoral system to "block voting" . This is a system of election where you have to vote for a party and not a person.     


WN

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vhinz08

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #41 on: March 04, 2010, 03:13:09 PM »
naa ko sa balay nanglampaso ko aning higayona samtang akong papa nagpanday sa amo-ang ba-y, naminaw mi sa radio sa dihang nahitabo ang unang edsa rebolusyon.

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #42 on: March 04, 2010, 08:59:50 PM »
I was at Nagtahan Road facing the soldiers who were carrying high-powered guns. We were up close with them separated only by barbed wires. We were waiting for the inevitable. Suddenly rocks and hollowblock pieces were thrown in our direction. Ngadto nganhi ang among pagdinaganay. Inig kalinaw-linaw na, thanks sa kaparian nga nagpatunga, mobalik na sab mi sa among pwesto atubangan sa mga sundalo nga luoy pud tan-awon kay nagpaniid ra pud sila kon unsay mahitabo.

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islander

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #43 on: March 04, 2010, 10:03:33 PM »
well taken, WN.  but we fool ourselves by expecting overnight change.  sometimes, change takes its little, hesitant steps by a simple change of leadership. marcos was bad in that he manipulated constitutional change to allow himself to stay in power longer than the stipulated 8 years. (i should know; a relative was a concon delegate then.)  he was good in that he was conscious of his legacy.  sure, he had thousands of presidential decrees.  the subsequent administration, you say, did not change any.  we can't get too nitty-gritty by combing through thousands of decrees, some of which have been modified or have simply become moribund (i.e., PD 1396 of 1978).  we take the good and relevant, we do away with the opposite.  it might be worth noting that the marcos-era constitution itself was changed during the succeeding administration. 

martial law was good?  maybe you didn't have a relative who was arrested sans the writ of habeas corpus?  and that relative disappeared forever?  that's martial law.     

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Way Nada

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #44 on: March 05, 2010, 03:38:54 PM »

Islander,

This is what I said two years ago. "I did not expect Marcos will terminate Martial Law in our country in just too short a time." To change a society is not only a matter of 11, 20 or 30 years. I was very much positive that his "new society" will flourish long after his death... or even much longer to those who were younger than the generation of Marcos and Ninoy. I mean a fresh generation will emerge... as fresh as the morning sun to take over the system that maybe considered harsh to the previous generation but ideal to the new ones. This is what I was comtemplating of what the "New Society" will bring us.

Take the experiences of England, Denmark and Sweden. If you look deeper into their past they can be seen as brutal countries. They oppressed their own people, but today their people are earning higher per capita than any country in the world. And with their grand pageantry especially during a royal coronation, I think of these countries as if they are still living in a fairy tale world. Hehehe.... 

Some countries in Asia were trained especially by England to follow their footstep like Australia, Hongkong, Singapore and Malaysia. And to prove a point... these countries in Asia are today earning higher than the Philippines when in fact we were second to Japan economically after WW-II.

I am not of the opinion to follow a brutal system but what I am thinking of is for the Philippines to get rid of too much freedom and a free-wheeling democracy. Our system is patterned after that of the United States  and it is working very well for them but it is not working for us. The truth is; democracy in our country is beneficial only to a few like the press, the academe, the business elite and the intelligentsia but it is not working well to the vast majority.

You think Marcos was bad because he manipulated the law in his favor. But how bad if compared to EDSA I and II? The two Edsas are worse than the declaration of Martial Law! They not only manipulated the law but they also fooled the people to scream in the street for freedom and democracy when in fact during the time of Marcos the people did not go hungry. The most important to man is the democracy in his stomach. Today, rice which is our staple food is changed to noodles or worse than that; Filipinos are resorting to soup with kropeck flavor... while before during the time of Marcos we were exporting rice to other countries.

The Marcos era constitution is changed but not his PD's. Yes I agree with you that there are Marcos PD's that are repealed by the Cory administration but to be more accurate I would like to quote Atty. Manuel M. Lazaro, he said;

"Significantly, out of the 7,883 presidential issuances, only 67 PDs or less than .01 percent have either been repealed or modified. The minimal percentage of 67 PDs either repealed or modified by EO No. 187 of President Corazon Aquino were the decrees increasing the penalties for certain offenses against public order and security, e.g., PDs 38, 1735, 1834, 1974 and 1996."

Therefore 99.99% of Marcos PD's are still enforce until today.

And with regard to your question if; "martial law was good"... I think this is a question of politics and it can be accurately answered politically. But if you ask a personal question to the person who was a victim of Martial Law, then of course it is not good.

WN


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islander

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #45 on: March 06, 2010, 11:04:30 AM »
way nada,

          first things first… i now appreciate why lorenzo admires your writing.  with your logic, grammar and all, you two can certainly communicate well with each other.

          allow me to point out some things, thus:

1.  we are taking different stands.  so let’s let that be.  to each his own, as they say.  no one is correct as no one is wrong.  we both are just expressing our personal opinions.

2.  i express my personal opinions in this forum just for that--- to express.  i don’t expect anyone to be convinced with my opinions; neither should you expect anyone to be convinced with yours.  if by chance someone else does, then well and good.  but that’s about it.

3.  you believe marcos did not fool the people with martial law but the people were fooled with edsas uno and dos.

4.  you are now eating noodles and not rice because it is no longer the time of marcos’s martial law?

          now let me tackle the points one by one and let’s see if we can communicate too.  (n.b.  yours is in italics.)


This is what I said two years ago. "I did not expect Marcos will terminate Martial Law in our country in just too short a time." To change a society is not only a matter of 11, 20 or 30 years. I was very much positive that his "new society" will flourish long after his death... or even much longer to those who were younger than the generation of Marcos and Ninoy. I mean a fresh generation will emerge... as fresh as the morning sun to take over the system that maybe considered harsh to the previous generation but ideal to the new ones. This is what I was comtemplating of what the "New Society" will bring us.

          sorry that the termination of martial law vis-à-vis your expectations ran short.  no question about societal change that would take generations.  even martial law could not hurry that change, whether it was extended or not.  the so-called “new society” had its moments, until greed overtook the leaders.  sadly, marcos missed out on being another lee kuan yew.  he could have been.  but because of him, the world now has new english terms--- kleptocracy and imeldific.

          martial law had to be ended for the nation to start afresh.  as for the direction it had to take, it is up to us now.  we just have to trust ourselves once again to do the right thing.   


Take the experiences of England, Denmark and Sweden. If you look deeper into their past they can be seen as brutal countries. They oppressed their own people, but today their people are earning higher per capita than any country in the world. And with their grand pageantry especially during a royal coronation, I think of these countries as if they are still living in a fairy tale world. Hehehe.... 

    the historical experiences of the european countries you mentioned are different from the philippine historical experience.  comparison, I believe, holds no merit here as it would defy logic.  (we cannot compare cucumbers with apples.)  you’ve mentioned monarchies whose ascensions appear like fairy tales in the pictures.  we never had kings and princes, obviously.  there were official pictures though of the then first couple, the marcoses, which appeared like they were royalty--- chairs designed like thrones, sashes for the couple (what were those for?), and imelda with her tiara.  come on…   

“Some countries in Asia were trained especially by England to follow their footstep like Australia, Hongkong, Singapore and Malaysia. And to prove a point... these countries in Asia are today earning higher than the Philippines when in fact we were second to Japan economically after WW-II.”

          yes, we were second to japan economically after wwII and all the way to the early 1960s.  it was during the 21-year term of marcos that we descended to being second after bangladesh, from the bottom.

I am not of the opinion to follow a brutal system but what I am thinking of is for the Philippines to get rid of too much freedom and a free-wheeling democracy. Our system is patterned after that of the United States  and it is working very well for them but it is not working for us. The truth is; democracy in our country is beneficial only to a few like the press, the academe, the business elite and the intelligentsia but it is not working well to the vast majority.

          so did martial Law not work well for the greatest majority.  otherwise, the nation would have clamored for it to remain, no matter who called for the edsa revolt. 

          but when does freedom become too much?  maybe when there no longer is the rule of law.  fortunately, we have it.  our justice system works, imperfect as it may be, and criminals are still punished through proper procedures.  (that’s why the ampatuans are on trial.  that’s proper procedure.)  we can appreciate our freedom because it allows us to discuss this way, via tb, for one.  with martial law, this forum would not have been allowed to exist.


          meanwhile, doesn’t it seem like what works well for the u.s. and not for r.p. and what works well for England, Denmark and Sweden may not also work well for r.p.?  by the way, the only difference between those european countries and the u.s. is that the former have institutional monarchies with prime ministers who run their governments while that of the u.s. is a presidential form of government.  everything else is the same, freedom, democracy and all.   

You think Marcos was bad because he manipulated the law in his favor. But how bad if compared to EDSA I and II? The two Edsas are worse than the declaration of Martial Law! They not only manipulated the law but they also fooled the people to scream in the street for freedom and democracy when in fact during the time of Marcos the people did not go hungry. The most important to man is the democracy in his stomach. Today, rice which is our staple food is changed to noodles or worse than that; Filipinos are resorting to soup with kropeck flavor... while before during the time of Marcos we were exporting rice to other countries.

          the Filipino people, stomachs full or not, cannot be fooled into screaming in the streets for freedom and democracy if these indeed existed. 

          the export-import of rice depends on many things--- policies, law of demand and supply, the vagaries of weather included.  instant noodles didn’t exist yet in the 1980s. 


The Marcos era constitution is changed but not his PD's. Yes I agree with you that there are Marcos PD's that are repealed by the Cory administration but to be more accurate I would like to quote Atty. Manuel M. Lazaro, he said;

"Significantly, out of the 7,883 presidential issuances, only 67 PDs or less than .01 percent have either been repealed or modified. The minimal percentage of 67 PDs either repealed or modified by EO No. 187 of President Corazon Aquino were the decrees increasing the penalties for certain offenses against public order and security, e.g., PDs 38, 1735, 1834, 1974 and 1996."

Therefore 99.99% of Marcos PD's are still enforce until today.


          even if it were 100%, it still does not prove that martial law does not constitute a banana republic.  (lazaro, bless him, is a lawyer for the marcos’s plunder cases.)

And with regard to your question if; "martial law was good"... I think this is a question of politics and it can be accurately answered politically. But if you ask a personal question to the person who was a victim of Martial Law, then of course it is not good.

          the question of politics is answered by politics and, depending on which side one is on, that’s what we have been actually discussing.




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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #46 on: March 07, 2010, 09:57:58 AM »

way nada,

          first things first… i now appreciate why lorenzo admires your writing.  with your logic, grammar and all, you two can certainly communicate well with each other.

Reply:

Ok... let's try.

Islander:

          sorry that the termination of martial law vis-à-vis your expectations ran short.  no question about societal change that would take generations.  even martial law could not hurry that change, whether it was extended or not.  the so-called “new society” had its moments, until greed overtook the leaders.  sadly, marcos missed out on being another lee kuan yew.  he could have been.  but because of him, the world now has new english terms--- kleptocracy and imeldific.

          martial law had to be ended for the nation to start afresh.  as for the direction it had to take, it is up to us now.  we just have to trust ourselves once again to do the right thing.

Reply:

Martial Law could have continued for up to 30 or 50 years or more. I think at this span of time anti Marcos and those who are opposed to Martial Law might have been dead already. When that happen another fresh leaders with new outlook in governance will takeover the rein of government. Marcos fault is that he did not sustain his New society in an unbroken pace until the time there is change in our society.   

The progress of Australia, Malaysia and Singapore is a mirror for us to see that in an authoritarian system with soft dictatorship progress is fast. Marcos adapted a government with a soft dictatorship because his Martial Law regime did not employ military brass at its bureaucratic level. Marcos let the civilian government functioned.

Marcos fault was when he shortened his authoritarian regime and tolerated the free press it became his own pitfall. The people are not yet well educated in what kind of society he's bringing and then he tried to change horses in midstream that is why he failed.

Islander:

    the historical experiences of the european countries you mentioned are different from the philippine historical experience.  comparison, I believe, holds no merit here as it would defy logic.  (we cannot compare cucumbers with apples.)  you’ve mentioned monarchies whose ascensions appear like fairy tales in the pictures.  we never had kings and princes, obviously.  there were official pictures though of the then first couple, the marcoses, which appeared like they were royalty--- chairs designed like thrones, sashes for the couple (what were those for?), and imelda with her tiara.  come on…

Reply:

Our political past is comparable to that of the European countries. We experience kings and princes before. Is it not true that there were tribal kingdoms in the Philippines before the coming of the Spaniards? Like the kingdom of Rajah Soliman of Manila or the Kingdom of Rajah Humabon of Cebu.

But that is beside the point. I am not comparing... I was only suggesting to look into the past experience of these countries I mentioned like; England, Denmark and Sweden. These countries brutalized their own people long before there was an American system of democracy.

Today the situation is reversed; once they were contesting as to who is the most brutal to their own people; Now these countries are the world's promoter of Human Rights and giving the best of comfort to their own people.

Their experience if the authoritarian regime of Marcos was sustained maybe we will end up living in a world of fairy tale like them also. To repeat... I am not suggesting to follow their brutal past. Anyway Marcos said that his Martial Law is a smiling Martial Law.

Is there something to disagree with that idea?

Islander:

          yes, we were second to japan economically after wwII and all the way to the early 1960s.  it was during the 21-year term of marcos that we descended to being second after bangladesh, from the bottom.

Reply:

Before Martial Law we were second to Japan with an economy based on agriculture. When Martial Law was declared and Marcos adapted an authoritarian form of government, he started to industrialize the country. To attract investments, he put up the Export Processing Zone Authority [EPZA] and develop and promote agricultural products, by creating the National Irrigation Administration.

Marcos caused the acquisition of Filoil and changed its name to Petron and made it the biggest oil company of the country. To protect the Philippines from the rising price of oil, he established the Oil Price Stabilization Fund.[OPSF] A form of subsidy to protect consumers. Marcos also controlled the price of commodities. Through the establishment of the PSC or Price Stablization Council simple folks can buy commodity needs at reasonable price. The price of rice per kilo was sold at low price at every Kadiwa store.

Our car industry and the initial manufacture of Ford Fiera, Toyota Tamaraw, Mitsubishi Cimmaron and Volkswagen Sakbayan   were the mainstay of the Philippine industrialization. After he left office the leaders who preceded him bankrupted the economy. And the program of the car industry in our country, because it was started by Marcos was sidelined and investors transferred the program to Malaysia and Indonesia. Only the Toyota Tamaraw is left in the Philippines.

The specialty hospitals of the Philippines, like the Lung Center, Philippine Heart Center, Kidney Center, Philippine Children’s Center, were his response to public health. Sadly, after more than 20 years of Marcos departure, no specialty hospital of consequence has been established.

Islander:

          so did martial Law not work well for the greatest majority.  otherwise, the nation would have clamored for it to remain, no matter who called for the edsa revolt.

Reply:

Yes, the authoritarian regime of Marcos worked well for the greater good to the greatest number of Filipinos. My reason is this; during the time of Marcos Filipinos do not have to go abroad to look for a job. The jobs in the Middle East then, was not an economic solution, but a solution to give more employment to the Filipinos. Marcos signed PD's that were favorable for foreign investors which is why there were many export processing zones that were established in our country... Mactan in Cebu, Morong in Bataan and Baguio city.

Marcos caused the establishment of Offshore-Banking System in the Philippines thus upgrading the banking system and invite foreign banks to do business in the Philippines under certain incentives and guarantees.

There is no more clamor for his return, he is dead already but there are political sounds echoeing for the return of Marcos parliamentary form of government through charter change.[cha-cha] According to a study in UP the Marcos decrees and edicts that are deemed beneficial to the Filipino people are the OPSF or the law subsidizing the price of oil and the Price Control Law through the Price Stabilization Council which control the price of prime commodity in the market. 

Marcos adapted the French style strong president government but his authoritarian power is British like; Amendment no. VI in the constitution. 

Islander: 

          but when does freedom become too much?  maybe when there no longer is the rule of law.  fortunately, we have it.  our justice system works, imperfect as it may be, and criminals are still punished through proper procedures.  (that’s why the ampatuans are on trial.  that’s proper procedure.)  we can appreciate our freedom because it allows us to discuss this way, via tb, for one.  with martial law, this forum would not have been allowed to exist.

Reply:

Freedom becomes too much when you shout inside a movie house of fire when there is no fire. And when a journalist accepts bribe from an oppositionist to report of an unproven anomaly or reporting of corruption when clearly the journalist has no evidence to prove it then; it is abuse of freedom of the press.

Journalists today are likely to be assassinated doing their job than the practice of journalism during the time of Marcos. Seldom do we hear of reports about killing of journalists in countries like; Australia, Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam, East timor, Laos, Samoa, Tonga, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Thailand and Fiji. These countries like the government of Marcos before are adapting a parliamentary form of government. 

The Ampatuans are on trial because there is a glaring evidence that they killed journalists but those accused by journalists in their reports in the papers as corrupt are not on trial, Why? The answer is because their allegation cannot stand in a court of law, but only a part and parcel of the real politik in our country. This is the reason why they become victims of an assassin's bullet.

It is on record that the Philippines has a high incident of journalists assassinated because of their profession. Does the record proved that freedom of the press is exercised in our country freely or they are killed because they lacked the most important journalistic etiquette... which is responsible reporting.     

You believe that in our country the "rule of law" is alive and thriving. If so, Erap as a post-Marcos president is a product of the belief in Edsa, so why forced him out of power if there is a rule of law? Erap was elected overwhelmingly through the will of the people in an election. The ousting of Erap from the presidency is contrary to the tenet of democracy. You can not see the rule of law there but clearly it is mob rule.

Islander:

          meanwhile, doesn’t it seem like what works well for the u.s. and not for r.p. and what works well for England, Denmark and Sweden may not also work well for r.p.?  by the way, the only difference between those european countries and the u.s. is that the former have institutional monarchies with prime ministers who run their governments while that of the u.s. is a presidential form of government.  everything else is the same, freedom, democracy and all.

Reply:

Our government is patterned after that of the us and it's not working well for us because of cultural differences. We are onion skin that we easily succumbed to criticism or we cannot take in too much abuse from the press. In the US criticism is a right and it is ingrained already in the system. The Americans value more their freedom than anything else. We don't... those who believe that they are free to express their opinion are killed as I have explained the issue above.

But what works well for England, Denmark and Sweden, I believe they are adaptable to the Filipinos. Which is why my point of making Australia, Singapore and Malaysia as our mirror for emulation as their system is a pattern of the British.

The US is a republican state with the president as head of state with three branches in government. The US is adapting a capitalist economic system. This is why it's called capitalist democracy. It is totally different from England, Denmark and Sweden because these countries are called socialist democracy. They have monarchs as head of state and they are a socialist state partly adapting the Marxist principle in economics. 

Let us focus our attention on the British system because this is the country that the Americans revolted. Here are their differences; If the US and the Philippines have the right to suffrage, in England and Australia suffrage is not a right but a duty. In law the only person who has the right is the king. The people's right to freedom of speech is unabridge by law, in the US and the Philippines... but in England and Australia you have no right to criticize the monarch and its system. Criticism today against the government is tolerated but the law still remains.

The late Princess Diana's criticism of the monarchy when she was alive is a crime of treason punishable by beheading.   
Islander:

          the Filipino people, stomachs full or not, cannot be fooled into screaming in the streets for freedom and democracy if these indeed existed.

Reply:

They were fooled to go out into the street to oust Erap. Erap was democratically elected president.

What I mean by "democracy of the stomach" is that majority of the people are not concern too much about politics but more concern on the food on the table next meal.


Islander: 

          the export-import of rice depends on many things--- policies, law of demand and supply, the vagaries of weather included.  instant noodles didn’t exist yet in the 1980s.

Reply:

If the export-import of rice depends on --- policies, law of demand and supply then... Marcos policy before is better than today because we were able to export, with abundant rice production because of the Masagana program of Marcos. It was also the right timing when the mass production of the famous miracle rice in the Philippines.

Today after Marcos the Philippines returns as a rice importer from Vietnam and the irony is that we backslide to the pre-Martial Law era of smuggling rice into the country when a boat load of rice was unloaded off the coast of Albur.

 Islander:

          even if it were 100%, it still does not prove that martial law does not constitute a banana republic.  (lazaro, bless him, is a lawyer for the marcos’s plunder cases.)

Reply:

The meaning of a banana republic pertains to a country with no permanent government or a government that cannot last to its prescribe term because of incessant military coup d'etat. It is called a banana republic because like banana plant when it grows it will produce banana shoots that grow strong at the side of the mother or original banana. Most of these countries are in South America. On record the highest number of coup d'etat is Bolivia.

Marcos government was stable for 21 years and no off shoot government grew at its side. Unlike the Cory government which experience the Manila Hotel capers with the late Arturo Tolentino proclaimed himself as the president and Gringo Honasan's numerous coup d'etats the Cory government looks more a banana republic.

The GMA government is worse because she was exercising the power of the president as an usurper. Why? Because Erap the duly elected president of the Philippines is alive who chose to be persecuted politically rather than go into exile.

Islander:

          the question of politics is answered by politics and, depending on which side one is on, that’s what we have been actually discussing.

Reply:

I agree!

WN
     
     

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #47 on: March 07, 2010, 10:55:57 AM »
maayo sab.  good discussion...  :D

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #48 on: March 10, 2010, 07:55:10 PM »
(FIRST OF FOUR PARTS)

way nada,

1.  WN (Way Nada):  Ok... let's try.

Is. (islander):   nice try.  let’s try some more.  


2.  WN:  Martial Law could have continued for up to 30 or 50 years or more. I think at this span of time anti Marcos and those who are opposed to Martial Law might have been dead already. When that happen another fresh leaders with new outlook in governance will takeover the rein of government. Marcos fault is that he did not sustain his New society in an unbroken pace until the time there is change in our society.     

Is.:   could have continued, but couldn’t, and didn’t.  martial law anywhere in the world is only a temporary palliative that everybody hates except those who are in power.  

your supposition presumes that those who are opposed to martial law will die before marcos.  as marcos was born in 1917, oppositionists at his age level and older may have been of a negligible number by the time the country’s martial law was on its way out.  (it had to be ended in 1982 as a concession to pope john paul II’s visit.)  

meanwhile, there were those of the generation next to his, like the students at the time who, in the natural course of things, made pretty obvious who’s bound to die first.  they were the most rabid and vocal oppositionists.  (modern world history shows that revolutions of the masses against the established order start with students, i.e., from france in 1776 to prague’s velvet revolution and the color revolutions in a number of countries.)  

another presumption here is that martial law will lead to a change in our society.  it did change, for the worse.  

presumptions of this kind that tend to confirm the consequent to be true when it is still to be proved are nothing but hypothetical; they make a basis out of something that is as yet unestablished.  meanwhile, there were those who lived through martial law and suffered, a fact which is clearly established.

just because we are dissatisfied and disaffected by what’s around us now doesn’t prove that martial law and the so-called ‘new society’ would have been better.

levity aside, here’s a piece of recorded history of those times:

1969 - Marcos wins a second four-year term as president.  He is the first president to be reelected in the short history of Philippine democracy.  However, growth slows and quality of life begins to deteriorate. Violence and crime begin to become everyday occurrences. The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) starts to make inroads in the provinces, with its military wing, the New People's Army (NPA) spreading across the archipelago.

On the southern island of Mindanao, Muslim secessionists organize under the banner of the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF).  In August Marcos launches major military campaigns against the NPA and MNLF.

1970 - Social unrest continues to build.  Student demonstrators attempt to storm the Malacanang Palace, the presidential mansion, on 30 January.  Manila and other large cities are rocked by random bombings.  Marcos blames leftists and suspends habeas corpus in August 1971, a prelude to martial law.

                                  -(excerpts from Independence, Dictatorship, and People Power; emphasis mine)



3.  WN:  The progress of Australia, Malaysia and Singapore is a mirror for us to see that in an authoritarian system with soft dictatorship progress is fast. Marcos adapted a government with a soft dictatorship because his Martial Law regime did not employ military brass at its bureaucratic level. Marcos let the civilian government functioned.

Is.:   we must have been reading different books and news sources.  australia and malaysia never had dictatorships.  (mahathir bin mohamad served for 22 years as prime minister, voted into office by the parliament without changing the constitution.  some analysts believe he wanted to become a dictator by changing an article of their constitution so that the judiciary will fall under his control.  he did not succeed.)  

i did mention earlier that marcos missed the chance of becoming another lee kuan yew whose leadership paved the way for  singapore’s economic miracle.  lee didn’t plunder his city-state, he knew when to step down, and he retired as a respected elder statesman.  as for marcos’s ‘soft dictatorship’, here’s one for the record:

The armed forces are politicized.  Officers from Marcos’s home province are promoted to high rank.  A childhood friend of Marcos becomes chief-of-staff of the armed forces and head of the internal security network.  Officers are appointed to manage several corporations and the military is ordered to take control of all public utilities and the media.  The size of the army is also increased, with numbers swelling from about 58,000 in 1971 to 142,000 in 1983.

The military has virtually unlimited powers to search, arrest and detain civilians without reason and without recourse to legal representation.  Military tribunals are set up throughout the country to try and sentence detainees.  The civilian courts are stripped of their power and autonomy, and the Philippine police force is placed under military control.  It is estimated that more than 60,000 people are arrested between 1972 and 1977.  

                                      -(excerpts from Independence, Dictatorship, and People Power; emphasis mine)



4.  WN:  Marcos fault was when he shortened his authoritarian regime and tolerated the free press it became his own pitfall. The people are not yet well educated in what kind of society he's bringing and then he tried to change horses in midstream that is why he failed.  

Is.:   His fault was to start an authoritarian regime, which did not tolerate a free press.

1972 – Opposition figures (including Benigno ‘Ninoy’ Aquino), journalists, student and labor activists and criminals are arrested and detained at military compounds run by the army and the police.  Newspapers are closed and the mass media tightly controlled.  Demonstrations, strikes and boycotts are outlawed.  Marcos assumes absolute legislative power.  The constitution, which permits presidents only two terms in office, is suspended.

                                      -(excerpts from Independence, Dictatorship, and People Power; emphasis mine)


***

“On media ownership in the Philippines, which includes, she said, rich families and their cronies, such as Romualdez, Marcos, Cojuangco, Prieto, Lopez, among others:  â€˜Structurally, the ownership of all these major newspapers (and broadcast media) is geared towards the ruling class of the Philippines.  So ownership is the first restriction on press freedom.  And if owners of a newspaper or publication happen to run counter to the dominant bias of the (ruling class) culture, then the owners are going to be in great trouble.’

She noted, as an example, the arrest and incarceration in 1969 of The Dumaguete Times editor and staffers – among them Hermie and Mila Garcia of Toronto’s The Philippine Reporter – who exposed the landgrabbing abuses by hacenderos in Negros Oriental.  The Garcias, as well as Balita publisher and editor, Ruben Cusipag, and Rosca herself were among the hundreds of journalists and writers critical of the Marcos dictatorship who were jailed in detention centers during martial law.”  

                                        -(excerpts from a press release on Ninotchka Rosca’s lecture, 2005, emphasis mine)



5.  WN:  Our political past is comparable to that of the European countries. We experience kings and princes before. Is it not true that there were tribal kingdoms in the Philippines before the coming of the Spaniards? Like the kingdom of Rajah Soliman of Manila or the Kingdom of Rajah Humabon of Cebu.  

Is.:   the “kings” that we had when the spaniards came were but tribal leaders, not national leaders.  They were called “rajah” after the maharajahs of india (as influenced by pre-colonial traders of hindu-malayan culture based in java).  it’s a thin basis for our political past as “comparable to that of european countries”.  comparable to our southeast asian neighbors, maybe, but not europe.  


6.  WN:  But that is beside the point. I am not comparing... I was only suggesting to look into the past experience of these countries I mentioned like; England, Denmark and Sweden. These countries brutalized their own people long before there was an American system of democracy.

Today the situation is reversed; once they were contesting as to who is the most brutal to their own people; Now these countries are the world's promoter of Human Rights and giving the best of comfort to their own people.

Their experience if the authoritarian regime of Marcos was sustained maybe we will end up living in a world of fairy tale like them also. To repeat... I am not suggesting to follow their brutal past. Anyway Marcos said that his Martial Law is a smiling Martial Law.  

Is.:   yes, it took a thousand years for europeans to slaughter each other and end up in modern times as having one of the most civilized and civil societies.  we cannot even compare ourselves to their brutal past which we do not share.  how much more can our political past be comparable to theirs?  you’re right.  this truly is beside the point.  

what is clear about european history is that things got worse before they got better.  our own country could be taking the same course.  it takes time to get better.  

-to be continued-


islander

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #49 on: March 10, 2010, 08:53:11 PM »
(SECOND OF FOUR PARTS)


way nada,


7.  WN (Way Nada):  Is there something to disagree with that idea?

Is. (islander):  nothing to disagree with that idea of yours, really, especially when you quote marcos as saying his was a ‘smiling martial law’.  (did i ever disagree with you?)  there’s nothing to believe in, either, from the historical perspective.  (nothing personal, truly.)  

and there’s nothing to smile about with this:

1973 - A new constitution allowing Marcos to stay in office indefinitely and to rule by decree is introduced.  The result is confirmed by a fraudulent referendum enabling him to continue as president until the end of martial law and to arbitrarily appoint all government officials, including members of the judiciary.  Imelda Marcos is made governor of Manila and minister of human settlements and ecology.

***
Political prisoners are routinely tortured by the military. "Disappearances" and murders of suspected political activists are common, with over 500 cases being recorded for the period 1975-80.  Meanwhile, inflation and unemployment rise while already low living standards drop.

***
The brutality of the regime and the stagnating economy cause may Filipinos to turn to the communists for protection and support.

                                    -(excerpts from Independence, Dictatorship, and People Power; emphasis mine)

these are established documentations of those years, based on records and proper research and not someone’s wishful thinking.  our recent history simply proves that marcos’s martial law was not beneficial to the country.
 

8.  WN:  Before Martial Law we were second to Japan with an economy based on agriculture. When Martial Law was declared and Marcos adapted an authoritarian form of government, he started to industrialize the country. To attract investments, he put up the Export Processing Zone Authority [EPZA] and develop and promote agricultural products, by creating the National Irrigation Administration.

Marcos caused the acquisition of Filoil and changed its name to Petron and made it the biggest oil company of the country. To protect the Philippines from the rising price of oil, he established the Oil Price Stabilization Fund.[OPSF] A form of subsidy to protect consumers. Marcos also controlled the price of commodities. Through the establishment of the PSC or Price Stablization Council simple folks can buy commodity needs at reasonable price. The price of rice per kilo was sold at low price at every Kadiwa store.

Our car industry and the initial manufacture of Ford Fiera, Toyota Tamaraw, Mitsubishi Cimmaron and Volkswagen Sakbayan   were the mainstay of the Philippine industrialization. After he left office the leaders who preceded him bankrupted the economy. And the program of the car industry in our country, because it was started by Marcos was sidelined and investors transferred the program to Malaysia and Indonesia. Only the Toyota Tamaraw is left in the Philippines.

Is.:  true, true.  but:

Martial law initially brings stability and an economic turnaround but with the costs of reduced social freedoms and increasing corruption.  Limited land reforms are introduced but prove ineffective.  Manufacturing and business enterprises are nationalized or handed to Marcos's cronies or relatives.  Profits are siphoned off for personal enrichment and mismanagement is rife.                                                                                                    
                                           -(excerpts from Independence, Dictatorship, and People Power; emphasis mine)


9.   WN:  The specialty hospitals of the Philippines, like the Lung Center, Philippine Heart Center, Kidney Center, Philippine Children’s Center, were his response to public health. Sadly, after more than 20 years of Marcos departure, no specialty hospital of consequence has been established.  

Is.:  why add some more when these ‘specialty hospitals’, as you call them, are already there?  more so when until now our country is paying for the loans made to finance those structures?  isn’t it more commonsensical to just fully utilize what are already existing rather than borrow some more from foreign creditors and deplete the country’s coffers some more, the way the marcoses did to fund their grandiose show windows?  by the way, the term “edifice complex” bestowed on imelda was not for nothing.


10.  WN:  Yes, the authoritarian regime of Marcos worked well for the greater good to the greatest number of Filipinos. My reason is this; during the time of Marcos Filipinos do not have to go abroad to look for a job. The jobs in the Middle East then, was not an economic solution, but a solution to give more employment to the Filipinos.  

Is.:  filipino migration for jobs abroad started in 1906.  the number increased greatly in the 1960s.  we had a young new president then on whom our country pinned so much hopes.  during his tenure of 21 years, the country’s foreign debts ballooned and the economy worsened.  this was when filipinos began their job diaspora in droves.  the trend hasn’t stopped decades after as the country hasn’t gotten out of the morass of those foreign debts.
  

11.  WN:  Marcos signed PD's that were favorable for foreign investors which is why there were many export processing zones that were established in our country... Mactan in Cebu, Morong in Bataan and Baguio city.

Marcos caused the establishment of Offshore-Banking System in the Philippines thus upgrading the banking system and invite foreign banks to do business in the Philippines under certain incentives and guarantees.

There is no more clamor for his return, he is dead already but there are political sounds echoeing for the return of Marcos parliamentary form of government through charter change.[cha-cha] According to a study in UP the Marcos decrees and edicts that are deemed beneficial to the Filipino people are the OPSF or the law subsidizing the price of oil and the Price Control Law through the Price Stabilization Council which control the price of prime commodity in the market.  

Is.:  yes, as dictated by the world bank and the international monetary fund (IMF) as preconditions for loans.  thus:

“Companies importing capital goods could expect approval of foreign loans only if their production processes were geared to exports, decreed the Central Bank.” (Robin Broad and John Cavanagh, Unequal Alliance, University of California Press, 1987)

and this says it all:

As opportunities for profit in the Third World dwindled, transnational banks and corporations refocused their sights back on the developed world.  Four years as the lead international institution in this era of debt crisis management left the IMF almost universally despised across the South—and nearly broke.  So, the next heir to the international debt and development management throne was anointed: the World Bank, which (with U.S. government blessing) chose structural adjustment of the Philippine variety as its cure-all.

***
The model, Philippines, having been opened up to the world economy in new and expanded ways in the early 1980s through the structural adjustment process, fared among the worst of the debtor nations.  Internal corruption and cronyism combined with collapsing export earnings to plunge the country into deep economic and then political crisis.  Only those Filipinos who managed to salt dollars away abroad through secret and often illegal capital flight seemed able to avoid the worst of this all-encompassing crisis.                                                            
***
Indeed, in many respects, the one relic of value that a fleeing Ferdinand Marcos left his successor was a negative example: a two-decade blueprint for guaranteed economic disaster. There was much to learn from studying Marcos's mistakes.  For in the failure of Marcos, the World Bank, and the IMF lay important lessons that might be applied to another approach to development—one placing people before the market. (Robin Broad and John Cavanagh, Unequal Alliance, University of California Press, 1987; emphasis mine)


12.  WN:  Marcos adapted the French style strong president government but his authoritarian power is British like; Amendment no. VI in the constitution.  
 
Is.:   the 1976 sixth amendment to the 1973 constitution authorized the chief executive to legislate, as follows: “Whenever in the judgment of the President there exists a grave emergency or a threat or imminence thereof, or whenever the Interim Batasang Pambansa or the regular National Assembly fails or is unable to act adequately on any matter for any reason that in his judgment requires immediate action, he may, in order to meet the exigency, issue the necessary decrees, orders or letters of instructions, which shall form part of the law of the land.”

i’m curious as to what’s french and british about it.  (n.b.: the british government is not authoritarian.)


-to be continued-



islander


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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #50 on: March 10, 2010, 09:14:14 PM »
(THIRD OF FOUR PARTS)


way nada,


13.  WN (Way Nada):  Freedom becomes too much when you shout inside a movie house of fire when there is no fire. And when a journalist accepts bribe from an oppositionist to report of an unproven anomaly or reporting of corruption when clearly the journalist has no evidence to prove it then; it is abuse of freedom of the press.

Journalists today are likely to be assassinated doing their job than the practice of journalism during the time of Marcos. Seldom do we hear of reports about killing of journalists in countries like; Australia, Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam, East timor, Laos, Samoa, Tonga, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Thailand and Fiji. These countries like the government of Marcos before are adapting a parliamentary form of government. 

The Ampatuans are on trial because there is a glaring evidence that they killed journalists but those accused by journalists in their reports in the papers as corrupt are not on trial, Why? The answer is because their allegation cannot stand in a court of law, but only a part and parcel of the real politik in our country. This is the reason why they become victims of an assassin's bullet.

It is on record that the Philippines has a high incident of journalists assassinated because of their profession. Does the record proved that freedom of the press is exercised in our country freely or they are killed because they lacked the most important journalistic etiquette... which is responsible reporting.     

Is. (islander):  someone who shouts ‘fire’ in a movie house even if there’s no fire invites the penalty of arresto menor for public disturbance and, depending on the damage of his act, risks charges ranging from misdemeanor to felony, which means no one is free to shout a false alarm. 

any journalist worth his salt will tell us that he only reports what is there.  journalists are news reporters/broadcasters/writers, not newsmakers.  whether the record of killed journalists proves that freedom of the press is exercised in our country or not depends on one’s perspective.  the “killers” kill because they believe they’re justified to silence journalists forever; journalists believe they’re exercising responsible reporting (what journalist would say he isn’t?) in their risky profession in which their lives may just be sacrificed.  that’s perspective. 

those unfortunate journalists in the ampatuan massacre were killed not because they were primarily journalists, i suppose, but because they were in the line of fire in a deadly political rivalry where witnesses to the crime were considered a bane and had to be silenced forever.  as a parallel, most of the women in that massacre were wives.  there are no statistics for wives killed; there are for journalists. 

meanwhile, here’s some kind of footnote to those martial law years (aside from the excerpts of Ninotchka Rosca’s lecture in no. 4 of this posting)--- a review of the book Conjugal Dictatorship (1976) by Primitivo Mijares, national press club president at that time:

“Primitivo "Tibo" Mijares tells it as it is during the time he was way in with the "in" crowd of Malacanang Palace during the perilous days leading up to and during martial law.  Mijares was then president of the National Press Club of the Philippines and was responsible for most of the propaganda work leading up to the declaration of Martial Law in 1972.  Mijares was privy to important meetings and decisions made by Marcos and was one of the few people Marcos trusted when it came to media.

This book is more than just an insider's look into the happenings inside Malacanang Palace during the regime of Ferdinand Marcos, but also speaks of the tug-of-war of emotions within Mijares.  Ultimately, in the end, Mijares' conscience got the better of him and he fled to the United States to testify against Marcos at the US Congress.  He disappeared shortly after, and was never heard from again.  His son was also killed by alleged henchmen of the dictatorship.”


i repeat, there was no freedom of the press during martial law.
 

14.  WN:  You believe that in our country the "rule of law" is alive and thriving. If so, Erap as a post-Marcos president is a product of the belief in Edsa, so why forced him out of power if there is a rule of law? Erap was elected overwhelmingly through the will of the people in an election. The ousting of Erap from the presidency is contrary to the tenet of democracy. You can not see the rule of law there but clearly it is mob rule.

Is.:  the ouster of one president who had allegedly plundered the country’s treasury does not constitute an absence of the rule of law. 

it seems that after marcos, accusations of plunder against someone sitting in the highest office of the land is enough to mobilize large crowds for a mass protest.   

(mobocracy – mob rule or ochlocracy; a government by mob or a mass of people)

unlikeable as they may seem, the administration that took over after erap’s ouster wasn’t the mass of people.  the mass of people went home and went on with their lives.


15.  WN:  Our government is patterned after that of the us and it's not working well for us because of cultural differences. We are onion skin that we easily succumbed to criticism or we cannot take in too much abuse from the press. In the US criticism is a right and it is ingrained already in the system. The Americans value more their freedom than anything else. We don't... those who believe that they are free to express their opinion are killed as I have explained the issue above.

Is.:  would that our “onion skin” be shed off simply by emulating the british system and those of other countries that you’ve mentioned.  i can’t imagine us valuing our freedom less than the americans, though.  let’s take both of us; we are expressing our opinions and are free to do so, as we are doing it now in tb.  will we be killed?   


16.  WN:  But what works well for England, Denmark and Sweden, I believe they are adaptable to the Filipinos. Which is why my point of making Australia, Singapore and Malaysia as our mirror for emulation as their system is a pattern of the British.

The US is a republican state with the president as head of state with three branches in government. The US is adapting a capitalist economic system. This is why it's called capitalist democracy. It is totally different from England, Denmark and Sweden because these countries are called socialist democracy. They have monarchs as head of state and they are a socialist state partly adapting the Marxist principle in economics. 

Is.:

Democracy – a government in which power is invested in the people as a whole, usually exercised on their behalf by elected representatives

Capitalism – an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and distribution of goods, characterized by a free competitive market and motivation by profit

Socialism- political system of communal ownership; typically advocates an end to private property and the exploitation of workers

Marxism- political and economic theories in which class struggle is a central element in the analysis of social change in western societies (books:  Communist Manifesto and Das Kapital, in partnership with Friedrich Engels)


-all Encarta dictionary definitions

western europe certainly has more of the socialist democratic economy as compared to that of the u.s. and canada.  it isn’t socialist democracy in the strictest sense of the phrase, though, because private property exists.  generally, the exploitation of workers has been eradicated. 

european countries are known for their generous social safety nets compared to other countries elsewhere, including the u.s.  maybe this is what you meant by their having a socialist democracy.
 
as in anywhere else, any system has thrusts and intentions that are meant to work for the common good.  the enforcement of these parameters is another matter.  we can only hope that what works for europe works of us.  otherwise, we have no basis for concluding that it could or couldn’t.

today’s monarchies in the countries you’ve mentioned are ceremonial heads of state.  the running of their government is left to parliament, with the prime minister as head.  their governments remain democracies, not monarchies.   


17.  WN:  Let us focus our attention on the British system because this is the country that the Americans revolted. Here are their differences; If the US and the Philippines have the right to suffrage, in England and Australia suffrage is not a right but a duty. In law the only person who has the right is the king. The people's right to freedom of speech is unabridge by law, in the US and the Philippines

Is.:  there’s no difference, really.  our own right of suffrage is also our duty, as it is in the u.s.  (for every right, we have a concomitant responsibility.)  and there’s no such law, anywhere, that only the king has the right, as you say.  as for the “people’s right to freedom of speech” being “unabridged by law in the US and the Philippines”, surely, you must have heard of libel cases.  that’s one of the ways our laws and that of the u.s. “abridge” freedom of speech.   

by the way, zimbabwe with dictator robert mugabe at the helm has also a british legacy. 


18.  WN: ...but in England and Australia you have no right to criticize the monarch and its system.  Criticism today against the government is tolerated but the law still remains.  

Is.:  there’s no monarch in australia.  as a former colony of great britain, it is just a member of the commonwealth of nations (previously named the british commonwealth) whose members total 54 sovereign states, most of which were former british colonies or dependencies of those colonies.  malaysia is also a member.  so are rwanda and zimbabwe.  the latter, currently with a runaway inflation, has dictator robert mugabe. 

everyone can criticize the monarch in england (the anti-monarchists are alive and well and vocal), and all laws anywhere in the civilized world remain unless otherwise reversed or amended through a legislative process.


-to be continued-

islander



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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #51 on: March 10, 2010, 11:17:20 PM »
LAST OF FOUR PARTS


way nada,


19.  WN (Way Nada):  The late Princess Diana's criticism of the monarchy when she was alive is a crime of treason punishable by beheading.   

Is. (islander):  in the run-up to the legal separation and eventual divorce of prince charles and princess diana, there was mention of the word ‘beheading’, credited to a british royalist who said something like “in the old days, superfluous princesses were simply beheaded”.  there was no such threat of beheading as punishment for princess diana or for anybody else accused of lese majeste. 

beheading in england as a capital punishment was officially ended in 1973.  even by then, beheading was already obsolete.  the last beheading was in 1747, with the execution of simon fraser, lord lovat, convicted of high treason. 

england abolished the death penalty altogether with the crime and disorder act of 1998.  meanwhile, all the 45 member-countries of the council of europe have abolished the death penalty.  by 2002, europe had become the only region in the world where the death penalty no longer applies.


20.  WN:  They were fooled to go out into the street to oust Erap. Erap was democratically elected president.

Is.:  a big mass of people cannot be fooled; the filipino people are no fools, unless you and i would presume that we can speak for them as we speak for ourselves.  yes, you and i could be fools, but those numbers who went to the streets?  that calls for disbelief. 

yes, erap was democratically elected, but when he was perceived (please note that in politics, perception is everything) to have abused his powers, the masses spoke.  that’s democracy of the streets, whether we like it or not.


21.  WN:  What I mean by "democracy of the stomach" is that majority of the people are not concern too much about politics but more concern on the food on the table next meal.

Is.:  a quaint term, that one, but it is easy to understand as it begs to emphasize what needs no emphasis.  who of us, really, would sacrifice our stomachs for politics?  by your definition, “democracy of the stomach” existed long before democracy itself was invented.
 

22.  WN:  If the export-import of rice depends on --- policies, law of demand and supply then... Marcos policy before is better than today because we were able to export, with abundant rice production because of the Masagana program of Marcos. It was also the right timing when the mass production of the famous miracle rice in the Philippines.  

Today after Marcos the Philippines returns as a rice importer from Vietnam and the irony is that we backslide to the pre-Martial Law era of smuggling rice into the country when a boat load of rice was unloaded off the coast of Albur.

 Is.:  granting that marcos was responsible for such miracles, what happens then to the other two factors, the law of supply and demand and the vagaries of weather?  the best of policies would be useless in this case if there’s no rice to export because there are more mouths to feed now or that production is damaged because of some force majeure.  by the way, smuggling exists at all times in any country, martial law or not, by different smugglers, and will continue to exist for as long as people give vent to their greed. 

an excerpt from Marcos’ ‘Masagana 99’ made RP rice exporter, self-sufficient (Amy R. Remo, Philippine  Daily Inquirer, 04/26/2008), quoting Rep. Salvador “Sonny” Escudero, the last agriculture minister during the marcos dictatorship:

"The secret with Masagana 99 was the very liberal credit and extension work. We provided farmers with full credit support. We were in full control of our agricultural technicians, whom we regularly educated," he said.

With this program, the Philippines experienced its highest productivity increase in local rice production from 1976 to 1985--three years after it started. 

***
Escudero said the P43.7-billion program, called FIELDS, announced by President Macapagal-Arroyo during the national food summit in April to boost rice production was similar to the Marcos project. FIELDS stands for fertilizers, infrastructure and irrigation, education and extension work, loans, drying and postharvest facilities, and seeds.

"There's no secret in agriculture. The programs are already there and are similar to Masagana 99. The key is adequate and timely funding," Escudero stressed. "And these funds should be maximized."

"If the P43 billion in funds allocated for the FIELDS program will be released adequately, on time, and will be maximized, I won't be surprised to find palay oozing out of our ears," he said.

and here’s another excerpt (Evangeline de Vera, Malaya, January 19, 2008):

…From 1965 to 1985, rice imports exceeded rice exports for 12 years (1965 to 1967; 1971 to 1977; and 1984 to 1985), while exports surpassed imports for nine years (1968 to 1970; and 1978 to 1983).

According to Dr. Rolando Dy, executive director of the Center for Food and Agribusiness at the University of Asia and the Pacific, this seeming uncontrolled population growth is just one of the factors why the government has difficulty attaining rice sufficiency.

"The population is growing every year, and the agriculture sector simply could not catch up. That’s why we will continue to import. It will take us sometime, at least until after 2012, before we could do that, but we have to pull our acts together and if we push for the full implementation of the AFMA," he said.

obviously, it wasn't just marcos.


WN:  The meaning of a banana republic pertains to a country with no permanent government or a government that cannot last to its prescribe term because of incessant military coup d'etat. It is called a banana republic because like banana plant when it grows it will produce banana shoots that grow strong at the side of the mother or original banana. Most of these countries are in South America. On record the highest number of coup d'etat is Bolivia.

Is.:  it is the function of language, especially a widely spoken language like english, to take on other nuances through the years.  sure, banana republic is a “country that is politically unstable and is dependent on limited agriculture (such as bananas), and ruled by a small, self-elected, wealthy, and corrupt clique”.  The term was originally used for “dictatorships that thrived on kickbacks by supporting large-scale agriculture” (like those banana plantations in central and south america).

currently, the term had also come to mean kleptocratic governments (i.e. those in positions of power use it to maximize their own gains) and the legislature is a mere rubber stamp.  in short, a failed state.

here are other salient realities of our martial law years:  the chief executive assumed absolute legislative powers; the batasang pambansa, the name of the unicameral legislative body, was perceived as a rubber stamp (there was a token opposition, foremost of which was the pusyon bisaya whose members were actually powerless to oppose the sheer number of votes of the pro-administration ones), and:

2007 - In September the Transparency International estimate of the amount embezzled by Marcos is quoted in a report by the Stolen Assets Recovery Initiative, a joint venture of the World Bank and the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime.

According to the report, “The channels whereby the money was allegedly stolen were diverse, including the takeover of private companies; creation of monopolies for sugar, coconuts, shipping, construction, and the media; fraudulent government loans; bribes from companies; and skimming off foreign loans and raiding the public treasury. ”       
                     
                                                    -(excerpts from Independence, Dictatorship, and People Power, emphasis mine)

thus was another aspect of a functioning state absent during martial law--- accountability.  bananas, anyone?  (look at my avatar!)   


24.  WN:  Marcos government was stable for 21 years and no off shoot government grew at its side. Unlike the Cory government which experience the Manila Hotel capers with the late Arturo Tolentino proclaimed himself as the president and Gringo Honasan's numerous coup d'etats the Cory government looks more a banana republic.

The GMA government is worse because she was exercising the power of the president as an usurper.  Why?  Because Erap the duly elected president of the Philippines is alive who chose to be persecuted politically rather than go into exile.

Is.:  and marcos was not a usurper?  please note:

1971 - At a constitutional convention opposition delegates introduce a provision to prevent Marcos from remaining as head of state or government once his second term as president has expired.  Marcos succeeds in having the ban overturned the following year.

1972 - Using the excuse of an alleged assassination attempt against Defence Minister Juan Ponce Enrile, Marcos declares martial law on 21 September, promising to eliminate poverty and injustice and create a "new society."  It is later revealed that the assassination attempt had been staged by the military.

Opposition figures (including Benigno 'Ninoy' Aquino), journalists, student and labor activists and criminals are arrested and detained at military compounds run by the army and the police.  Newspapers are closed and the mass media tightly controlled. Demonstrations, strikes and boycotts are outlawed.  Marcos assumes absolute legislative power.  The constitution, which permits presidents only two terms in office, is suspended.

1976 - The constitution is amended further to allow Marcos to continue to rule by decree even after the lifting of martial law.

                                             -(excerpts from Independence, Dictatorship, and People Power; emphasis mine)


there goes the primary function of presidential decrees.  how stable can such a government be?

further:

“Marcos might not be one of the all-time killers but he is certainly one of the biggest thieves in the history of the planet. Estimates of his ill-gotten gains range from US$3 billion to US$35 billion. Some suggest that the true amount is over US$100 billion, perhaps even trillions of dollars.

While these latter sums may he fanciful, the legacy of the Marcos dictatorship is all too real--- an economy struggling just to pay the interest on its foreign debt and a seriously compromised democracy seemingly unable to shake off entrenched corruption.  Witness the debacle of the Estrada presidency.  It took Marcos 20 years to pillage and wreck the Philippines. Unfortunately it may take far longer for the damage to be undone.”

                                   -(excerpts from Comparative Studies in Freedom, emphasis mine)



(Is., in an earlier post: “ the question of politics is answered by politics and, depending on which side one is on, that’s what we have been actually discussing.”)


25.  WN:  I agree!

Is.:  so do i! 

as i believe that we are not in the midst of an argumentum ad hominem, a toast then to argumentum ad nauseam!


islander








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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #52 on: March 11, 2010, 06:42:45 PM »


Islander:

Is.:   could have continued, but couldn’t, and didn’t. 

martial law anywhere in the world is only a temporary

palliative that everybody hates except those who are in power.

Reply:

I agree... Martial Law cannot be permanent but it is temporary

like the declaration of Martial Law in the province of Cavite

during the time of the American occupation in the Philippines.

The declaration of Martial Law in Mindanao during the uprising

of Kamlon. They were all temporary.

But in the US there were several instances of declaration of

Martial law in every state. The latest was in the state of

Louisiana during Katrina or in California during the

earthquake. The purpose of Martial Law according to the Americans is to hasten the redevelopment of its

infrastructure.

Islander:   

your supposition presumes that those who are opposed to

martial law will die before marcos.  as marcos was born in

1917, oppositionists at his age level and older may have been

of a negligible number by the time the country’s martial law

was on its way out.  (it had to be ended in 1982 as a

concession to pope john paul II’s visit.)

Reply:

Here is what I said;

"Martial Law could have continued for up to 30 or 50 years or

more. I think at this span of time anti Marcos and those who

are opposed to Martial Law might have been dead already. When

that happen another fresh leaders with new outlook in

governance will takeover the rein of government. Marcos fault

is that he did not sustain his New society in an unbroken pace

until the time there is change in our society."

At that span of time 50 years or more even Marcos is dead as a

door nail.

Islander:     

meanwhile, there were those of the generation next to his,

like the students at the time who, in the natural course of

things, made pretty obvious who’s bound to die first.  they

were the most rabid and vocal oppositionists.  (modern world

history shows that revolutions of the masses against the

established order start with students, i.e., from france in

1776 to prague’s velvet revolution and the color revolutions

in a number of countries.) 

Reply:

The French revolution was started by the masses but the

Philippine iinsurgency during the time of Marcos was led by

Joma Sison in the lecture room of UP. They were not the

masses. There were students who followed Joma Sison and in the

course of their rebellion against the government took up arms

and were killed but only a few. The revolution led by Joma

Sison is a losing cause.

Islander:   

another presumption here is that martial law will lead to a

change in our society.  it did change, for the worse.

Reply:

I agree... because people power that aborted the Marcos "New

Society" made the economy worse than during the authoritarian

regime of Marcos.

Islander:

presumptions of this kind that tend to confirm the consequent

to be true when it is still to be proved are nothing but

hypothetical; they make a basis out of something that is as

yet unestablished.  meanwhile, there were those who lived

through martial law and suffered, a fact which is clearly

established.

Reply:

I agree... it is hypothetical because the total reversal or

turning our system into a "New Society" did not happen. It was

aborted by people power. There were those who lived through

martial law and suffered but the majority of the people were

contented. Those who suffered under Martial Law were those few

who were imprisoned by Marcos and opposition to Martial Law.

Their imprisonment were only preventive. 

Islander:

just because we are dissatisfied and disaffected by what’s

around us now doesn’t prove that martial law and the so-called

‘new society’ would have been better.

levity aside, here’s a piece of recorded history of those

times:

1969 - Marcos wins a second four-year term as president.  He

is the first president to be reelected in the short history of

Philippine democracy.  However, growth slows and quality of

life begins to deteriorate. Violence and crime begin to become

everyday occurrences. The Communist Party of the Philippines

(CPP) starts to make inroads in the provinces, with its

military wing, the New People's Army (NPA) spreading across

the archipelago.

On the southern island of Mindanao, Muslim secessionists

organize under the banner of the Moro National Liberation

Front (MNLF).  In August Marcos launches major military

campaigns against the NPA and MNLF.

1970 - Social unrest continues to build.  Student

demonstrators attempt to storm the Malacanang Palace, the

presidential mansion, on 30 January.  Manila and other large

cities are rocked by random bombings.  Marcos blames leftists

and suspends habeas corpus in August 1971, a prelude to

martial law.

Reply:

You got it! These are the reasons why Marcos declared Martial

Law in 1972. That in his own judgement he believed the country

is in eminent danger.   

Islander:

Is.:   we must have been reading different books and news

sources.  australia and malaysia never had dictatorships. 

(mahathir bin mohamad served for 22 years as prime minister,

voted into office by the parliament without changing the

constitution.  some analysts believe he wanted to become a

dictator by changing an article of their constitution so that

the judiciary will fall under his control.  he did not

succeed.)

Reply:

I'm neither a bookworm. Hehe... nor I am a habitual newspaper

reader. But when it comes to politics I can create my own

political theory sometimes, but my lesson in politics started

from reading the newspaper long time ago. I found out that the

"real politik" is almost the same issue everyday. But it is a

learning process and the best we had was during the time of

Martial Law.

I'll take first the issue of Malaysia. You're telling me that

Malaysia never had dictatorship. The simple understanding of

the Malaysian government is that it is called a parliamentary

democracy. They patterned this kind of government after the

British and the same British style of parliament that Marcos

was very interested to copy.

In my previous posting/reply I told you the Marcos government

is a soft dictatorship because the civilian bureaucracy and

the Batasang Pambansa was functioning and not completely ruled

by the military. My point here is; parliamentary democracy is

a soft dictatorship. In this system, democracy is practice

only inside the parliament where members have the immunity to

criticize the government but outside of parliament they can be

sued if they criticize their system.

The part that the people play its role is, in the election. In

a system like Malaysia the people has no right to criticize

the government and its system they have a regulated press.

Filipino journalists were invited by some members of the press

of Malaysian to create criticisms against Mahathir and his

government. They were imprisoned and then deported.   

In other words their system is not participatory unlike the

Philippines.

Australia started as a big prison colony of the British where

their undesirables were banished without any hope of returning

back to England. The whole of Australia was administered by

the military and the first military governor general was

Admiral Arthur Phillip of the Royal Navy. Therefore the first

functioning government in Australia is based on Martial Law.
The Federation of Australia was established in 1901 by labor

unions. All other parties is the off shoots of the Labor Party

and liberal politics arrived only in 1948 after the war. It

was a soft dictatorship long time ago and it is still today.

But Australia today has adapted the system of tolerance but

the laws remain.
       
Islander:

i did mention earlier that marcos missed the chance of

becoming another lee kuan yew whose leadership paved the way

for  singapore’s economic miracle.  lee didn’t plunder his

city-state, he knew when to step down, and he retired as a

respected elder statesman.  as for marcos’s ‘soft

dictatorship’, here’s one for the record:

Reply:

I agree with your view that Lee Kuan Yew did not plunder. He,

like Marcos received also gratuities or as shares of stock and

commissions in recognition of a business and participation in

investments in Singapore. This is present in every system of

government all over the world. I believe this is not a form of

corruption but legal and part of the government system.

In Singapore the media are restrained by regulation to report

this as corruption. What the Singaporean media is reporting

are news are the news of corruption in other Asian countries

like the Philippines. There are people who are oppositors of

Lee Kuan Yew because they believe Lee is worse than Marcos. In

a Lee K.Y. style of dictatorship they are not allowed to eat

"chewing gum". To satisfy their anger against Lee they urinate

inside an elevator car.

The issue of coruption was debunked and proven by Marcos and

Westinghouse Inc. that they did not commit a crime when they

were sued by the Cory government of corruption and bribery. It

was heard in a Seattle court. The Cory government alleged that

Marcos received a bribe of $10 million dollars in building the

BNPP and they have a receipt found in Malacanang left by the

Marcoses when they fled to Hawaii to prove it.

The court rendered their decision in favor of Marcos and

Westinghouse Inc. The court concurred with the argument of

Westinghouse Inc. that the giving of commission is not a

bribe. Rene Saguisag who is the lead lawyer of the Philippine

government went home empty handed.     

Islander:           

The armed forces are politicized.  Officers from Marcos’s home

province are promoted to high rank.  A childhood friend of

Marcos becomes chief-of-staff of the armed forces and head of

the internal security network.  Officers are appointed to

manage several corporations and the military is ordered to

take control of all public utilities and the media.  The size

of the army is also increased, with numbers swelling from

about 58,000 in 1971 to 142,000 in 1983.

The military has virtually unlimited powers to search, arrest

and detain civilians without reason and without recourse to

legal representation.  Military tribunals are set up

throughout the country to try and sentence detainees.  The

civilian courts are stripped of their power and autonomy, and

the Philippine police force is placed under military control. 

It is estimated that more than 60,000 people are arrested

between 1972 and 1977.

Reply:

I agree with your opinion that Marcos favored the promotion of

military officers who came from his home province because I

believe he trusted them than anybody else. That is normal. Of

course he should appoint as power broker of Martial Law those

he had his confidence. The military was already politicized

before Martial Law because if not... then how did Ninoy Aquino

know about "Oplan Sagittarius" if there is no military officer

or officers loyal to him who told him that Marcos will suspend

the Writ of Habeas Corpus and declare Martial Law. 

The military has virtually unlimited powers to search, arrest

and detain civilians "not" without reason and those arrested

were detained in a military detention facility because in

cases where they committed crime of insurgency and rebellion

their cases should not be arraigned in a civilian court.     

Islander:

Is.:   His fault was to start an authoritarian regime, which

did not tolerate a free press.

Reply:

I can't figure it out why you find fault in the authoritarian regime of Marcos and you praised Lee Kuan Yew's leadership in authoritarianism who you believe, paved the way for economic miracle of Singapore. What do you mean? Marcos is not capable as a dictator and Lee Kuan Yew can. LKY was also a dictator and he did not also allow a free press.

Islander:

1972 – Opposition figures (including Benigno ‘Ninoy’ Aquino),

journalists, student and labor activists and criminals are

arrested and detained at military compounds run by the army

and the police.  Newspapers are closed and the mass media

tightly controlled.  Demonstrations, strikes and boycotts are

outlawed.  Marcos assumes absolute legislative power.  The

constitution, which permits presidents only two terms in

office, is suspended.

Reply:

Ninoy Aquino is like a mother hen about to lay egg. He is like Obama of the US, a good public speaker but a bad achiever in political leadership. He was detained by Marcos because he was one of the supporters of Bernabe Buscayno "alias Kumander Dante" who destabilized the government by creating havoc in the country side. Ninoy Aquino was also the mastermind of the UP student's barricade.

Islander:

“On media ownership in the Philippines, which includes, she

said, rich families and their cronies, such as Romualdez,

Marcos, Cojuangco, Prieto, Lopez, among others: 

‘Structurally, the ownership of all these major newspapers

(and broadcast media) is geared towards the ruling class of

the Philippines.  So ownership is the first restriction on

press freedom.  And if owners of a newspaper or publication

happen to run counter to the dominant bias of the (ruling

class) culture, then the owners are going to be in great

trouble.’

Reply:

You are partly correct... because in the case of Ninez Cacho Olivares whose newspaper was harassed by the military for criticizing Gloria Arroyo and please listen; in an atmosphere of freedom and democracy how much during Martial Law when Marcos curtailed the free press in pursuit of progress.

The part that I believe you are wrong is that you include the Marcoses, Romualdez, Cojuangco and Prieto as owners of media outlets. They are not.   

Islander:

She noted, as an example, the arrest and incarceration in 1969

of The Dumaguete Times editor and staffers – among them Hermie

and Mila Garcia of Toronto’s The Philippine Reporter – who

exposed the landgrabbing abuses by hacenderos in Negros

Oriental.  The Garcias, as well as Balita publisher and

editor, Ruben Cusipag, and Rosca herself were among the

hundreds of journalists and writers critical of the Marcos

dictatorship who were jailed in detention centers during

martial law.”

Reply:

What is your reason behind these issues. The issues you bring are normal in Martial Law. If they are journalists and they are critizing the Marcos authoritarian regime they can be detained because critizing the government is in breach of the press regulations introduced by Martial Law.

Islander:     
                                       
Is.:   yes, it took a thousand years for europeans to

slaughter each other and end up in modern times as having one

of the most civilized and civil societies.  we cannot even

compare ourselves to their brutal past which we do not share. 

how much more can our political past be comparable to theirs? 

you’re right.  this truly is beside the point. 

Reply:

I did not say "compare" but to "look" at their brutal past.


WN

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Lorenzo

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #53 on: March 12, 2010, 07:31:33 AM »
i was at home, watching tv, until the tv was turned dead because of the shooting at the tv station's main tower in manila. 

all your historical/cynical claims have basis in fact, wn and lorenzo (though it's hitting the 'nail on the head' and not the 'nail on the coffin,' please), but aren't we also helping perpetuate this system?  we vote for this same people, we behave as if we honor them (don't u.s. fil-am groups invite politicians--- as speakers, as inducting officers of organizations; think boawas of seattle and some other funny acronyms somewhere else--- and roll the red carpet for them?).  sadly, these political leaders could be mirrors of what we are.  we may deserve them even if we feel we don't.

edsa I was a nation's effort to effect change.  after 21 years, we have bent backward too long.  the process may have had its failings.  there may have been puppeteers who held the strings.  (well, who says revolutions don't have manipulators?)  the results may be disappointing as we are disappointed now.  but edsa uno at least assured us that power is still in the people. 

let the new generation learn better and effect change better.  best of all, let the new generation be better politicians than their elders.  (by the way, is jinggoy better than erap?)   

p.s.  that shooting at the tv tower in quezon city... one of the more poignant pictures of edsa I was of a dead soldier dangling from the tower.  there were two of them. the other survived; he turned out to be the brother of our neighbor.  i met him and he struck me as somewhat bonkers.  he couldn't get over the death of his buddy. 

(do you think we could have a forum such as tb if it were still marcos?  i was banned from showing up at the office for some days because i wore yellow once.)  that's why i believe edsa uno was not for nothing.     



Islander, I am merely sharing my views in comparison and through reading reports as well as case studies regarding the Marcos Administration and from taking several classes in US Foreign Policy in my undergraduate years. Sadly I was born after Martial Law and was too young to even remember or see Marcos in the television set (I was born in the summer of 1985).

Let us just say that Marcos is admired for his actions abroad and by the Fil-Am community.

On the notion of change; what change have we really seen? Most of the promulgations that the late Pres. Ferdinand E. Marcos are still in effect. Over 90 of his Republic Acts are still in effect, to this very day. That should not dim the brilliance of Marcos, despite claims of corruption and plunder by many of his peers, who do the same this very day.

In my opinion, there are none after Marcos who initiated as much progress and infrastructural growth.

And in my personal opinion, the very notion of continuous People's Power is a failed concept. The French made this known in the repudiation of Marat as well as Max Robespierre during the waning days of the French Revolution. And in the end, it is the plethoric masses that are utilized by the rich elite, under the banner of change. Has there really been change? The poor remain poor and the rich remain rich. And the greed of politicians continue to rule the day.

Marcos brought and maintained some sense of control and stability in the Republic.



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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #54 on: March 12, 2010, 07:39:45 AM »
Islander wrote, "Is.:  a big mass of people cannot be fooled; the filipino people are no fools, unless you and i would presume that we can speak for them as we speak for ourselves.  yes, you and i could be fools, but those numbers who went to the streets?  that calls for disbelief.  "


Correction, the French Masses under the veneer of the Revolutionary tones of "The People", "Le Masse" placed in itself a aura of legitimacy to plunder the Royal Estate and to enact revolutionary edicts to abolish the established order.

The people, the very mass that was responsible for this culmination were indeed fooled by proliferation of writings by Robiespierre as well as other revolutionary fanatics that called for the extension of the Revolutionary thought by force outside the very borders of France; well inside the States of the Rhine as well as establishing a Revolutionary Republique throughout most of Monarchist Europe {to the detriment to the monarchies of Spain, Hapsburgian Austria, Prussia, and Russia}

The people were fooled in as much as placed into a fervor that led to the Dark Days of the Guillotine and lawlessness that was silenced only by force when Napoleon Bonaparte implemented law and military order throghout France. Ironically in the name of the Revolution, yet at the same time crowning himself as Le Empereur de France, a decade after the beheading of Louis XVI and most of the French Aristocracy.

Excessive Mass hysteria, is detrimental to society. And must be placed in check by the government in control.

The case study in France and in some instances of People's Power in the Philippines is testimony to this.



Lorenzo.

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #55 on: March 12, 2010, 08:08:03 AM »
aq..wa pa tawn natawo...hehehhe

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #56 on: March 12, 2010, 11:28:13 AM »
aq..wa pa tawn natawo...hehehhe

LOL!

Okay ra pood kai we were still babies when Marcos was deposed. Baby pajud ko adtong panahona.



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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #57 on: March 12, 2010, 12:13:03 PM »
LOL!

Okay ra pood kai we were still babies when Marcos was deposed. Baby pajud ko adtong panahona. heheheh...wa pa tay alamag



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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #58 on: March 12, 2010, 03:23:09 PM »
Islander:

1973 - A new constitution allowing Marcos to stay in office indefinitely and to rule by decree is introduced.  The result is confirmed by a fraudulent referendum enabling him to continue as president until the end of martial law and to arbitrarily appoint all government officials, including members of the judiciary.  Imelda Marcos is made governor of Manila and minister of human settlements and ecology.

Reply:

This is a given argument. Of course he ruled by decree because there was no congress. He was the Martial Law administrator.

Islander:
***
Political prisoners are routinely tortured by the military. "Disappearances" and murders of suspected political activists are common, with over 500 cases being recorded for the period 1975-80.  Meanwhile, inflation and unemployment rise while already low living standards drop.

Reply:

There was not a single case of torture... if there was who was the accuse military personnel. This issue is part of the hate campaign against Marcos. Those who disappeared or presume to be murdered were part of the campaign against the insurgency.

Islander:

Is.:  true, true.  but:

Martial law initially brings stability and an economic turnaround but with the costs of reduced social freedoms and increasing corruption.  Limited land reforms are introduced but prove ineffective.  Manufacturing and business enterprises
are nationalized or handed to Marcos's cronies or relatives.  Profits are siphoned off for personal enrichment and mismanagement is rife.

Reply:

You are admitting to this fact. This is true also in other countries who were able to sustain authoritarian regimes that in exchange for a fast economic recovery you have to surrender your freedom temporarily.                                     

Islander:

Is.:  why add some more when these ‘specialty hospitals’, as you call them, are already there?  more so when until now our country is paying for the loans made to finance those structures?  isn’t it more commonsensical to just fully utilize what are already existing rather than borrow some more from foreign creditors and deplete the country’s coffers some more, the way the marcoses did to fund their grandiose show windows?  by the way, the term “edifice complex” bestowed on
imelda was not for nothing.

Reply:

If they cannot add some more then they should put extensions to some of those hospitals. Some of these hospitals are overcrowded. Patients are already in the corridors especially in the Heart Center.

Islander:

Is.:  filipino migration for jobs abroad started in 1906.  the number increased greatly in the 1960s.  we had a young new president then on whom our country pinned so much hopes.  during his tenure of 21 years, the country’s foreign debts ballooned and the economy worsened.  this was when filipinos began their job diaspora in droves.  the trend hasn’t stopped decades after as the country hasn’t gotten out of the morass of those foreign debts.

Reply:

I agree... there were already Filipino workers went to Hawaii and California as farmers but it was not said that their earnings were to help the economy of the Philippines. The late Blas Ople the minister of labor during the time of Marcos did not open the Middle East for Filipino laborers to help the economy of the Philippines but to give more employment to the Filipinos.

After Marcos because of their campaign of hatred many investments were closed especially the EPZA in Morong, Bataan. Ford Australia who established spare parts manufacturing in the Philippines transferred to Malaysia. Volkwagen cars was closed. Mattel was sabotaged by the labor union and closed shop. Filipino workers who lost their jobs looked for jobs abroad. And for the first time Filipinos were to accept petty jobs as domestic helpers in Bahrain, Kuwait, saudi Arabia, Singapore and Hongkong. Our women because of poverty... and mind you it is happening today as we speak; they accept sleazy jobs as stripteasers and entertainers/cum prostitutes.
     
And our government hailed them as heroes for sending dollar remittances to the country helping the economy grows.

===================================================
Statements below are issues I brought up for you to comment.

But you comment on the WB conditionalities of borrower country

like the Philippines. Anyway I'll try to answer those issues

fro Robin Broad and John Cavanagh.
==================================================
11.  WN:  Marcos signed PD's that were favorable for foreign investors which is why there were many export processing zones that were established in our country... Mactan in Cebu, Morong in Bataan and Baguio city.Marcos caused the establishment of Offshore-Banking System in the Philippines thus upgrading the banking system and invite foreign banks to do business in the Philippines under certain incentives and guarantees.

There is no more clamor for his return, he is dead already but there are political sounds echoeing for the return of Marcos parliamentary form of government through charter change.[cha-cha] According to a study in UP the Marcos decrees and edicts that are deemed beneficial to the Filipino people are the OPSF or the law subsidizing the price of oil and the Price Control Law through the Price Stabilization Council which control the price of prime commodity in the market.

===================================================

Islander:

Is.:  yes, as dictated by the world bank and the international monetary fund (IMF) as preconditions for loans.  thus:“Companies importing capital goods could expect approval of foreign loans only if their production processes were geared to exports, decreed the Central Bank.” (Robin Broad and John Cavanagh, Unequal Alliance, University of California Press, 1987)

Reply:

When your a borrower your option is to agree to the conditions of the lender. Why? If your the owner of a bank are you not going to put conditionalities to whoever is going to borrow

money?

Islander:   

and this says it all:

As opportunities for profit in the Third World dwindled, transnational banks and corporations refocused their sights back on the developed world.  Four years as the lead international institution in this era of debt crisis management left the IMF almost universally despised across the South—and nearly broke.  So, the next heir to the international debt and development management throne was anointed: the World Bank, which (with U.S. government blessing) chose structural adjustment of the Philippine

variety as its cure-all.


***
The model, Philippines, having been opened up to the world

economy in new and expanded ways in the early 1980s through

the structural adjustment process, fared among the worst of

the debtor nations. Internal corruption and cronyism combined

with collapsing export earnings to plunge the country into

deep economic and then political crisis.  Only those Filipinos

who managed to salt dollars away abroad through secret and

often illegal capital flight seemed able to avoid the worst of

this all-encompassing crisis.                                 

                         

***
Indeed, in many respects, the one relic of value that a

fleeing Ferdinand Marcos left his successor was a negative

example: a two-decade blueprint for guaranteed economic

disaster. There was much to learn from studying Marcos's

mistakes.  For in the failure of Marcos, the World Bank, and

the IMF lay important lessons that might be applied to another

approach to development—one placing people before the market.

(Robin Broad and John Cavanagh, Unequal Alliance, University

of California Press, 1987; emphasis mine)

Reply:

I cannot agree more the opinion of Robin Broad and her husband

than to say that she, her husband and Walden Bello are not

economist in the real sense but they engaged themselves in

economic politics and as critic of the IMF and the WB. Since

she and her husband's opinion are in harmony with Walden Bello

who is a known leftist professor at UP I can say clearly they

are spinning a leftist bias opinion. Her aim is not for

scholastic records but to destabilize and to put down

conservative governments. Which is why if there is any

scholastic study she had for the Philippines I think it is not

acceptable from the point of view of the Makati Business Club.

Her opinion that; "Ferdinand Marcos left his successor was a

negative example: a two-decade blueprint for guaranteed

economic disaster"... is contradictory to her first statement.

She admits that; "the Philippines is WB/IMF model having been

opened up to the world economy in new and expanded ways in the

early 1980s".... but "fared among the worst of the debtor

nations." Where are her proof?

Islander:
 
Is.:   the 1976 sixth amendment to the 1973 constitution

authorized the chief executive to legislate, as follows:

“Whenever in the judgment of the President there exists a

grave emergency or a threat or imminence thereof, or whenever

the Interim Batasang Pambansa or the regular National Assembly

fails or is unable to act adequately on any matter for any

reason that in his judgment requires immediate action, he may,

in order to meet the exigency, issue the necessary decrees,

orders or letters of instructions, which shall form part of

the law of the land.”

i’m curious as to what’s french and british about it.  (n.b.:

the british government is not authoritarian.)

Reply:

The Philippine government during Marcos copied the French

model which has a strong president, like Marcos himself who

can legislate. So he is a strong president. While Amendment

no. 6 is similar to the British law that gives Reserve Power

to the monarch of England. In case of instability in the

British parliament the monarch can this Reserve Power. It is

like the declaration of Martial Law in the US. The British

system came from or it originated from an authoritarian

regime.     

Islander:

Is.  someone who shouts ‘fire’ in a movie house even if

there’s no fire invites the penalty of arresto menor for

public disturbance and, depending on the damage of his act,

risks charges ranging from misdemeanor to felony, which means

no one is free to shout a false alarm.

Reply:

Correct... that person who shouted "fire" committed a crime.

You got the literal interpretation. But when a journalist is

shouting in the newspaper that his government is on fire, and

politicians are thieves without any supporting evidence he is

free in our system. But in Australia, Britain and Singapore he

will go to jail.

Island:     

any journalist worth his salt will tell us that he only

reports what is there.  journalists are news

reporters/broadcasters/writers, not newsmakers.  whether the

record of killed journalists proves that freedom of the press

is exercised in our country or not depends on one’s

perspective.  the “killers” kill because they believe they’re

justified to silence journalists forever; journalists believe

they’re exercising responsible reporting (what journalist

would say he isn’t?) in their risky profession in which their

lives may just be sacrificed.  that’s perspective.

those unfortunate journalists in the ampatuan massacre were

killed not because they were primarily journalists, i suppose,

but because they were in the line of fire in a deadly

political rivalry where witnesses to the crime were considered

a bane and had to be silenced forever.  as a parallel, most of

the women in that massacre were wives.  there are no

statistics for wives killed; there are for journalists.

Reply:

Journalists worth his salt in our country are a rare specimen.

I believe they are more corrupt than the politicians because

nobody is watching them. The high record of journalists killed

in our country proved that they are too aggressive to write

opinions that are ofensive to somebody. In our country freedom

of the press is to offend. If a journalist is a hard hitter he

should have all the evidences to support all the issues he

brought up. He is not free to lie.

Islander:   

i repeat, there was no freedom of the press during martial

law.

Reply:

Did I not say in my previous opinion that during Martial Law

the press was regulated just like the present system in

Australia, New Zealand, Singapore and Malaysia. Most of these

countries have a press tribunal that any complain about

irresponsible reporting is investigated.   
 
Islander:

Is.:  the ouster of one president who had allegedly plundered

the country’s treasury does not constitute an absence of the

rule of law. 

it seems that after marcos, accusations of plunder against

someone sitting in the highest office of the land is enough to

mobilize large crowds for a mass protest.   

(mobocracy – mob rule or ochlocracy; a government by mob or a

mass of people)

unlikeable as they may seem, the administration that took over

after erap’s ouster wasn’t the mass of people.  the mass of

people went home and went on with their lives.

Reply:

A government of mob is like the Mafia. They know only about

chaos and violence. If you believe in mobocracy then what can

I do.

Island:

Is.:  would that our “onion skin” be shed off simply by

emulating the british system and those of other countries that

you’ve mentioned.  i can’t imagine us valuing our freedom less

than the americans, though.  let’s take both of us; we are

expressing our opinions and are free to do so, as we are doing

it now in tb.  will we be killed?

Reply:

Who will kill us when we are not abusing our freedom?
     
Islander:

today’s monarchies in the countries you’ve mentioned are

ceremonial heads of state.  the running of their government is

left to parliament, with the prime minister as head.  their

governments remain democracies, not monarchies.

Reply:

Not in England. 

Islander:

Is.:  there’s no difference, really.  our own right of

suffrage is also our duty, as it is in the u.s.  (for every

right, we have a concomitant responsibility.)  and there’s no

such law, anywhere, that only the king has the right, as you

say.  as for the “people’s right to freedom of speech” being

“unabridged by law in the US and the Philippines”, surely, you

must have heard of libel cases.  that’s one of the ways our

laws and that of the u.s. “abridge” freedom of speech.

Reply:

That is if you are talking about our right and in the US...it

is a duty in your own interpretation but I am differentiating

suffrage as a duty in Australia and England and suffrage in

the Philippines and the US. In libel it is not abridging the

press because libel is crime again a person's reputation and

honor.

You did not get my point. England with an unwritten

constitution has no "bill of rights" in its originality. The

only person in the constitution who has the right is the king.

All other people are subjects to the king. But today in modern

times parliament legislates the right of the people. In it is

not constitutional but also legislated.     

Islander:

Is.:  there’s no monarch in australia.  as a former colony of

great britain, it is just a member of the commonwealth of

nations (previously named the british commonwealth) whose

members total 54 sovereign states, most of which were former

british colonies or dependencies of those colonies.  malaysia

is also a member.  so are rwanda and zimbabwe.  the latter,

currently with a runaway inflation, has dictator robert

mugabe.

everyone can criticize the monarch in england (the anti-

monarchists are alive and well and vocal), and all laws

anywhere in the civilized world remain unless otherwise

reversed or amended through a legislative process.

Reply:

In my knowledge about Australia in 1970 it was reported on TV

that the monarch of England is the monarch of Australia. In

the 90's again on the news on ABS-CBN it was reported that

Australia was having a referendum to retain the monarch of

England or become a republic. The people voted to retain the

monarch, therefore I believe that the monarch of England is

the monarch of Australia.

The anti monarchy in England can criticize the monarch but not

in the press. I think there is a difference between freedom of

speech and freedom of the press in England. 

==============================================================

My opinion which says that; "The late Princess Diana's

criticism of the monarchy when she was alive is a crime of

treason punishable by beheading." This statement is taken out

of context.

==============================================================

 
Islander:

Is.:  a big mass of people cannot be fooled; the filipino

people are no fools, unless you and i would presume that we

can speak for them as we speak for ourselves.  yes, you and i

could be fools, but those numbers who went to the streets? 

that calls for disbelief.

Reply:

It was easy for the anti Erap to fool the people. The fact

that almost all media outlets in Manila demonized Erap the

more the people were fooled.

Islander:   

yes, erap was democratically elected, but when he was

perceived (please note that in politics, perception is

everything) to have abused his powers, the masses spoke. 

that’s democracy of the streets, whether we like it or not.

Reply:

Not perceived by the people but perceived by media. The media

will always say that their opinion is the opinion of the

people. It is not true. The people spoke in an election. But

some power hungry politicians perceived that the election is

still 4 years long wait. For Filipino politicians one week is

already a long wait for the next election. That is how greedy

they are.

Islander:

 Is.:  granting that marcos was responsible for such miracles,

what happens then to the other two factors, the law of supply

and demand and the vagaries of weather?  the best of policies

would be useless in this case if there’s no rice to export

because there are more mouths to feed now or that production

is damaged because of some force majeure.  by the way,

smuggling exists at all times in any country, martial law or

not, by different smugglers, and will continue to exist for as

long as people give vent to their greed.

currently, the term had also come to mean kleptocratic

governments (i.e. those in positions of power use it to

maximize their own gains) and the legislature is a mere rubber

stamp.  in short, a failed state.

Reply:

You granted that Marcos was able to export rice was a miracle.

So the two other factors that were favorable to Marcos were

also miracles. Kleptocracy... to mean that the Marcos regime

depends also in your perspective viewpoint. Cory and her

kamag-anak Inc. are not keptocrats because you believe them

better than Marcos. With only 6 years in power, with so many

disruption of coupd'etats her kamag-anak were able to build

houses in Green Valley and Antipolo, Rizal. Those who were

attached to the Sumulongs who have no business of any kind

before Cory's term in office, became bigtime instant

businessmen during the Cory administration. I should know

because I am living in Antipolo.

Islander: 

2007 - In September the Transparency International estimate of

the amount embezzled by Marcos is quoted in a report by the

Stolen Assets Recovery Initiative, a joint venture of the

World Bank and the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime.

According to the report, “The channels whereby the money was

allegedly stolen were diverse, including the takeover of

private companies; creation of monopolies for sugar, coconuts,

shipping, construction, and the media; fraudulent government

loans; bribes from companies; and skimming off foreign loans

and raiding the public treasury. ”

Reply:

Did they prove that Marcos stole the money. He was already

charged of corruption together with Westinghouse Inc. but they

were acquited. Imelda was charged in NY with the RICO case but

was acquited. She was charged in the Philippines of graft but

the SC found her innocent. Everything had been thrown to them

including the kitchen sink. If they are guilty they should be

jailed. And now Bongbong is fast approaching to become another

Marcos in government. Imelda will be singing "Happy Days are

Again".

Islander:

Is.:  and marcos was not a usurper? Please note:

1971 - At a constitutional convention opposition delegates

introduce a provision to prevent Marcos from remaining as head

of state or government once his second term as president has

expired.  Marcos succeeds in having the ban overturned the

following year.

1972 - Using the excuse of an alleged assassination attempt

against Defence Minister Juan Ponce Enrile, Marcos declares

martial law on 21 September, promising to eliminate poverty

and injustice and create a "new society."  It is later

revealed that the assassination attempt had been staged by the

military.

Reply:

Marcos was not an usurper because what he did was through the

workings of the law. Martial Law is legal. It's in the

constitution.

The 1971 concon is irrelevant because it was overtaken by the

declaration of Martial Law. Just imagine the whole concon

delegates were convinced by Marcos to sign the new charter

believing that they will become interim members of the new

parliament.

Enrile's alibi that the attempt on his life was staged as a prelude to Martial Law is unbelievable. He said this during

his rebellion against Marcos when he was looking for allies in

Cory and Cardinal Sin, because his life again is in danger. He

branded Imelda a "kaskasera" and he did look into himself who is also a "kaskasero".   

WN                     

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #59 on: March 12, 2010, 03:25:09 PM »

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #60 on: March 13, 2010, 05:26:51 PM »
Islander, I am merely sharing my views in comparison and through reading reports as well as case studies regarding the Marcos Administration and from taking several classes in US Foreign Policy in my undergraduate years. Sadly I was born after Martial Law and was too young to even remember or see Marcos in the television set (I was born in the summer of 1985).

Let us just say that Marcos is admired for his actions abroad and by the Fil-Am community.



You must have had revisionist if not strange readings of reports and case studies and lessons in US foreign policy in your undergraduate years to make you conclude that Marcos was admired for his actions abroad and by the Fil-Am community.
 
There were demonstrations by Fil-Ams in the US in the dead of winter asking then foreign affairs committee chairman Richard Lugar to do something about the political situation in the Philippines.  

(Suggested additional light readings, for starters:  Aquino’s Philippines:  The Center Holds, Sandra Burton, Council on Foreign Relations; The Philippines Chasing Marcos’ Millions, Time Magazine, March 31, 1986)  

And maybe the following speeches (and the data they contain) were missed out in your undergraduate years?

César Gaviria Trujillo, secretary general of the Organization of American States:

Senator Lugar’s support for democracy around the world has been marked by deeds and not just words. He has observed elections in Guatemala and was co-leader of the official U.S. Election Observer Delegation in the 1986 Philippines election in which Corazon Aquino became President. In the Philippines, Senator Lugar highlighted the systematic electoral fraud committed by the Marcos regime and convinced the U.S. government to recognize Mrs. Aquino as the rightful winner.

Is this something about Marcos that Fil-Ams can admire?

Senator Richard Lugar’s tribute to Cory Aquino, 1996 Fullbright Ceremony, US Department of State:

I’ve mentioned my short tenure as chairman of the [Foreign Relations] Committee, and it was fortuitous that those were the years—1985 and 1986—in which this occurred. Fairly early in 1985, we had testimony from the State Department and from our Department of Defense—conspicuous testimony by Paul Wolfowitz and Richard Armitage—as they outlined growing debate within those two departments as to where our interests lay and where they ought to lie in the future. We were sensitized, both as a committee and as a Congress, and as a public, that we had some hard choices ahead of us.

What we could not have imagined was that the focus of this debate in our country might lead President Marcos to call the snap election which he did on the Brinkley program on a Sunday afternoon in November and in essence, challenged us to put up or shut up. The input of that particular program was to say, "I’m calling a special election and I ask anybody in the world who wants to come and observe it—especially you people in the United States. And you will see that I’m going to win it, and I’m going to win it big, and democracy will be served." At that point, the wheels began to move in our committee and within the Reagan administration and particularly in the minds of Secretary George Shultz and of Steve Bosworth, our great ambassador out there on the point. And without going through all of the detail of what occurred, an observer group was named. I was co-chairman with John Murtha, distinguished congressman who still serves in the state of Pennsylvania.

With a host of about 30 distinguished Americans assembled to go to all parts of the Philippines, we negotiated with the Marcos administration on such things as how close we could get to the voting booths. A strange law was adopted shortly before we were underway that 150 feet would be our distance. Then we said we won’t come under those circumstances and to the end Marcos was so eager for us to come that essentially almost all of the rules and stipulations we suggested they acceded to, understanding that 30 people in the midst of that vast country were unlikely to see a whole lot. We proceeded and, in fact, had an experience that is indelible in my memory and, I think, that of our honoree today. Let me just say that the election was one in which our intelligence people told me before I went that President Aquino would be the winner if, in fact, all the votes were counted—at least it was beyond what we call now in our election campaigns the margin of error. But, they indicated to me, she would not be the winner. I had to understand the realpolitik of the situation. It was simply not in the cards, given the nature of the way the election was going to be conducted, despite all of our best efforts to observe and to editorialize. And indeed, as the election approached, a very large number of people were disenfranchised and suddenly strange machinations occurred as some polls reported votes of 400 to 0 and other things to which I’ve become accustomed in some of our own elections in Indiana. We were prepared for the challenge. We were not prepared, I suspect, for the aftermath.


***

Without going through everything that occurred subsequently, let me just say that by Saturday President Reagan had come to a different evaluation, that the election had been fraudulent, indeed, to a grave extent and set in motion events which led to President Marcos being spirited out of the country through Hawaii and President Aquino being sworn in as president.

***

And the ultimate judgment of that election, by our friends not only in Asia—in South Korea—but in Latin America, was that there had been a change in our foreign policy, and President Reagan enunciated that in a speech to the Congress not long thereafter in which he said that our policy will now be to fight totalitarianism of the left and authoritarianism of the right equally, evenhandedly, both—not that one is more of a problem than the other. That was a change, and it was noted by people in Guatemala, in Nicaragua, in El Salvador, in many other places of the earth far away from the Philippines. It was certainly noted in South Korea in a hurry, and I will point out, just for the sake of historical accuracy, when I visited Indonesia later in 1986 that President Suharto sat me down and lectured me for 30 minutes on how he was a grass-roots politician, coming up through the democratic route, so we would not get any ideas while we were visiting Jakarta.

***

And there was Senator Paul Laxalt’s famous advice to Marcos to “cut and cut cleanly”.

Now I wonder what people “abroad and by the Fil-Am community,” to quote you, admire in Marcos.




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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #61 on: March 13, 2010, 05:40:56 PM »
On the notion of change; what change have we really seen? Most of the promulgations that the late Pres. Ferdinand E. Marcos are still in effect. Over 90 of his Republic Acts are still in effect, to this very day. That should not dim the brilliance of Marcos, despite claims of corruption and plunder by many of his peers, who do the same this very day.

Correction (to use your well-mannered term), Republic Acts are passed by a duly elected legislative body while promulgations are enactments, formally proclaiming a new statutory as in effect after it receives final approval.
 
With the executive (Marcos) making legislation (which would have been left to the legislative branch of government in keeping with the ideal of check and balance), the likes of you can certainly conclude that the man’s brilliance never dimmed.  (Although brilliance and inspired and honest leadership don't necessarily go hand in hand.)

Yes, those Republic Acts (or the Batas Pambansa, the name depending on the time of Marcos’s 21-year administration) are still in use, like the independence of Siquijor as a province or the implementation of the metric system in the country.




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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #62 on: March 13, 2010, 05:46:46 PM »
In my opinion, there are none after Marcos who initiated as much progress and infrastructural growth.

And none who made foreign borrowings to fund those projects (with percentages disappearing into some deep pockets to boot) enough to mess the country’s economy.  That’s not my opinion. It’s simple documented fact after legal investigations, a slew of paper trails, and scholarly analyses by experts.  (I dare not go into revisionism because, unlike you, who am I?)




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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #63 on: March 13, 2010, 06:09:08 PM »
And in my personal opinion, the very notion of continuous People's Power is a failed concept. The French made this known in the repudiation of Marat as well as Max Robespierre during the waning days of the French Revolution. And in the end, it is the plethoric masses that are utilized by the rich elite, under the banner of change. Has there really been change? The poor remain poor and the rich remain rich. And the greed of politicians continue to rule the day.
Thanks for your personal opinion.  This one is mine:

By the very nature of upheavals, some lives are sacrificed.  (“Revolution is like Saturn, it devours its own children.”  Die Revolution ist wie Saturn, sie frißt ihre eignen Kinder. - Danton’s Death, Act I, by Georg Büchner [1813–1837], German dramatist and revolutionary)
 
Marat and Robespierre abused their time in power by eliminating counterrevolutionaries, both real and imagined.  (Lucky us, Marcos and Imelda didn’t meet the fate of Romania’s Ceaucescu and his wife Elena.)  This dark chapter of the French Revolution and the succeeding wars do not necessarily negate what eventually became the current French republic.

As in the time of Marcos, not all poor remained poor.  Manny Villar passes himself off as the poor Tondo boy who made good and became very, very rich.  And stories of riches to rags never abate.  Some people are bound to be greedy, whether they’re politicians or not, Marcos’s time or not.

If Marcos stabilized the Republic, how come your family left such stability and settled in the US?

As for ‘plethoric masses’, I’m just curious about this phrase of yours. 
 
Plethora – large or excessive amount or number
Masses – large but unspecified numbers or quantities


They seem to be one and the same.  (I understand here that by ‘mass’ you refer to people and not lumps.)





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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #64 on: March 13, 2010, 07:26:02 PM »
Issue pa ba diay tawon ni--Marcos and his martial law? It's appalling that some people still believe that Marcos was an enlightened leader and that his martial law was beneficial to the Filipino people.

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #65 on: March 14, 2010, 09:24:09 AM »
Islander:

1973 - A new constitution allowing Marcos to stay in office indefinitely and to rule by decree is introduced.  The result is confirmed by a fraudulent referendum enabling him to continue as president until the end of martial law and to arbitrarily appoint all government officials, including members of the judiciary.  Imelda Marcos is made governor of Manila and minister of human settlements and ecology.

Reply:

This is a given argument. Of course he ruled by decree because there was no congress. He was the Martial Law administrator.

Islander:
***
Political prisoners are routinely tortured by the military. "Disappearances" and murders of suspected political activists are common, with over 500 cases being recorded for the period 1975-80.  Meanwhile, inflation and unemployment rise while already low living standards drop.

Reply:

There was not a single case of torture... if there was who was the accuse military personnel. This issue is part of the hate campaign against Marcos. Those who disappeared or presume to be murdered were part of the campaign against the insurgency.

Islander:

Is.:  true, true.  but:

Martial law initially brings stability and an economic turnaround but with the costs of reduced social freedoms and increasing corruption.  Limited land reforms are introduced but prove ineffective.  Manufacturing and business enterprises
are nationalized or handed to Marcos's cronies or relatives.  Profits are siphoned off for personal enrichment and mismanagement is rife.

Reply:

You are admitting to this fact. This is true also in other countries who were able to sustain authoritarian regimes that in exchange for a fast economic recovery you have to surrender your freedom temporarily.                                     

Islander:

Is.:  why add some more when these ‘specialty hospitals’, as you call them, are already there?  more so when until now our country is paying for the loans made to finance those structures?  isn’t it more commonsensical to just fully utilize what are already existing rather than borrow some more from foreign creditors and deplete the country’s coffers some more, the way the marcoses did to fund their grandiose show windows?  by the way, the term “edifice complex” bestowed on
imelda was not for nothing.

Reply:

If they cannot add some more then they should put extensions to some of those hospitals. Some of these hospitals are overcrowded. Patients are already in the corridors especially in the Heart Center.

Islander:

Is.:  filipino migration for jobs abroad started in 1906.  the number increased greatly in the 1960s.  we had a young new president then on whom our country pinned so much hopes.  during his tenure of 21 years, the country’s foreign debts ballooned and the economy worsened.  this was when filipinos began their job diaspora in droves.  the trend hasn’t stopped decades after as the country hasn’t gotten out of the morass of those foreign debts.

Reply:

I agree... there were already Filipino workers went to Hawaii and California as farmers but it was not said that their earnings were to help the economy of the Philippines. The late Blas Ople the minister of labor during the time of Marcos did not open the Middle East for Filipino laborers to help the economy of the Philippines but to give more employment to the Filipinos.

After Marcos because of their campaign of hatred many investments were closed especially the EPZA in Morong, Bataan. Ford Australia who established spare parts manufacturing in the Philippines transferred to Malaysia. Volkwagen cars was closed. Mattel was sabotaged by the labor union and closed shop. Filipino workers who lost their jobs looked for jobs abroad. And for the first time Filipinos were to accept petty jobs as domestic helpers in Bahrain, Kuwait, saudi Arabia, Singapore and Hongkong. Our women because of poverty... and mind you it is happening today as we speak; they accept sleazy jobs as stripteasers and entertainers/cum prostitutes.
     
And our government hailed them as heroes for sending dollar remittances to the country helping the economy grows.

===================================================
Statements below are issues I brought up for you to comment.

But you comment on the WB conditionalities of borrower country

like the Philippines. Anyway I'll try to answer those issues

fro Robin Broad and John Cavanagh.
==================================================
11.  WN:  Marcos signed PD's that were favorable for foreign investors which is why there were many export processing zones that were established in our country... Mactan in Cebu, Morong in Bataan and Baguio city.Marcos caused the establishment of Offshore-Banking System in the Philippines thus upgrading the banking system and invite foreign banks to do business in the Philippines under certain incentives and guarantees.

There is no more clamor for his return, he is dead already but there are political sounds echoeing for the return of Marcos parliamentary form of government through charter change.[cha-cha] According to a study in UP the Marcos decrees and edicts that are deemed beneficial to the Filipino people are the OPSF or the law subsidizing the price of oil and the Price Control Law through the Price Stabilization Council which control the price of prime commodity in the market.

===================================================

Islander:

Is.:  yes, as dictated by the world bank and the international monetary fund (IMF) as preconditions for loans.  thus:“Companies importing capital goods could expect approval of foreign loans only if their production processes were geared to exports, decreed the Central Bank.” (Robin Broad and John Cavanagh, Unequal Alliance, University of California Press, 1987)

Reply:

When your a borrower your option is to agree to the conditions of the lender. Why? If your the owner of a bank are you not going to put conditionalities to whoever is going to borrow

money?

Islander:   

and this says it all:

As opportunities for profit in the Third World dwindled, transnational banks and corporations refocused their sights back on the developed world.  Four years as the lead international institution in this era of debt crisis management left the IMF almost universally despised across the South—and nearly broke.  So, the next heir to the international debt and development management throne was anointed: the World Bank, which (with U.S. government blessing) chose structural adjustment of the Philippine

variety as its cure-all.


***
The model, Philippines, having been opened up to the world

economy in new and expanded ways in the early 1980s through

the structural adjustment process, fared among the worst of

the debtor nations. Internal corruption and cronyism combined

with collapsing export earnings to plunge the country into

deep economic and then political crisis.  Only those Filipinos

who managed to salt dollars away abroad through secret and

often illegal capital flight seemed able to avoid the worst of

this all-encompassing crisis.                                 

                         

***
Indeed, in many respects, the one relic of value that a

fleeing Ferdinand Marcos left his successor was a negative

example: a two-decade blueprint for guaranteed economic

disaster. There was much to learn from studying Marcos's

mistakes.  For in the failure of Marcos, the World Bank, and

the IMF lay important lessons that might be applied to another

approach to development—one placing people before the market.

(Robin Broad and John Cavanagh, Unequal Alliance, University

of California Press, 1987; emphasis mine)

Reply:

I cannot agree more the opinion of Robin Broad and her husband

than to say that she, her husband and Walden Bello are not

economist in the real sense but they engaged themselves in

economic politics and as critic of the IMF and the WB. Since

she and her husband's opinion are in harmony with Walden Bello

who is a known leftist professor at UP I can say clearly they

are spinning a leftist bias opinion. Her aim is not for

scholastic records but to destabilize and to put down

conservative governments. Which is why if there is any

scholastic study she had for the Philippines I think it is not

acceptable from the point of view of the Makati Business Club.

Her opinion that; "Ferdinand Marcos left his successor was a

negative example: a two-decade blueprint for guaranteed

economic disaster"... is contradictory to her first statement.

She admits that; "the Philippines is WB/IMF model having been

opened up to the world economy in new and expanded ways in the

early 1980s".... but "fared among the worst of the debtor

nations." Where are her proof?

Islander:
 
Is.:   the 1976 sixth amendment to the 1973 constitution

authorized the chief executive to legislate, as follows:

“Whenever in the judgment of the President there exists a

grave emergency or a threat or imminence thereof, or whenever

the Interim Batasang Pambansa or the regular National Assembly

fails or is unable to act adequately on any matter for any

reason that in his judgment requires immediate action, he may,

in order to meet the exigency, issue the necessary decrees,

orders or letters of instructions, which shall form part of

the law of the land.”

i’m curious as to what’s french and british about it.  (n.b.:

the british government is not authoritarian.)

Reply:

The Philippine government during Marcos copied the French

model which has a strong president, like Marcos himself who

can legislate. So he is a strong president. While Amendment

no. 6 is similar to the British law that gives Reserve Power

to the monarch of England. In case of instability in the

British parliament the monarch can this Reserve Power. It is

like the declaration of Martial Law in the US. The British

system came from or it originated from an authoritarian

regime.     

Islander:

Is.  someone who shouts ‘fire’ in a movie house even if

there’s no fire invites the penalty of arresto menor for

public disturbance and, depending on the damage of his act,

risks charges ranging from misdemeanor to felony, which means

no one is free to shout a false alarm.

Reply:

Correct... that person who shouted "fire" committed a crime.

You got the literal interpretation. But when a journalist is

shouting in the newspaper that his government is on fire, and

politicians are thieves without any supporting evidence he is

free in our system. But in Australia, Britain and Singapore he

will go to jail.

Island:     

any journalist worth his salt will tell us that he only

reports what is there.  journalists are news

reporters/broadcasters/writers, not newsmakers.  whether the

record of killed journalists proves that freedom of the press

is exercised in our country or not depends on one’s

perspective.  the “killers” kill because they believe they’re

justified to silence journalists forever; journalists believe

they’re exercising responsible reporting (what journalist

would say he isn’t?) in their risky profession in which their

lives may just be sacrificed.  that’s perspective.

those unfortunate journalists in the ampatuan massacre were

killed not because they were primarily journalists, i suppose,

but because they were in the line of fire in a deadly

political rivalry where witnesses to the crime were considered

a bane and had to be silenced forever.  as a parallel, most of

the women in that massacre were wives.  there are no

statistics for wives killed; there are for journalists.

Reply:

Journalists worth his salt in our country are a rare specimen.

I believe they are more corrupt than the politicians because

nobody is watching them. The high record of journalists killed

in our country proved that they are too aggressive to write

opinions that are ofensive to somebody. In our country freedom

of the press is to offend. If a journalist is a hard hitter he

should have all the evidences to support all the issues he

brought up. He is not free to lie.

Islander:   

i repeat, there was no freedom of the press during martial

law.

Reply:

Did I not say in my previous opinion that during Martial Law

the press was regulated just like the present system in

Australia, New Zealand, Singapore and Malaysia. Most of these

countries have a press tribunal that any complain about

irresponsible reporting is investigated.   
 
Islander:

Is.:  the ouster of one president who had allegedly plundered

the country’s treasury does not constitute an absence of the

rule of law. 

it seems that after marcos, accusations of plunder against

someone sitting in the highest office of the land is enough to

mobilize large crowds for a mass protest.   

(mobocracy – mob rule or ochlocracy; a government by mob or a

mass of people)

unlikeable as they may seem, the administration that took over

after erap’s ouster wasn’t the mass of people.  the mass of

people went home and went on with their lives.

Reply:

A government of mob is like the Mafia. They know only about

chaos and violence. If you believe in mobocracy then what can

I do.

Island:

Is.:  would that our “onion skin” be shed off simply by

emulating the british system and those of other countries that

you’ve mentioned.  i can’t imagine us valuing our freedom less

than the americans, though.  let’s take both of us; we are

expressing our opinions and are free to do so, as we are doing

it now in tb.  will we be killed?

Reply:

Who will kill us when we are not abusing our freedom?
     
Islander:

today’s monarchies in the countries you’ve mentioned are

ceremonial heads of state.  the running of their government is

left to parliament, with the prime minister as head.  their

governments remain democracies, not monarchies.

Reply:

Not in England. 

Islander:

Is.:  there’s no difference, really.  our own right of

suffrage is also our duty, as it is in the u.s.  (for every

right, we have a concomitant responsibility.)  and there’s no

such law, anywhere, that only the king has the right, as you

say.  as for the “people’s right to freedom of speech” being

“unabridged by law in the US and the Philippines”, surely, you

must have heard of libel cases.  that’s one of the ways our

laws and that of the u.s. “abridge” freedom of speech.

Reply:

That is if you are talking about our right and in the US...it

is a duty in your own interpretation but I am differentiating

suffrage as a duty in Australia and England and suffrage in

the Philippines and the US. In libel it is not abridging the

press because libel is crime again a person's reputation and

honor.

You did not get my point. England with an unwritten

constitution has no "bill of rights" in its originality. The

only person in the constitution who has the right is the king.

All other people are subjects to the king. But today in modern

times parliament legislates the right of the people. In it is

not constitutional but also legislated.     

Islander:

Is.:  there’s no monarch in australia.  as a former colony of

great britain, it is just a member of the commonwealth of

nations (previously named the british commonwealth) whose

members total 54 sovereign states, most of which were former

british colonies or dependencies of those colonies.  malaysia

is also a member.  so are rwanda and zimbabwe.  the latter,

currently with a runaway inflation, has dictator robert

mugabe.

everyone can criticize the monarch in england (the anti-

monarchists are alive and well and vocal), and all laws

anywhere in the civilized world remain unless otherwise

reversed or amended through a legislative process.

Reply:

In my knowledge about Australia in 1970 it was reported on TV

that the monarch of England is the monarch of Australia. In

the 90's again on the news on ABS-CBN it was reported that

Australia was having a referendum to retain the monarch of

England or become a republic. The people voted to retain the

monarch, therefore I believe that the monarch of England is

the monarch of Australia.

The anti monarchy in England can criticize the monarch but not

in the press. I think there is a difference between freedom of

speech and freedom of the press in England. 

==============================================================

My opinion which says that; "The late Princess Diana's

criticism of the monarchy when she was alive is a crime of

treason punishable by beheading." This statement is taken out

of context.

==============================================================

 
Islander:

Is.:  a big mass of people cannot be fooled; the filipino

people are no fools, unless you and i would presume that we

can speak for them as we speak for ourselves.  yes, you and i

could be fools, but those numbers who went to the streets? 

that calls for disbelief.

Reply:

It was easy for the anti Erap to fool the people. The fact

that almost all media outlets in Manila demonized Erap the

more the people were fooled.

Islander:   

yes, erap was democratically elected, but when he was

perceived (please note that in politics, perception is

everything) to have abused his powers, the masses spoke. 

that’s democracy of the streets, whether we like it or not.

Reply:

Not perceived by the people but perceived by media. The media

will always say that their opinion is the opinion of the

people. It is not true. The people spoke in an election. But

some power hungry politicians perceived that the election is

still 4 years long wait. For Filipino politicians one week is

already a long wait for the next election. That is how greedy

they are.

Islander:

 Is.:  granting that marcos was responsible for such miracles,

what happens then to the other two factors, the law of supply

and demand and the vagaries of weather?  the best of policies

would be useless in this case if there’s no rice to export

because there are more mouths to feed now or that production

is damaged because of some force majeure.  by the way,

smuggling exists at all times in any country, martial law or

not, by different smugglers, and will continue to exist for as

long as people give vent to their greed.

currently, the term had also come to mean kleptocratic

governments (i.e. those in positions of power use it to

maximize their own gains) and the legislature is a mere rubber

stamp.  in short, a failed state.

Reply:

You granted that Marcos was able to export rice was a miracle.

So the two other factors that were favorable to Marcos were

also miracles. Kleptocracy... to mean that the Marcos regime

depends also in your perspective viewpoint. Cory and her

kamag-anak Inc. are not keptocrats because you believe them

better than Marcos. With only 6 years in power, with so many

disruption of coupd'etats her kamag-anak were able to build

houses in Green Valley and Antipolo, Rizal. Those who were

attached to the Sumulongs who have no business of any kind

before Cory's term in office, became bigtime instant

businessmen during the Cory administration. I should know

because I am living in Antipolo.

Islander: 

2007 - In September the Transparency International estimate of

the amount embezzled by Marcos is quoted in a report by the

Stolen Assets Recovery Initiative, a joint venture of the

World Bank and the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime.

According to the report, “The channels whereby the money was

allegedly stolen were diverse, including the takeover of

private companies; creation of monopolies for sugar, coconuts,

shipping, construction, and the media; fraudulent government

loans; bribes from companies; and skimming off foreign loans

and raiding the public treasury. ”

Reply:

Did they prove that Marcos stole the money. He was already

charged of corruption together with Westinghouse Inc. but they

were acquited. Imelda was charged in NY with the RICO case but

was acquited. She was charged in the Philippines of graft but

the SC found her innocent. Everything had been thrown to them

including the kitchen sink. If they are guilty they should be

jailed. And now Bongbong is fast approaching to become another

Marcos in government. Imelda will be singing "Happy Days are

Again".

Islander:

Is.:  and marcos was not a usurper? Please note:

1971 - At a constitutional convention opposition delegates

introduce a provision to prevent Marcos from remaining as head

of state or government once his second term as president has

expired.  Marcos succeeds in having the ban overturned the

following year.

1972 - Using the excuse of an alleged assassination attempt

against Defence Minister Juan Ponce Enrile, Marcos declares

martial law on 21 September, promising to eliminate poverty

and injustice and create a "new society."  It is later

revealed that the assassination attempt had been staged by the

military.

Reply:

Marcos was not an usurper because what he did was through the

workings of the law. Martial Law is legal. It's in the

constitution.

The 1971 concon is irrelevant because it was overtaken by the

declaration of Martial Law. Just imagine the whole concon

delegates were convinced by Marcos to sign the new charter

believing that they will become interim members of the new

parliament.

Enrile's alibi that the attempt on his life was staged as a prelude to Martial Law is unbelievable. He said this during

his rebellion against Marcos when he was looking for allies in

Cory and Cardinal Sin, because his life again is in danger. He

branded Imelda a "kaskasera" and he did look into himself who is also a "kaskasero".   

WN                     

Well written, Way Nada.



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Lorenzo

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #66 on: March 14, 2010, 09:26:58 AM »
Correction (to use your well-mannered term), Republic Acts are passed by a duly elected legislative body while promulgations are enactments, formally proclaiming a new statutory as in effect after it receives final approval.
 
With the executive (Marcos) making legislation (which would have been left to the legislative branch of government in keeping with the ideal of check and balance), the likes of you can certainly conclude that the man’s brilliance never dimmed.  (Although brilliance and inspired and honest leadership don't necessarily go hand in hand.)

Yes, those Republic Acts (or the Batas Pambansa, the name depending on the time of Marcos’s 21-year administration) are still in use, like the independence of Siquijor as a province or the implementation of the metric system in the country.




In the end, over 90 Republic Acts are still maintained and utilized to this day.

:)

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #67 on: March 14, 2010, 09:42:37 AM »
I highly suggest reading Bonner's, Waltzing With A Dictator: The Marcoses and The Making of American Policy (1988); Romulo's, Inside the Palace: The Rise and Fall of Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos (1987), and Gleek's, President Marcos and the Philippine Political Culture (1988).



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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #68 on: March 14, 2010, 09:45:45 AM »
Thanks for your personal opinion.  This one is mine:

By the very nature of upheavals, some lives are sacrificed.  (“Revolution is like Saturn, it devours its own children.”  Die Revolution ist wie Saturn, sie frißt ihre eignen Kinder. - Danton’s Death, Act I, by Georg Büchner [1813–1837], German dramatist and revolutionary)
 
Marat and Robespierre abused their time in power by eliminating counterrevolutionaries, both real and imagined.  (Lucky us, Marcos and Imelda didn’t meet the fate of Romania’s Ceaucescu and his wife Elena.)  This dark chapter of the French Revolution and the succeeding wars do not necessarily negate what eventually became the current French republic.

As in the time of Marcos, not all poor remained poor.  Manny Villar passes himself off as the poor Tondo boy who made good and became very, very rich.  And stories of riches to rags never abate.  Some people are bound to be greedy, whether they’re politicians or not, Marcos’s time or not.

If Marcos stabilized the Republic, how come your family left such stability and settled in the US?

As for ‘plethoric masses’, I’m just curious about this phrase of yours.
 
Plethora – large or excessive amount or number
Masses – large but unspecified numbers or quantities


They seem to be one and the same.  (I understand here that by ‘mass’ you refer to people and not lumps.)





You did not answer my original question:
Has there really been change? The poor remain poor and the rich remain rich. And the greed of politicians continue to rule the day.



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Lorenzo

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #69 on: March 14, 2010, 10:03:01 AM »
This is directed towards Way Nada:

(I have several questions, pardon my interest in the subject)

1. What were the military plans that Marcos had regarding the issue of Sabah?

2. How would you describe the Philippine Foreign Policy, during the Marcos Administration, in regards to the War in Vietnam?

3. There are claims that it was Marcos that created the NPA, what, if any, are the odds of this being true, or not?

4. Did the Visayas region benefit under the Marcos Administration, in terms of infrastructure growth? If so, how would it compare to the rest of the country?

5. Why does the current Philippine government choose to retain over 90 Republic Acts that were passed during the Marcos Administration? Why aren't they repealed or abolished?


Thank You.

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #71 on: March 14, 2010, 08:10:36 PM »
Issue pa ba diay tawon ni--Marcos and his martial law? It's appalling that some people still believe that Marcos was an enlightened leader and that his martial law was beneficial to the Filipino people.

plain ignorance?

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #72 on: March 14, 2010, 08:43:27 PM »
plain ignorance?

Bwahaha! Either that, or complicated incompetence! ;D

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #73 on: March 14, 2010, 09:41:50 PM »
plain ignorance?
Bwahaha! Either that, or complicated incompetence! ;D

Hahaha some more. ;D  I like both your concise posts.  Just let me apologize because I still have to answer WN and Lorenzo, lengthily, after I'm done with my week's family laundry and weekend general house cleaning. :P

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Republic Act 8485 (Animal Welfare Act of 1998, Philippines), as amended and strengthened by House  Bill 6893 of 2013--- violation means a maximum of P250,000 fine with a corresponding three-year jail term and a minimum of P30,000 fine and six months imprisonment

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islander

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #74 on: March 14, 2010, 09:51:29 PM »
Well written, Way Nada.

I second the emotion. ;)

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Republic Act 8485 (Animal Welfare Act of 1998, Philippines), as amended and strengthened by House  Bill 6893 of 2013--- violation means a maximum of P250,000 fine with a corresponding three-year jail term and a minimum of P30,000 fine and six months imprisonment

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islander

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #75 on: March 14, 2010, 09:58:24 PM »
In the end, over 90 Republic Acts are still maintained and utilized to this day.

:)

Then there must be no end because these Republic Acts are still being used today, unless Siquijor disappears from the map.  Thank heavens for legislators. :) 

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Republic Act 8485 (Animal Welfare Act of 1998, Philippines), as amended and strengthened by House  Bill 6893 of 2013--- violation means a maximum of P250,000 fine with a corresponding three-year jail term and a minimum of P30,000 fine and six months imprisonment

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islander

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #76 on: March 14, 2010, 10:04:41 PM »
You did not answer my original question:
Has there really been change? The poor remain poor and the rich remain rich. And the greed of politicians continue to rule the day.



Apparently, you did not understand my answer.  Please read my post again.  After which, mind answering the question contained in that part of my post you quoted? :)

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Republic Act 8485 (Animal Welfare Act of 1998, Philippines), as amended and strengthened by House  Bill 6893 of 2013--- violation means a maximum of P250,000 fine with a corresponding three-year jail term and a minimum of P30,000 fine and six months imprisonment

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Way Nada

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #77 on: March 15, 2010, 07:12:59 AM »
This is directed towards Way Nada:

(I have several questions, pardon my interest in the subject)


1. What were the military plans that Marcos had regarding the issue of Sabah?

Reply:

There is no question that North Borneo [sabah] is a Philippine territory. The British annexed the territory to the Federation of Malaya after they were granted independence by the British. The former president Diosdado Macapagal sent then vice president Emmanuel Pelaez to Britain to claim North Borneo for the Philippines without success.

Malaysia in respond to the claim of the territory conducted a referendum asking the people as; "what country do they want to belong... Philippines or Malaysia? The Borneans voted for Malaysia."

When Marcos came to power our military possessed the best fighting men in all of South East Asia. Since Malaysia refused to hand-over the territory to the Philippines Marcos deviced a plan to bring back North Borneo to the Philippines. The military through the approval of Marcos recruited young Tausog Muslims to be trained as "commando fighters" to infiltrate North Borneo and agitate Filipinos living in North Borneo to start an insurgency war against the government of Malaysia.

This happened in the early part of the second term of Marcos. This plan of Marcos was not without a spy in congress. His name is Ninoy Aquino. In a privilege speech he dropped the bomb that the military massacred muslim recruits and one survivor swam from Corregidor and emerged out from the water along Roxas Boulevard. The name of the survivor is Araulo. This person who according to Ninoy emerged out from the sea along Roxas Boulevard... is a fictitious person supplied by a dossier to Ninoy. The press mentioned Araulo but nobody saw this person except in Ninoy's privilege speech. This person and the issue of the massacre were good material to lambast Marcos who was his political enemy. After everything is told and done the massacre that took place in Corregidor according to Ninoy... is a big lie. There was no massacre in Corregidor.

The Corregidor issue angered Nur Misuari who was then a professor at the University of the Philippines. He went back to Sulo and formed the MNLF. I can say that because of his privilege speech Ninoy Aquino was a big factor in the Moro insurgency under Misuari. The next worse thing that happened to the MNLF when Martial Law was declared was that many of them were driven out of Sulo to Sabah. This is why Ninoy in his speaking engagement abroad during his self-exile because of his own making he always tell his listeners that; "there are more than 200 thousands Muslim exiles in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah." He blamed Marcos for the plight of the Muslim exiles but to the person who understands the issue he is to be blamed.   

This issue brought up by Ninoy was a big blow to the government of Marcos that it became too embarrassing for the military to continue with their "commando" training. This scandal reached the British government that commonwealth allies like Australia and New Zealand sent a flotilla of warships into the sea fronting Palawan. To counter the planned sabotage by the Philippines, the gurkha fighters of the British Army was sent into North Borneo... trained the Malaysian Army in counter insurgency and jungle warfare. The last Gurkha that left Sabah [North Borneo] was in 1986 when Marcos military was in disarray and lost already the vigor to fight.

The irony here is that Marcos who dared to fight for our country's territory is a villain and Ninoy who betrayed the aim of the Filipinos to bring North Borneo is a hero.

WN


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Way Nada

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #78 on: March 15, 2010, 08:43:44 AM »
This is directed towards Way Nada:

(I have several questions, pardon my interest in the subject)



2. How would you describe the Philippine Foreign Policy, during the Marcos Administration, in regards to the War in Vietnam?

Reply:

During Marcos time since our military was the strongest in Southeast Asia and with the urging of the US we went to the war in Vietnam. As part of our foreign policy contribution we sent the PHILCAG to Vietnam. Before the Philcag there was the Philippine expeditionary force. We can say that our foreign policy in regards of fighting war against the communists in Vietnam it sits well also with our law illegalizing the Communist Party of the Philippines.   

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++

3. There are claims that it was Marcos that created the NPA, what, if any, are the odds of this being true, or not?

Reply:

Marcos created the NPA is false! NPA is leftist and Marcos authoritarian government was conservative rightist. The Partido Kumunista ng Pilipinas was there in the Philippines before the war. It was founded by Evangelista. His prominent follower was Juan Sumulong the great grandfather of Cory Aquino.

The NPA was founded by Bernabe Buscayno who was once a confidante of Ninoy Aquino. The CCP of Joma Sison fused with Buscayno and the NPA became the armed group of the communist party in our country. When Cory took over power her first land reform beneficiary is the NPA leader Bernabe Buscayno. After Buscayno received largesse from the Cory government... did the NPA insurgency in the Philippines cease? The answer is no.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

4. Did the Visayas region benefit under the Marcos Administration, in terms of infrastructure growth? If so, how would it compare to the rest of the country?

Reply:

Yes, the infrastructure that Marcos built was nationwide but more in his Ilocos region of course. Marcos was not like CPG who had only a hundred meters of concreted road built in his own province of Bohol. That concrete road is in Tubigon.

Marcos will go down in history as the only president who built more roads than all the presidents combined from Aguinaldo to Macapagal. The Philippine-Japan frienship highway was started by Marcos with the building of San Juanico Bridge spanning the islands of Leyte and Samar in the Visayas.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

5. Why does the current Philippine government choose to retain over 90 Republic Acts that were passed during the Marcos Administration? Why aren't they repealed or abolished?

Reply:

The current government cannot erase the laws of Marcos especially those promulgated during his authoritarian regime because those laws are well crafted by Marcos and his law experts inside his government. Please notice that these are not democratically enacted... as acts of congress. We all agree that in the practice of law Marcos is brilliant and with the help of experts, he meticulously designed the laws to last for years and maybe centuries. 

WN

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Re: Were you there during the First Edsa Revolution?
« Reply #79 on: March 15, 2010, 04:58:55 PM »

Marcos will go down in history as the only president who built more roads than all the presidents combined from Aguinaldo to Macapagal.

Marcos has already gone down in history after bequeathing to the Filipino people and the world a far more enduring legacy than roads and presidential decrees--a greedy and brutal reign that gained him entry to the pantheon of the world's most despised rulers.

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