SAY CHIZ!! -- From the Heart (Evangelista) 22 September 2014 Senator Chiz Escudero had some very, VERY, interesting proposition recently. Put an ending to the debacle and burry the former dictators body, Ferdinand Marcos Sr., at the Libingan ng mga Bayani, a memorial cemetery reserved, well, for heroes. As a young politician appealing to young voters, he appears to be courting both sides of the fence, the crony regime who will benefit on the forgetfulness, his dad being a cohort, while on the other the sorry recipients who are the majority of the exploited, misinformed and uninformed teaming masses. He is acting exactly as a traditional politician (trapo). One who it seems is willing to compromise the moral compass for which good governance lie upon. Indeed, a slap in the face, no, worse, getting literally defecated in the mouth, for all the martial law torture victims, whether dead or still alive, and the thousands of families left behind. Its a brilliant strategy I can only equate with the survival instincts and cunning of Senator Juan Ponce Enrile who is now in jail, awaiting trial for the crime of plunder. An architech of Martial Law who commanded the Armed Forces but managed to rehabilitate himself to becoming a shrewd politician, courtesy of the education deprived masses. Somehow, it is futile to represent our entire work force to be highly educated. We know for a fact that most college graduates were not taught in detail about our history. Hell, not even our most recent history. The entire world media and international bodies recognize the evils of Marcoss dictatorship. Our country is the only one who seems not to recognize it. There goes highly in education. But I digress. Their explanation would not stand scrutiny in the logic of the international community who subscribes to a sense of world and humane justice. If their argument is that he deserves to be buried in the halls of heroes because he served in the military during the 2nd world war (despite getting rebuked of fake medals), or he became president of this country, then use that argument to convince the rest of Germany to burry Hitler in a cemetery reserved for heroes. Do that for Pinochet. Do that for Pol Pot. Do that for Gaddafi. Binay recommends full military honors for the dictator to be burried in Ilocos. If he so believes the justification to accord this so called full military honors, then why not insist to burry him at the Libingan ng mga Bayani? Or is it because he just wants to accommodate and compromise the two sides of the divide, the hell with whats right or wrong? Binay is a martial law crusader who risked life and limbed only to succumb to greed once hes tasted power. Whos he partying with? Only the son and namesake of the former dictator who keeps on denying that his father did nothing wrong. Talk about not visiting the mistakes of the father to the son. Or may be partying, with all the pun intended, as is the case of political parties compromising and accommodating each other, Binay with a convicted plunderer of a former president - Erap Estrada. To put icing on the cake, as he accommodates the son of the former dictator, he must therefore accommodate the son of the former convicted plundering president to the position of Vice President in the upcoming elections. Thats Senator JUngoy (appears to be a typo error but couldn’t be bothered to check) Estrada currently in jail for the second time around for the crime of plunder, himself getting acquitted the first time, together with his father who was covicted. Binay leads the pack in the polls for president, pointing to a highly educated citizenry indeed. An irony lost in irony. Chiz insists that we should have closure by putting a a dot at the end of the sentence for the dictators body. If you want to at least go to the level of ending this burying debacle, put closure first to the crimes committed by the martial law operators and their crony capitalist perpetrators. How conveniently fair is it not that you want to accord honor to a savage dictator while damning the victims, in essence the entire country and its future generation, who have yet to get a sense of justice. To get a sense of justice, well, we only have the son, the daughter and the unholy mother of a ghost back in power, as senator, governor and congresswoman respectively. If thats not enough to jolt the sanity of any self-respecting citizen of the world, I don’t know what will. Why are these people enjoying self-flagellation, they may ask. You want to put closure, at least convict the martial law perpetrators. At least recover San Miguel from Cojuanco who used the coconut levy funds for it. At least recover the wealth from the cronies. At least recover the hidden Marcos wealth in Switzerland estimated to be at least USD 10 billion. And the least among the least, put on record the entire Marcos family admitting the dictators sins and crime to the Filipino nation. If they can not be convinced to admit, put all of them in jail. Thats where they should be in the first place. We all know they are guilty. We just lack the political will to document the misdeeds that will crucify and convict them. Only then can we talk about putting a dot and having closure. Bongbong Marcos talks about what could have been if his father stayed in power. That we could have been the next Singapore. Then here comes the respected former prime minister of Singapore Lee Kwan Yew himself exclaiming Only in the Philippines could a leader like Ferdinand Marcos, who pillaged his country for over twenty years, still be considered for a national burial. Insignificant amounts of the loot have been recovered, yet his wife and children were allowed to return and engage in politics. I mentioned earlier about a global community with a sense of justice, of moral values, of right or wrong. I rest my case. If Marcos gets buried at the Libingan ng mga Bayani, I don’t know how any self-respecting Filipino can ever face any other foreign person again, let alone to see himself in the mirror. Freedoms just another word for nothin left to loose, lines from a remake sang by Janis Joplin. Ours may be a young and immature democracy, afflicted by the ills of instutionalized corruption and crony capitalization, marred by a forgetful public, a pillaged country with three centuries of colonial misdeeds from Spain, the US, Japan and back to US again, in many ways under a covert self-serving policy. Theres the CIA orchestrated influence during previous presidential elections (e.g. Magsaysay) and theres the Vice President and elder George Bush in the 80s toasting Marcos, We love youradherence to democratic principles — and to the democratic processes, prefering to support dictators which was in vogue in those days, over a communist-run country, as a matter of policy during the Cold War. We can not afford to continue having the same line of excuse for all our ills. I believe we should keep up the debate and the noise in combatting such an injustice to our history. The rest and few who has the resources, from having at least one or all of the dignity of quality education, material wealth and idle time, to keep the fire burning, to filter out the message and moral logic to the nation. Its a salute for those who shed blood to bring democracy back. Its a salute to the fighting young who will inherit a country that is blessed in abundance in natural resource, but contemptibly and unacceptably poor. Its a testament to the lengths for which corruption emanates to the core of our being and our normal lives. You have a corrupted set of moral values, or even just a compromised sense of right or wrong, then it is logical to expect compromised decision making when dealing with political, economic, and social policies. A compromise in one can mean the rest of your dealings will have to be demanded another compromise amongst a set of requests within a group who is aware of a prior compromised deal. It is a way to keep everyone happy. My worry is that the supposedly educated tiny middle class who are expected to have a louder voice, are falling into the trap and concede to the Martial Law revisionists. I have always doubted the kind of façade that Chiz wants to parade. Now its clear as daylight. We should condemn such a breed of politicians. Let us not accommodate political expediency against our sense of right or wrong. Lets call a spade a spade. I for one don’t want to say Chiz.
Posted on: Mon, 22 Sep 2014 16:01:37 +0000
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