Martial rule under a veil
Perspective
Rowena V. Guanzon
Visayan Daily Star
Sept 27, 2005
There is no need for Gloria Macapagal Arroyo to declare Martial Law because her advisers know that they can get what they want and do what they want without declaring Martial Law anyway.Besides, Martial Law has a limited period of 60 days, and although that is enough to incarcerate anyone they want, hell will break loose.They also know that ifGMA does so, the political and economic costs will be very high. If in the time of Marcos only the left and the students went to the streets, this time we have had practice in street protests that will include the middle class, the religious, political parties, and those in civil society.It is just too much trouble.
But something has got to be done about these disturbances, besides I have controlled my temper for so long, GMA must have said. So instead of Martial Law, the government has warned that it will tighten its hold and instructed its police and other law enforcers to use “calibrated preemptive response.”That sounds like a military term to me, so someone from the military or with a military background must have christened their “new” strategy.
“Calibrated” sounds like calibrated to hurt but not to kill, calibrated to humiliate but not to destroy, or calibrated to shoot some but not shoot all, or shoot a little but not too much.Either way, this is not as benign as the administration wants it to sound, and those opposing Gloria Arroyo get the message exactly.Calibrated certainly does not mean getting smacked by a cardboard paddle by the police.And it doesn’t mean that the police, when pressed by protesters for every inch of ground, will take steps backward until their backs hit a wall. No. “Calibrated” refers to the amount of force that will be used, but force nonetheless. “Preemptive” means they will not wait for the protesters to pelt them tomatoes and saliva. They can strike before that, to prevent a tomato war.
Perhaps the loyal henchmen of GMA think that people like Cory Aquino, Susan Roces, Jojo Binay, and Princess Nemenzo (Freedom from Debt Coalition) will be afraid of water cannons, stop in their tracks and turn around when the police puts its meanest, bulkiest, and fiercest people in the front line ( like those in Escolta in 1977, bulging bellies and reeking with liquor, who spared no one, including nuns) Only Susan Roces has no previous experience in street protests, but trust thatthis Ilongga will no doubt show moral courage.If any policeman has the stupidity and temerity to come in any form of physical contact with Cory Aquino, former legitimate president of the Republic of the Philippines, then the Chief of the Philippine National Police and his deputy must resign. But before doing so, they must, in front of Ninoy Aquino’s statue in Ayala Avenue, kneel and tear offtheir shirts. In Japan, in the time of the Shogunate and even after that, honorable men committed hara-kiri, suicide with a knife.Of course we have no objection to hara-kiri in this instance, and they should take some other people along with them for good measure.
However, the warnings of GMA that this time, the “rule of law” must prevail, and the government will not sit back while it is beaten black and blue in the streets, cannot be taken lightly.GMA has gotten herself indebted to the military and military-like people around her who helped with her political survival.This “calibrated” response to protests is consistent with type of people hanging around her. Or is this also consistent with GMA’s personality? Vengefulness?It is betterto live by the motto that
”looking good is the best revenge.”
But GMA and her advisers must mean a different “rule of law” than what we studied in law school, the kind that citizens expect under a democracy. Certainly is it is not “rule of law” when law enforcers, without a warrant, enter a house and take documents and other things especially when the citizen involved is one who is helping Loren Legarda with her election protest case.It looks more like destroying or contaminating Legarda’s evidence of fraud.And when castigated in the Senate by no less thana Martial Law enforcer, Juan Ponce Enrile, the police officers just put on their meek faces while inside their heads they were saying, “ so what are you gonna do about it?”This is the response of thugs.
I don’t know what kind of “rule of law” we have when lawyers and media people are killed like flies and the government is not concerned about it, as if it is exactly what these people deserve. I don’t know what kind of “rule of what” you call this now, but I know that more than 30% of our people live below the poverty line, with no access to quality health care and education.The poor’s and fixed income earners’ situation will soon be aggravated by the Expanded Value Added Tax and further increase in gas prices.Millions of Filipinos have no jobs or livelihood while many of our government officials spend our taxpayers’ money on expensive restaurants, travel, public funds for gasoline for their private trips, and collect kickbacks from constructionprojects and franchises.
All I know is that I do not want this “rule.”I do not want a government that has compromised all institutions, bartered everything in exchange for political favors,cannot create new jobs, is notorious for corruption, has no transparency, and has no respect for human rights.
