Pedrosa article re Noynoy censored by PhilStar

This article of Carmen N. Pedrosa was intended for publication on the 08 May 2010 issue of the Philippine Star. Unfortunately, it was censored out. Even if you do not agree with the views of the writer, you will have to agree that the non-publication was a clear instance of abuse of media power in gross violation of the constitutional right to freedom of expression. Dodong aka Ka Kiko

From: carmen pedrosa
Date: Sat, May 8, 2010 at 8:58 AM
Subject: column not printed today
May 8, 2010 (Saturday) Carmen N. Pedrosa

The machines that will fail; letters from Boston

It is not as if it is being said for the first time. I repeat what others have said that failure of election will not come from the PCOS but from two other machines - FV (Filipino voter) and FC (Filipino candidates).

The machines are so out of date, they cannot function properly for the selection of leaders for our country. The FV is out of sync and performs as if it has nothing to do with why he is voting a particular FC. The FC operates within this flaw and produces results with nothing to do with FV.

That in brief is the problem we face when the results are known after May 10. When disaster strikes and the country malfunctions (with candidates declaring beforehand that they will not accept defeat) let us put the blame on those who refused to accept that the machines are not and cannot work unless these are fixed.

*       *       *
Among those I turned to in my quest for information that would help voters choose a qualified candidate to be our president is another family friend of both the Aquinos and the Agulars. They formed a tightly knit Filipino community in Boston. Let us just call him Jim because, he, too like so many others who have something to say about Noynoy as unfit to be president of the Philippines does not want to expose himself.
*       *       *
Dear Ms. Pedrosa

Just when I think of giving up on RP...because it doesn't want to be helped...I meet someone of your high stature---who is into saving RP (from dud leaders?). I am naturally encouraged again.

To go into your inquiry, I am sorry to tell you that I do not have any medical information about Noynoy.

Seriously, I don't hope to go into that route. I have always relied on my own personal observation and inference in evaluating a person, and that is how I form my idea of someone who should not even think of being president.

I'm sorry to sound preachy, but I think it is time for us Filipinos to discern that way about candidates who simply "like" public positions, but which are out of their aptitude.

The Agulars and I stayed together everyday of my trip there leading to the Upsilon reunion at the Manila Polo Club. Steve and I belong to that Batch. And to his widow and son's family, it was a sentimental reunion with "Steve's brods."

To this day, we are each other's extended families, as when we both lived in Massachusetts.

Personally, I think the Agulars, (especially the late Dr. S. Agular), are apolitical. But they are very loyal to family friends. The Aquinos are one.

In politics, I am more loyal to RP ( the Republic of the Philippines. That's why Gordon is my candidate. I wish to read more of your regular columns. I think we have many sensible things in common about what is good for RP.

This letter was followed by another.

Thank you for this attention…tho' undeserved... but I would rather not be another 'witness to corroborate' the imperfections of Noynoy. I believe we have enough evidence in the open to convince a nation that Noynoy should best be left to himself...not running for president...and certainly not be used---not by his sisters, not by his relatives, and not fussed about by the media.

Unfortunately, the RP media abetted this yet another political aberration. It's our culture and our habit to promote the bizarre and the incompetent, e.g. Erap, Lapid, Revilla, etc.

We prefer to be entertained, it seems that way. And this might sell newspapers, but it carries no responsibility.

I could not believe, for instance, the headlines that came out from both The Philippine Inquirer and the Philippine Star newspapers. They actually hailed the dramatic internal struggle of Noynoy to make a decision for the 'big plum.' Is there a movie about this heir cashing in on a huge political inheritance?

That's right...the media played a big part in making a Noynoy attractive to the millions of impressionable voters.  Of course, it's not lost in me that we (you & I?) might be that child yelling to the crowd that the king is shriveled in the head, and has no clothes.

But we have to look back some 30 years ago. How much can we rely on Pinoy "kantiyaw" humor...things said in anecdotal bantering of a small party of friends?

In MA then, I remember asking why ... "itong anak ni Ninoy ang layo kung sumagot."(not in the presence of Ninoy, of course.)

And the answer I got was: ..."kasi may kulang." ...which was consistent with what I thought was a missing bolt in his head. (never occurred to me that he would run for president, let alone his mother, Cory!...years after. Cory, I think, was a disaster for RP.)

Thirty years since...I repeated the incident, and the answer I got was: "ikaw naman...! 'di naman gano'n ang ibig sabihin ng "kulang".

And what did it mean? The explanation was that...he was "kulang sa pansin ng tatay"....because all the attention was given to the (spoiled) youngest, Kris. And this, supposedly, had a big impact on the "kid."

I see...but not quite. I may get into EXPLANATIONS, but still this is not the DISCUSSION I want to get into with my friends. So I left this matter to rest. Besides, it is a 30 year-old personal observation of a "kid". Times have changed. I'm often chided. Even some people are able to get out of cancer, so I'm reminded.

Today, I am further reassured, "Have you heard Noynoy speak lately? He KNOWS how to speak in public now."

And is this why 'that kid' is urged to run for president?!?

*       *       * 
These letters reinforce the opinion that the validity of a psychiatric report on a person’s ability to lead does not rest on whether the report was signed. Indeed the report can be true even without a signature.

What is necessary is that what it reports can be verified through other means. It is not the signature that makes the report. Experts arrive at their conclusions by observation, asking questions and then evaluating their observations through the prism of knowledge through textbooks and experience. Ordinary people can do the same without having formal expertise.

Reports do not become bogus for a lack of signature. The details of the report have been reported widely and interpreted by its readers according to what they hear, what they see, and make their own profile of the person concerned.

Surveys as pre-election cheating?

There's now a surge to put Gibo in Malacañang!
SHOOTING STRAIGHT By Bobit S. Avila (The Philippine Star) Updated May 07, 2010 12:00 AM

Yesterday we featured the Smart/Philippine STAR survey that shows Gibo and Noynoy Aquino are in a virtual tie in almost all issues and that survey only proves to one and all that the SWS & Pulse Asia surveys were manipulated. This story came out in the left front page of The Philippine STAR last Thursday entitled, “Noynoy kin, allies, behind Pulse, SWS’. Proof of the pudding is the Smart/Philippine STAR surveys that Gibo isn’t ranking only a single-digit as what SWS and Pulse Asia was selling to us.

It is also fact that this week alone, GIBO has suddenly experienced a last minute surge obviously coming from the silent majority or the undecided voters who took the slogan “Kaming Walang Kibo; Ay para kay Gibo!” Again proof of this comes from an email sent to me yesterday.

“Sir for the past days I have been trying to gauge voters’ sentiments in social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter in order to gauge if Gibo could really be a “Dark Horse” candidate. It appears there is a steady surge of support for Gilbert Theodoro’s candidacy. Proof to this is the fact that GIbo’s official fan page grew from 260,000 fans to around 330,000 in less than 24 hours. I wanted to ask you if you notice a similar welling of support in the form of reactions to your column. Thanks. RB Osorio, 4th year student BS International Relations major in Diplomacy Lyceum of the Philippines U.”

Mr. Osorio, truth to tell, my Facebook and my emails have been deluged with letters thanking me for enlightening our readers on the truth about Gibo Teodoro. Although I did get a few nasty ones, who tell me that I’m a liar, a braggart and yes, some even asking me how much is Gibo paying me for the columns we write. All I can say to these people who deals on hatred is, “God forgive them for they do not know what they are doing.” But this is part of my neighborhood being a columnist. These people do not even know that I am based in Cebu. But if I’m getting less than 1 percent nasty letters, then there must be something good that I am doing. 

Again for our final plea… especially to those who are undecided at this time that they shouldn’t be fooled into believing that yarn that a vote for Gibo is a vote for Manny Villar. This idiocy has been debunked by the Smart/Philippine STAR survey. Hence a vote for Gibo is a vote for Gibo!

Cardinal hits call for people power

Rosales reacts to Aquino’s warning of poll fraud

By Leila Salaverria
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 00:36:00 05/03/2010

MANILA, Philippines—A senior church prelate Sunday said that warnings of another “people power” outburst if next week’s elections were marred by massive fraud were “crazy (and) irresponsible” and the conditions that produced the 1986 popular revolt were not present now.

“The laws are not done in the streets,” Manila Archbishop Gaudencio Cardinal Rosales said in a talk with reporters, adding that the 1986 People Power Revolution that ousted dictator Ferdinand Marcos was “an extraordinary situation.”

“You don’t do that again. That’s why we have the laws now,” he added.

Rosales made the statement when asked by a reporter to comment on a statement by Liberal Party standard-bearer Benigno Aquino III that people might again take to the streets if he were cheated of victory in the presidential election.

Rosales said he had not heard anyone make that statement but that he disagreed with such sentiments.

“I did not hear that but if anyone said that, that is (an) irresponsible statement,” he said.

People are sovereign

Aquino, the front-runner in surveys conducted by the polling outfits Social Weather Stations and Pulse Asia, was quoted in a media report as saying during a campaign sortie in Pangasinan province that “sovereignty resides in the people.”

“If they feel their will has been thwarted, I’m sure they will again regain sovereignty among themselves,” he said.

The same report quoted Aquino as saying that “it’s premature to call for people power.”

An ABS-CBN report last week quoted dissident Marine Capt. Nicanor Faeldon as saying that if politicians manipulated the results of the elections, “the people will come out … We have no choice but people power.”

Asked for clarification of Aquino’s position, his spokesperson Edwin Lacierda told the Inquirer by phone Sunday: “If it is clear that he lost because he was cheated, or through failure of elections, then that (people power) is an option that he will take.”

“If he lost in an honest, clean and orderly elections, then he will abide by the results,” Lacierda added.

‘Let’s use our head’

Rosales said that if there was a basis to call for people power, he was not averse to it, but he indicated that he saw no reason to call for any mass movement now.

He said the situation in 1986, when Filipinos turned out in massive numbers to oust Marcos, was different from the current situation.

“Why inject that, why infuse that into the present situation?” Rosales said.

“Remember, at that time there was a dictator and the dictator was there with no real credible election, only referendum, and it was (for) as long as 20 years. Good heavens. Do you repeat that? No, come on, let’s use our head. These are two different things.”

Rosales said that anybody in the place of the late Manila Archbishop Jaime Cardinal Sin, who called on Filipinos to support the military rebels against Marcos in 1986, would have to do what he did.

But Rosales said that at the time, there were “unimaginable things,” such as there having been no credible elections for 20 years.

“Come on, come on, that’s just crazy, crazy, crazy,” he said. “These are two different things. That’s why whoever said that, that’s a little different. Whoever said that, I have never heard him, but [that] kind of thinking is irresponsible thinking.”

‘No, for heaven’s sake’

Asked if he would call for people power if the elections would not be credible, Rosales said he would not since there were legal recourses that people could take.

“No. For heaven’s sake, there is the Constitution. All these are covered by provisions of the Constitution. If there are complaints, credible, you go to the Comelec, you go (to) Congress, because you still have that,” he said.

Rosales lamented that Filipinos were always in a hurry, which was why, he said, they had failed to develop into a better people and tended to call for people power easily.

“We are always in a hurry,” he said. “We forget to grow in citizenship and to develop a real credible nation. To reach a stage where we mature as a nation and also [as a] people will take time.” With a report from Philip Tubeza

Yellow Revolution 2

Why we should not take surveys seriously
POSTSCRIPT By Federico D. Pascual Jr.
(The Philippine Star)
Updated April 29, 2010 12:00 AM

SURE WINNER?: Concern was expressed by a number of readers reacting to our Postscript of April 25 calling attention to propaganda that the only way Candidate X (Noynoy Aquino) who thinks he is a sure winner, to lose is for him to be cheated.

This explains why Candidate X (Noynoy Aquino) has been priming the public for taking to the streets —in a clumsy rerun of EDSA 1986 — to grab back the victory that he claims will be snatched from him.

He was leaning heavily on the reports of survey firms claiming to have interviewed some 2,000 individuals on their presidential preferences.

I was pleasantly surprised to find with the email in my inbox a note from Celia Laurel, the widow of the late Vice President Doy Laurel. She must have been so aggravated by the propaganda that she took time to write.

* * *

SABI NI CELIA: “I was reminded of the 1949 presidential elections, when it was widely perceived that Jose P. Laurel was cheated. Furious Batangueños led by leaders like Col. Poling Valeriano and Francisco Medrano wanted to start a revolt in protest.

“But Dr. Laurel calmed them down saying ‘The presidency is not worth a revolution. — I don’t want to go down in history as the man who plunged the country into a bloody revolution that turned it into a banana republic.’

“At a more recent occasion — the EDSA Revolution to be precise — it is said that when Gen. Fabian Ver begged President Marcos to allow him to fire at the mammoth crowd that had congregated on EDSA, Marcos vehemently objected to the plan and forbade Ver to take any drastic action that would hurt the people even if they were rallying against him and could unseat him.

“Both leaders showed nobility of character and a true and selfless love of country.

“Today things are quite the opposite. As you said: ‘The line being developed is that Candidate X is a sure winner by all indications, including surveys. The only way he can lose is if he is cheated. When cheated, people should take to the streets to claim the victory snatched from him.’

“We are warned that ‘People Power’ would take place.

“As you wrote, ‘this is dangerous and irresponsible.’ Indeed it is! It is obvious they don’t care what happens to our people as long as they have their way.

“EDSA I was a brief shining moment in our history. It was hailed and marveled at throughout the world because it was an uncanny spiritual experience — a revolution — achieved through peace, goodwill and prayers. It was a moment that should always live in our hearts.

“But is ‘People Power 2010’ intended to be peaceful as well? Or is it a dismal foreboding that we shall witness a grim reenactment of the carnage that took place in the Mendiola and Dona Luisita massacres IF we don’t make Candidate X (Noynoy Aquino) win?”

The Present as History: A Narration and Interpretation of Events

THE PRESENT AS HISTORY:
A NARRATION AND INTERPRETATION OF EVENTS
By Gonzalo M. Jurado, Ph.D.

The Landscape

Remember the “Hello Garci” Tapes and the hysteria they created that threatened to rend the national society apart? That was June 2005.

The events unleashed in those days by the playing of the tapes which indicated a woman, said to be President Arroyo, and a man, said to be Comelec Commissioner Virgilio Garcillano, talking about numerical details of the presidential election sparked the resignation of the so-called Hyatt 10 and their demand for the President’s own resignation. These officials, some of them of Cabinet rank, were joined by a wide band of political and business groups and individuals including a Liberal Party Faction, the United Opposition, the Makati Business Club, and former Presidents Corazon Aquino and Joseph Estrada, Senate President Franklin Drilon, Senators Aquilino Pimentel and Panfilo Lacson, all demanding not just the President’s immediate resignation but her impeachment as well.

A few weeks earlier, Sen. Jingoy Estrada had announced on the floor of the Senate, with absolute certainty, that Mrs Arroyo’s days in the presidency “were numbered.”

The bulk of the media, broadsheet and television, raised the clamor for the President’s resignation or impeachment to hysterical pitch.

Only the intervention of former President Fidel V. Ramos, Speaker Jose de Venecia, and members of Leagues of Local Government Units, who individually and collectively affirmed their support for the President, saved the day for GMA.

As events unfolded, somebody had wiretapped the President in violation of the law against wiretapping. It was said that a member of the Armed Forces, T Sgt Vidal Doble, did it. After investigating the matter, Armed Forces Headquarters concluded that the armed services did not have the technical capability to do that kind of job.

Further, the adverse information about the workings of the Philippine Government that served as cannon fodder for the political opposition had been delivered to them directly by a Philippine-born US marine working in the White House by the name of Leandro Aragoncillo and, in some cases, indirectly through a former assistant of Senator Lacson, Michael Ray Aquino, who had fled to the United States to escape indictment in connection with the Dacer-Corbito murder case. The material had been prepared by the US Embassy in Manila.

In the days that followed, Garcillano, who had gone into hiding, surfaced and appeared before a House of Representatives investigating committee, admitting that he indeed had talked to politicians – to the President once and to others including members of the opposition many times. In response, Congressman Francis Escudero admitted that he had talked to Garcillano during the election period not for himself but on behalf of a constituent. In addition, Congressmen Escudero and Rolex Suplico acknowledged that one day during this period of political turmoil they had visited the US Embassy.

Questions

Even before the tumult had died down and continuing to this day, many observers of the national scene have been asking such questions as:

(1) Could the political and economic forces that got together on that day of June 2005 to unanimously demand the resignation or impeachment of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo have come together by accident or where they organized and coordinated by an Unseen Hand? The diversity of the anti-GMA forces on the one hand and the uniformity of their demand and timing of their actions on the other seem to rule out spontaneous combustion.

(2) How could Leandro Aragoncillo, a US marine whose financial future was assured, or any sensible human being for that matter, have been so short-sighted and so reckless as to jeopardize his lifetime security by violating his government’s State Secrecy Act through delivery of information to anti-government politicians in a foreign land, who were not even in power?

(3) How explain the breadth and depth of the vilification campaign against the President, mobilizing not just the opposition politicians and the anti-Gloria newspapers and television stations but also a business club, an opinion survey entity, leftists groups, and even a few academics acknowledged for their principled championship of nationalist anti-imperialist causes?

Answers

To find an answer to these questions, one has to go back to Angelo dela Cruz (remember him?), the OFW captured by Iraqi militants and threatened to be beheaded if the Philippine contingent in Iraq was not withdrawn. The Philippines had earlier joined George W. Bush’s “Coalition of the Willing” and sent a small contingent to Iraq. Facing an issue of political commitment versus human life, GMA opted for the latter, withdrawing the Philippine contingent to save the life of Angelo dela Cruz. That was July 2004.

This is where the dog is buried. George W. Bush was “dismayed” by the withdrawal. Thereupon, the Bush Administration through its Central Intelligence Agency launched what can be called the Aragoncillo Project, a program of destabilization and vilification aimed at the overthrow of the Arroyo government, mobilizing as its tools everybody in the Philippines that had an axe to grind against GMA.

Was the gathering of the motley group of politicians and businessmen, rightists and leftists, on that day in June 2005 accidental? Who could have done so efficient an orchestration? Was Aragoncillo reckless? Now we know.

It was at about this time that the US government appointed Ambassador to the Philippines – hold your breath -- a former CIA agent. Not long after her arrival, the Ambassador called on President Arroyo and Senate President Drilon on separate occasions. Press statements from the US Embassy released after each visit indicated, when compared, that the Ambassador spent time with the President that was less than one-half that spent with the Senate President. This is standard CIA way of degrading anyone that does not meet its approval.

Thenceforward, with diplomatic niceties out of the way, the Ambassador wasted no time in travelling on sorties to far-flung communities of her country of assignment, distributing goods to poverty-stricken groups, delivering little speeches to rural crowds. These were no innocent acts of charity as the media made them out to be. These were authentic CIA tactics of political interference – in this instance designed to alienate the Philippine government under President Arroyo from its constituencies.

George W. Bush himself made a personal contribution to the destabilization campaign. On meeting GMA in the halls of the United Nations in New York in September 2005, he made big water of the employment of a Filipina chef in the White House when he could easily have referred to somewhat less trivial state-related matters. If the world did not notice the insult, it was because GMA overshadowed it by her masterful chairmanship of a United Nations General Assembly Meeting at that time.

In July 2007, Aragoncillo was meted by a US federal court a 10-year sentence for stealing and passing on secret US documents. In the Philippines we call this moro-moro. Michael Ray Aquino was sentenced to six years and four months in prison, too harsh a sentence for a forced accomplice.

More recently, the failure of President Barack Obama to receive GMA on several occasions, explained by Washington people as arising from his heavy schedules, was a deliberate snub intended to remind GMA – and the Philippines-- that Uncle Sam remains profoundly displeased over the Philippine government’s failure to stand by the US in Iraq.

And so the destabilization and vilification campaign against GMA rages on, carried out by politicians, businessmen, newspapers and television stations, an opinion survey firm, individuals from left and right, some academics, all of them associating every conceivable wrong-doing with the President. The US ambassador’s political interference continues unabated.

A Comment

It’s been five and a half years since the redemption of Angelo de la Cruz, what conclusion can we derive from the events that transpired over that period of time? Two conclusions. The first is that the destabilization and vilification campaign has succeeded in projecting the President as guilty of all charges of wrong doing, alienating the President from many of her people, as gleefully chronicled by an opinion survey firm day after day. Though a case can be made that GMA is one of our better presidents, some people are convinced she is the worst. In terms of its over-arching objective of toppling the Arroyo government, however, the destabilization and vilification campaign has miserably failed. There are reasons for this.

One, the campaign lacked popular support, Remember the hundreds of thousands of people that the United Opposition promised to bring into Makati to protest GMA’s mandate that never came? Or former President Corazon Aquino’s attempt to rouse another People Power, through a prayer vigil supporting some Fort Bonifacio mutineers, that people simply ignored? Or Sen. Pimentel’s repetitious call for snap elections that fell on deaf ears? Remember how the sidewalk crowds of Makati disdainfully turned their noses up to the Peninsula putschists when these tried to entice the crowds to join them, exposing these putschists’ isolation from the public?

Two, the political opposition, as excellent as it was in its brand of Parliamentary practice, suffered from what can be called litigational infirmity, the lack of ability to back up allegation with evidence or proof. As a consequence, whatever issue it raised, many reasonable people dismissed as plain politicking. The continuous carping, however, did produce a good result for some of the critics: it got them elected to the Senate.

This technical incompetence must be supplemented by the physical cowardice of the military ringleaders who identified themselves with the destabilization effort. Their pathetic surrender at the Peninsula even before a single APC could enter the hotel lobby reduced the whole destabilization program to a comical and ridiculous enterprise.

And three, the media outlets that supported the anti-Gloria crusade did so with such arrogance and self-righteousness they only succeeded in undermining their own cause. As some independent-minded observers wondered, how could these media outlets be so sanctimonious in their judgments when they were merely pushing forward their owners’ interest?

The second conclusion is that some of our leaders in politics and business and many of our opinion makers in media did not mind selling their country down the river, performing the role of stooges of a foreign power, so long as it promoted their personal ambitions. More normally functioning countries have a way of dealing with such behavior as this.

In summary, it must be galling, with Big Brother calling the shots at that, to have thrown at your opponent everything including the kitchen sink and the kitchen itself to destroy her, to have exposed your most meticulously hidden secret for the sake of overthrowing her, only to see her still standing, as strong as ever.

The President continues to preside over the affairs of our country, pushing its development as she sees fit. By all indications, she will remain in office until her term expires, on June 30, 2010.

Dr. Jurado is Vice-President for Finance and Development and concurrently Professor of Economics of Kalayaan College. In this essay he advances of recent events an interpretation that has far-reaching implications to the political sovereignty of our country.

Martial Law in Maguindanao

http://abpquevedo.blogspot.com/
Saturday, December 12, 2009

After Martial Law in Maguindanao, What?

Deeply rooted in Maguindanao is a culture of dominant clan power. A false reading of the situation results in a truncated view of Maguindanao political history. This view sees the phenomenon as the product of one government period, the decade of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. Arguably a greater share of the blame could be laid at the door of the present government. But the culture of dominant and changing local power has been with us in the once “empire province of Cotabato,” which included the present Maguindanao, since at least the 1950s. To my knowledge, no government from the 1950s to the present did anything serious to root this out. In the past 60 years, all governments and many politicians from all parties wanting to get votes have cultivated this culture and ignored the periodic violence that erupted. It was a case of mutual political exploitation and expediency. We ourselves, ordinary citizens, have kept quiet in the past 60 years and learned the art of accommodation.

But of course criticism of Martial Law in Maguindanao is really based on total distrust of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. Survey after survey is paraded to say that this is the pulse of the people. The stand of small protesting “militant” groups is given disproportionate media exposure. Political oppositionists and personalities from “militant” organizations are interviewed again and again to give their expected negative views on actions of government. In a very real sense the extraordinary amount of media exposure that is given to the opposition in Manila provides a distorted view of the country as a whole...

Martial Law by its nature as a last resort should be of short duration. But precisely because of its brevity, the following will result: one clan will be significantly disarmed; the balance of political and armed power will shift to other clans; private armies will remain though possibly less visible and probably more sophisticated in behavior; the deep trauma resulting from the massacre will persist; rido is not going to be stopped; the legislative, justice, and executive--and electoral--mechanisms will still be in the hands of those related to or have debts of gratitude to various families; and if a member of the rival clan will somehow gain the top post of the province, do we in Maguindanao really believe that the provincial capitol will remain in Shariff Aguak? Even the peace process will be affected by the loyalties of local rebel commanders to their own clans. Hence, the fundamental dysfunctions in Maguindanao will remain after Martial Law.

What do I see as a possible solution? Even now sentiments are strong in Central and southern Mindanao that elections for local offices in Maguindanao should be deferred. Or at least the term of Martial Law should be extended till after the elections. The fundamental suggestion is for us to move forward from partisan political criticism to collective constructive thinking and effective action on this central issue of Maguindanao dysfunction. I respectfully address this to all concerned, particularly the Senate, House of Representatives, the judicial branch and the Arroyo administration, as well as to all of us Maguindanawons.

+Orlando B. Quevedo, O.M.I.
Archbishop of Cotabato
December 11, 2009

Private armies and the insurgency

By-product
FIRST PERSON
By Alex Magno
(The Philippine Star)
Updated November 28, 2009 12:00 AM

The standing estimate is that the Ampatuan clan has 800 men (!) under arms. That virtual army is maintained largely at the expense of the state. Government armed and paid allowances to most of these men: a private army operating under the cover of “civilian volunteers” useful for containing the insurgency in the region.

Until this chilling tragedy (in Maguindanao) happened, the authorities found the arrangement concerning “civilian volunteers” a largely functional one. A trade-off was adopted early in the game, many presidencies ago.

Since the AFP did not have enough men and equipment to effectively contain the armed secessionist groups in the area, the “civilian volunteers” functioned as force extenders. In the case of Maguindanao, the “civilian volunteers” were very useful. They kept the MILF trapped in the Maranao areas, with the Maguindanao-speaking areas relatively free of insurgents.

There is a price to pay for that: government tacitly condoned warlords who did their best to contribute to suppressing the insurgency. This has been the unspoken arrangement since the days when these “civilian volunteers” were called BSDUs and then CAFGUs.

The “civilian volunteers” in Maguindanao province provided a crucial buffer, keeping the insurgent groups away from the productive plantations, tuna industries and bustling urban economies to the south. The occasional abuses committed by the warlords, until this week, were a small price to pay for the strategic role of keeping the Maguindanao area and those to the south of the province free of insurgency.

In a way, government had little choice. There was not enough money to enlarge the army so that it achieves an effective ratio of superiority over the secessionist guerrilla forces and the isolated communist gangs. “Civilian volunteers” might be a band-aid solution to a strategic vulnerability, but it was the best that could be done.

This is the complex structure of considerations underpinning Gibo Teodoro’s statement that the only way we can get rid of private armies is to enlarge the army. That is a statement made boldly and frankly — even at the risk of many voters failing to get the point.

Gibo Teodoro should know what the complex considerations are. He served an exemplary two years as defense secretary.

The warlords were not about to squander the leverage they enjoyed. They used the private armies to consolidate their local power bases and occasionally pleased their patrons in Manila by delivering votes in their favor. Still, the existence of these private armies is a by-product of a strategic vulnerability of the state, not just the administration.

Until we have enough money to invest in greater military capability to contain a well-armed insurgent movement, we will have to rely on the cheap repressive labor contributed by “civilian volunteers” organized by local warlords...

But something truly disastrous has happened. The arrangement will now have to be abrogated. What that means is that the civilian volunteer groups need to be disbanded, the offending local tyrants made to face the full weight of the law, and the military, although already thinly spread out, must be redeployed to cover the vacuum...

In the wake of this tragedy, the only guys who have anything to cheer about are the insurgent groups and their allied criminal and terrorist gangs. That is the greatest misfortune of this whole thing.