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The May 14 elections loom as a watershed for the country’s current
politics.
Both the Arroyo administration and the various
opposition groups have high stakes in the coming political exercise.
For the administration, the results of the May
elections will herald whether President Arroyo is able to govern in
relative peace until 2010.
The opposition, meanwhile, looks forward to
doing what the US Democratic Party did in that country’s mid-term
elections, which is to sweep back to power in both houses of
Congress.
The US Democrats, of course, merely want to
reverse the policies of President George W. Bush. Philippine
opposition groups have made no bones about their ultimate
objective—ousting President Arroyo via the impeachment route.
Elections are critical because Filipinos show
little enthusiasm for a repeat of People Power, which has deposed
two of this country’s Presidents.
The low turnout in recent opposition-sponsored
demonstrations does not mean a rise in support for President Arroyo.
On the contrary, SWS and Pulse Asia surveys give her very low
ratings across all social classes in all geographic regions.
Clearly, that Mrs. Arroyo remains in power is
not because the Filipinos find her administration laudable. They are
merely weary of short-circuiting the political process, especially
in the aftermath of the last People Power experiment.
The opposition, thus, knows its best shot are
the elections, which it hopes could result in a dramatic but legal
expression of anger towards the incumbent administration.
This is as it should be in a democracy. The vote
is a people’s most powerful weapon, either for the advocacy of
reforms or the punishment of those who have failed the nation.
But there are ways of subverting democracy.
Elections also offer a venue for the unscrupulous, whether they seek
power or desperately try to hold on to it.
The phrase “guns, goons and gold” is not
just a cliché. It is a reality in Philippine politics.
This early, we are seeing omens of particularly
bloody elections.
The Philippine National Police (PNP) admits
there are 93 private armies nationwide, with 56 in ARMM; 5 in Ilocos,
including the Cordillera Administrative Region; 6 in Cagayan Valley;
9 in Central Luzon; 5 in Southern Tagalog; 5 in Bicol; 5 in Eastern
Visayas; and 2 in Cagayan Valley.
Police have promised to dismantle these private
armies.
But this seems to be a perpetual vow, heard
every time the nation readies to troop to the polls and political
killings start piling up. If police can now regale media with the
locations of these private armies, why has it taken them so long to
go after these goons?
The problem may lie in the composition of these
armed groups.
The suspects in the murder of Rep. Luis Bersamin,
the identified killers of other politicians in Abra and various
provinces, and even in the cases of slain journalists, are either
active or retired cops and soldiers.
Most suspects are not first-time perpetrators.
The fact that they remain free to kill arouses suspicions of, at
best, a leniency among law enforcers and, at worst, their collusion
in the murders they are sworn to stop.
Briefings are good but these will not halt the
violence or protect the electorate.
The only way to stop the rampage of those who
seek to subvert democracy is to show clearly and firmly—and
consistently—that crime does not pay.
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