|
The anti-Arroyo forces are working to bridge the gap between two
givens The first given is the general disenchantment with the Arroyo
administration. Filipinos generally want her out of
the presidency, if not today, tomorrow. But the sad part is their
disgust is coupled with a hard-to-explain indifference. They wont
march a single step to make the ouster a reality—which is the
second given.
The agenda of the opposition is to make most
Filipinos cross that threshold of indifference. And toward this,
they are grappling with several questions. How? What is the
ideal trigger? When will the objective conditions tip over, from one
of general indifference to one of massive outrage?
Prayers, Senate testimonies, screaming headlines
and media commentaries calling for her downfall have so far failed
to move most Filipinos into action. The proven formulas, used
successfully in 1986 and the dying days of 2000, are not
working this time. The answers to how things can be
fast-tracked have so far eluded the best strategists of the
anti-Arroyo forces.
The anti-Arroyo forces cannot allow
the ouster move to simmer down into a protracted struggle. If not
now, it might be never. Mrs. Arroyo is a master of political
survival. No present-day political leader can match her in
strategizing for survival. If no ouster move succeeds within the
next few weeks, the political opposition should better concentrate
on the 2010 elections.
Indeed, the crying question is this: What would
make Filipinos leave their homes, offices, factories and farms to
jam EDSA with their collective fury?
Crying Jun Lozada is not the key. Though
elevated by civil society to near sainthood, Lozada does not leave
an impression of sincerity and integrity. Ninety per cent of what he
said is probably true, from the pay-offs to the central cast in the
broadband deal. But as I said earlier, you can smell the whiff of a
scumbag in him, the wheeler-dealer and broker of deals aiming for
sham heroism.
I wanted to puke after reading his account about
Rizal. When you testify about corruption, you do not invoke
martyrdom and heroism. You just do it, period, because it is the
right thing to do. With Lozada, you get the feeling that even his
tears are crocodile tears.
A testimony by Romulo Neri will neither rekindle
the dying embers of civic conscience. Neri, a former lackey of
Joe de Venecia, leaves the impression that he is just like de
Venecia talking—lots of hot air and posturing. Should he
testify, an instant canonization by civil society awaits Neri, but
I don’t think that will move Filipinos into clogging the lanes of
EDSA to force Mrs. Arroyo out.
Neri had already indicted Mrs. Arroyo in the
darkest, most sinister term possible based on the testimony of
Lozada. What fresh and revolting things can he possibly add to his
claim that the president is “evil”?
Mrs. Arroyo will really have a big problem should
a member of her economic team testifies before the
senate and paints a graphic picture of the tangled web of corruption
that attended the NBN deal. And probably other deals as well.
Cool, composed and unruffled, the economic
manager-turned-witness can do a tell-all minus the theatrics and
hysteria of Lozada. He will use official documents, mathematical
equations, the pros and cons of economic proposals.
Instead of muttering inanities such as “I am
humbled” like Lozada, the Cabinet member-turned witness will make
his sentences short, his presentation graphic without intending to,
and his testimony superbly credible.
But will there be such witness? Maybe, or maybe
not.
Right now, there is only one thing sure. Neither
Neri nor Lozada, with their long history of lackeying and wheeling
and dealing, can move people to spill out of their homes,
offices, factories and farms to force Mrs. Arroyo out.
Shortly after 9/11, essayist Lance
Morrow wrote that America should summon the most intense of its
rage, “a purple kind of rage” to exact vengeance from
those responsible for the carnage at the Twin Towers.
The opposition to Mrs. Arroyo should also summon
that kind of purple rage from our lethargic people to
accomplish their objective.
|
