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AT the core of democracy is the basic principle that majority rules.
That is as it should be: we elect our leaders, and each member of
the body politic is bound to accept the results; were it otherwise,
chaos and institutional paralysis would ensue. This is, in fact, the
insistent mantra of those who now disavow “people power” even as
this was the ticket upon which they strode into Malacañang in the
first place. Wait for 2010, they urge; people power should be
relegated to the dustbin of history as a relic of an unstable
democracy, being a tool prone to the manipulation of those with a
dubious political agenda.
However, the argument makes sense only in the
context of a “true” democracy. While there is no exact science
to it, the basic components of what that means is clear to most
people because it is founded on common sense and the simplest
understanding of what is fair and just. Of these, there are at least
three that I consider most essential to the existence of a
“true” democracy.
First, those who are elevated into power must
have been actually elected, i.e. the votes should be counted as they
were cast.
Second, all institutions of government must be
allowed to perform their job as these are defined under the law;
what that implies is independence and integrity. No job in the
government requires the occupant to lie and/or to bully to defend
any illegal act. For example, the Ombudsman’s function is to
investigate allegations of anomaly as these are made; it is a
perversion of their mandate to delay an investigation, or to conduct
one posthaste at the convenience of any particular individual.
Third, freedom of expression must be respected
and its exercise encouraged; people have the right—and the
obligation—to demand a rational explanation on any and all matters
of public interest, and to complain when this is suppressed or none
is forthcoming. While not all people in a democracy are intelligent,
almost all are not stupid.
The outrage that has sparked demonstrations all
over the country these past two weeks stems in large part from this
administration’s call to “democracy” and its reliance upon
subservient institutions to cling on to power while subverting
democracy’s basic components. The parade of government witnesses
explaining their actions in regard to the abduction, and possibly
planned murder, of Jun Lozada illustrates the subversion. In the
end, what they said and what they did could be characterized, as
government witness Undersecretary Gaite did, as being without
“rational justification.”
The puzzle that confronts our people today is
not whether this administration is corrupt. Three out of four
people, according to the latest SWS survey, think so and distrust
the President for this reason. The question is how to move forward,
and the variety of solutions offered illustrates the dilemma.
Uncertainty in a post-Gloria scenario has been seized upon by the
administration as its best defense. Indeed, the incumbent
administration has propagated an erroneous belief gripping
governors, mayors, local politicians, and other sectors, that the
status quo is to their best interest; that the ordinary citizen
wields no power against forces of the present leadership, which
holds all government structures in its hand; and that our people are
mostly indifferent because the elected administrations will
thereafter foment the same corrupt and fraudulent system.
Uncertainty is no excuse, however, for inaction.
We must now reclaim our legacy, a legacy of the past two people
power revolutions, notwithstanding the cost, thence do whatever is
necessary to preserve the gains of that legacy, and nurture the
components of a true democracy. We must replace the government’s
alternative of terror and despair with the option of courage and
hope.
If the incumbent administration claims economic
prosperity, and claims this could not have been achieved without our
flourishing democracy, then this is not a democracy that people will
fight for. Because people now gathering in various plazas and
centers around the nation in solidarity with the rest are fighting
for a cause beyond the claimed economic prosperity. A government
that engages in the intimidation of witnesses to fraud and
corruption, a government that threatens its soldiers and police with
dismissal if they attend mass demonstrations, a government that
prevents its Cabinet secretaries from attending congressional
hearings cannot claim to have installed a flourishing democracy.
The nation which has been incapable of governing
and ordering itself, delivering itself to the slavery of its own
corruption and human greed shall be delivered over to other masters
because it has no soul. The real issue that we are now fighting
about is an issue that is being fought in the hard and stony passes
of our human spirit, “where even if a man is killed he cannot
die.” If armed might wins, if dirty money wins, if cheaters win,
then democracy in this country is inexistent.
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