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In a statement titled “War and Peace Adviser” Amina Rasul, lead
convenor of the Philippine Council for Islam and Democracy, writes
from Marawi City:
The appointment of newly retired Gen. Hermogenes
Esperon Jr. to the position of Presidential Adviser on the Peace
Process shows that Mrs. Arroyo is either controlled by the military
or is completely insincere about the peace process (or both).
General Esperon, as the head of the Armed Forces of the Philippines
until recently, was adamant about crushing the communist and Moro
insurgencies as well as terrorism. Today, we are asked to believe
that the general has had a change of heart with the change in his
position.
General Esperon’s military record shows him
leading the 602nd Infantry Brigade during the all out campaign
implemented by then President Joseph Estrada against the Moro
Islamic Liberation Front (MILF). He led his troops in many
victorious but bloody skirmishes in dismantling of the MILF camp in
Rajamuddah at the Liguasan marsh complex in 1999. He also led troops
in Basilan against the feared Abu Sayyaf Group. Are we to believe
that this man whose career was built on a foundation of war would
suddenly trade in his sword for a plowshare?
The Malaysians have withdrawn from the
International Monitoring Team (IMT). The IMT is withdrawing from
several satellite offices in Central Mindanao. With a much
diminished presence of peace monitors, who will be the buffer
between the military and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front when the
Peace Adviser himself is a firm believer in the effectiveness of
military solutions over peace processes? What of the Communist
insurgents whom he and Mrs. Arroyo have vowed to eliminate? Symbolic
gestures are critical to the success of peace processes, especially
when they are stalled. What message is this government trying to
send with the appointment of Esperon?
Machiavelli once advised rulers that even when
they do something evil, they should at least appear to be good. Mrs.
Arroyo obviously doesn’t care at all. We might as well end the
charade of a peace process now.
Amina Rasul
Philippine Council for Islam and Democracy
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Remember Ike and McNamara
I agree with Amina.
But, being an optimist, I am also willing to
wait for Mr. Esperon to prove his critics wrong.
The words of pro-GMA Rep. Abraham Mitra of
Palawan are worth quoting: “If swords can be beaten into
plowshares why can’t a soldier of war be not made into a fighter
for peace?
“Some are saying that Esperon’s more than
three decades in the frontlines fighting Muslim secessionists and
Communist rebels had made him a hawk, but it had probably also
opened his eyes to the futility of using war as the only means of
achieving peace,” he said.
Mitra excuses Esperon’s having cultivated an
image of a warmonger. He says that is what his job as a general
required. “When you lead an army, you cannot project yourself as
the peacenik-in-chief. A lamb cannot lead an army of lions.” It
seems that for all his being a fierce and “all out war” general,
he had also spoken for the record that he believed that the
insurgency fueled by poverty cannot be defeated by guns and bullets.
Unfortunately, Mitra says, “only his saber-rattling gets quoted in
the papers.”
This does not excuse Esperon’s allegedly being
one of the “Hello Garci” generals.
My take on that is he will be held liable for
that when the time comes, in God’s time. So will, for that matter,
President Arroyo—if she really did all the election-fraud crimes
she is accused of having committed.
Meanwhile, since People Power has not brought
down the Arroyo administration, since the President is in power and
and is accepted or tolerated—by the people and the Supreme Court
and the Congress—as the legitimate head of state and head of
government of the Republic, since her appointees to the Cabinet like
Esperon have not been rejected by the Commission on Appointments, we
have no choice but to pray: God’s will be done.
Maybe, Esperon will turn out to be the best
bloke to advance the peace process. Maybe he will be just like
Robert Strange McNamara who was once US defense secretary. He
resigned when he developed doubts about the Vietnam War and later
became the vehicle for exposing many of the truths about the follies
and crimes of that war.
Remember it was President Ike, retired General
Dwight David Eisenhower, who warned America and the world about
“the military industrial complex.”
rqb@manilatimes.net
rq_bas@yahoo.com
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