Nothing has changed

For today's post, i decided on "re-publishing" one of Conrado de Quiros's articles from http://www.inquirer.net/.

Come to think of it, after almost 23 long years since EDSA People Power 1, nothing has changed.


Theres The Rub
One Ponce Enrile

By Conrado de Quiros
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 01:49:00 11/20/2008

There’s someone who’s more “malakas” [strongly favored] with all the presidents than Ronaldo Puno and Miriam Defensor-Santiago. That’s Juan Ponce Enrile.

Puno was “malakas” with Fidel Ramos, Joseph Estrada, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, and in part with Ferdinand Marcos. Miriam was “malakas” with Cory Aquino, Joseph Estrada and Arroyo. That’s chicken. Enrile was malakas with Cory, Ramos, Estrada, Arroyo, and above all Marcos. Hell, he was Marcos’ right-hand man.

Of course, only three of those people he was “malakas” with were real presidents. The first and last were/are not. Marcos was not when he became his right-hand man, which was during martial law. But Marcos was so before that, for two terms. That is something Marcos does not share with Arroyo. Pretty much everything else he does.

When Santiago demanded to know why Puno was so “malakas” with all the presidents (she was furious, remembering what Puno did to her in the 1992 elections, which in her view was to rob her of the presidency), her implication was that only someone so unscrupulous, so unprincipled, so opportunistic could possibly manage the feat. That was so because it required either reconciling a slew of conflicting beliefs or having none at all. Her implication further was that his opportunism had been a successful one. He had so gotten into the good graces of his patrons he could commit any crime and get away with it.

Of course, Santiago’s fury blinded her to the possibility the same question might be asked of her and the same inferences drawn from it. But surely what applies to both of them applies tenfold to the one person who was far more “malakas” with all the presidents most Filipinos have known in their lifetime?

And so let us ask: Who is Juan Ponce Enrile and how did he manage that feat? Well, the highlights of his long and seemingly unending career include:

He is the one person who triggered martial law by claiming an attempt on his life in the Wack-Wack subdivision in San Juan. Luckily for him (and not so for the rest of his countrymen), he escaped completely unscathed. Later, during Cory’s time, while depicting himself in his campaign ads as someone who had been stricken by light on the way to Damascus, he admitted lying about it. But still later, he would deny ever having made that confession despite the fact that the world had heard it, compounding one lie with another lie. That alone would have qualified him to be a dependable ally of Arroyo, as he was of Marcos.

Citing that assassination attempt as a last straw, Marcos plunged the country into deepest darkness. With Enrile as chief executor.

He is the one person who claimed to have mounted EDSA People Power I in 1986 and to have rescued this country from Marcos. It didn’t sit well with a people who could not believe he would be so confused about who rescued whom. Or indeed who would be so confused about the difference between rescuer and oppressor. They made Cory their ruler despite his efforts to lay claim upon the crown. For good reason: She embodied EDSA People Power I, she was EDSA People Power I. Enrile was just the tuta who lost out to the mongrel Fabian Ver, and who rebelled against his “amo” [boss] as a result of it. And whom the people rescued from certain death, which gave him a fate worse than death, which was to continue living.

Figuring however, like Santiago afterward, that he had been robbed of the presidency, his boys at RAM mounted one coup after another against Cory, and failed. His boys ended up in jail, spending no small amount of time ruing their sins. He remained free, confined only to ruing lost time.

He is the one person who, along with Santiago and Estrada’s boys at the Senate, defended their master with every trick in the book. The same book that reigned supreme during Marcos’ time, the book of law without justice. To no avail: The people, and not the senators, ultimately sat as judge and found Estrada guilty, sending him gliding in a lonely boat all the way to San Juan by way of the Pasig River.

Later, Enrile (and Santiago) would take turns goading Estrada’s legions to “sugod, sugod” [attack, attack] Malacañang, which those legions did. Several people died in the riots there, at Mendiola. Unfortunately, they did not include Enrile or Santiago. Again, Enrile (and Santiago) would remain free, confined only to ruing lost time.

Not for long. For before you could blink an eye or say “one Ponce Enrile,” he (and Santiago) was lovey-dovey with the person he wanted “sugod-sugoded” at Palace by the Pasig.

He is the one person, who still along with Santiago but also now with Joker Arroyo, sought to discredit Jun Lozada, finding nothing wrong with a project that wasn’t just full of “bukol” [bulges—a street lingo for overpricing] but of malignant tumors. Indeed finding nothing wrong with the way Lozada was met and “escorted” by armed men and driven around, his fate hanging in the balance, before being delivered into the hands of the La Salle brothers. Well, he had seen worse as executor of martial law.

He is the one person who can be counted upon to thwart the “Joc-Joc” Bolante hearing, endorse Charter change, and keep Arroyo in power after 2010. Since he can no longer be king himself at 84 (though I hope age hasn’t dimmed his ambitions in that respect, if only so that he would collide with his current patron), he will be a queen-maker, or a queen-retainer. Along with Prospero Nograles, he will have Arroyo controlling both houses of Congress.

The senators who ousted Manuel Villar say Villar is not fit to lead them, his hands being tainted by corruption. They would rather have someone infinitely cleaner. They would rather have someone infinitely more progressive and democratic and libertarian. They would rather have someone this country can respect and trust and look up to.

They would rather have—one Ponce Enrile.

He is the president of the Senate today. He is master of the house today.

And he is back home, the right-hand man once again of another Marcos.