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Fumigating Malacañang
By Juan L. Mercado
September 9,2009

Former president Corazon Aquino died on July 31. Filipino families traditionally mark the 40th day of a family member’s death. Kith and kin gather for quiet remembrance. For Cory, the 40th day fell this week.

Perhaps, the 40the day would a good a time to look back, former UN economist Conrado Sanchez wrote. Sift the significant from the tributes that poured in for her. Choose from simple people on the streets to international publications. That may give us clue on what lies beyond the 40th day for this troubled country.

Like fumigating Malacanang?

After People Power chased the Marcoses into exile, one of Cory Aquino’s first orders, “was to have Malacañang fumigated,” Washington Post’s William Brannigan recalled. “But even then Aquino refused to live or work there, preferring to hold office in a nearby guest house and opting to live in a modest home a block away (Ultimately) the ouster of a dictatorship through nonviolent popular demonstrations became the model for democracy movements all over the world.”

Indeed, the number “40” has historical roots. Senator Benigno Aquino II fasted 40 days to protest his kangaroo trial by Marcos military tribunal. Jesus fasted for 40 days in the desert before starting his public life, Matthew tells us. Forty days of night-and-day rain unleashed the Great Flood, Genesis recalls.

“I have this beef against Moses”, Israel prime minister Gold Meir once said. “For 40 years, he led our people in the desert. And he settled down, in the only place within the whole Middle East, that had no oil.”

“She was the only true queen our people have ever had,” Fr Catalino Arevalo quoted a seminarian in his funeral mass homily. “She was queen because we knew she truly held our hearts in the greatness and the gentleness of her own.”

But ‘there seems a shared sense that Filipinos failed themselves, the New York Times notes. “We thought all we needed to do was remove the dictator and do nothing about it,” said Teresita I. Barcelo, president of the Philippine Nurses Association. “We thought the problem was just the dictator. I say the problem is us. We did not change.”

One of Asia’s most vibrant nations the Philippines hasn’t tamed its Communist and Muslim insurgencies, writes the Times’ Seth Mydan. A restive military is constantly plotting coups. “And the political arena sometimes seems more like a form of mass entertainment than a place of governance.”

“We keep coming up with new ways to describe the country,” said Sheila Coronel of Columbia University. “Democracy in decay, a nonfunctioning democracy, a challenged democracy.”

Did we factor in “OBE”? OB – what? “Overcome By Events” is military jargon. OBE is when cut-and-dried solutions are shot out from under us. Then, we scramble for decisions that never crossed our minds before.

Ferdinand Marcos cobbled an elaborate blueprint to remain president for life. Like all dictators, Marcos didn’t count on “OBE” otherwise known as Corazon Aquino.

In Hawaiian exile, did Marcos realize what T.S. Eliot once said: “To invite the unexpected is to release a new force…(That) lets the genie out of the bottle, start a new chain of events that (can spin) beyond our control.”

Senator Mar Roxas uncorked a new force when he shimmied down from presidential candidate. And he redrew the political coliseum for 2010 by endorsing Senator Benigno Aquino III as candidate.

Sure. Noynoy is a novice. Yet, he already proved “game changer” writes Columnist Alex Magno. There’s been a surge of support. Much has come from figures, not with tradpols, but those identified with reform initiatives: Pampanga Governor Ed Panlilio, Naga Mayor Jessie Robredo and Governor Grace Padaca. More significantly, so have ordinary citizens.

“What if Noynoy says no?” Inquirer’s Joaquin Bernas asks: Majority, however, assume he’ll run. Already, other “presidentiables are bracing an Aquino candidacy. Joseph Estrada’s camp, for example, insists an “OBE”, like Aquino, doesn’t affect Erap’s base among the masa.

Malacanang’s reaction has been virulent. Senator Aquino indulged in “gimmickry” by going on retreat, the Palace said. The Palace trotted out 49 governors who “back” Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro--who barely appears on survey radar screens. By their critics, you shall know them.

Candidates platitudes spiral into tv soundbytes or quickie headlines. Sense instead the “hidden pattern of change”, we are advised. These are geological changes underfoot that escape our notice.”

A deep-seated demand to “fumigate Malacanang” roils underfoot. The uproar over Rep. Juan Miguel “Mikey” Arroyo’s undeclared beachfront home in San Mateo county, California, is only the latest display of this force. This administration has sown the wind. Now, it finds that OBEs narrow options for riding the resulting whirlwind.

“This election will be a battle between two irreconcilable constituencies”, Columnist Alex Magno argues. ”It will be between those who breathe and think politics-as-usual and those who dare hope for the possibility of a genuinely new politics. The configuration is changing rapidly and irreversibly.”

Is this simply wish fathering the thought? Ignatius of Loyola’s image of “Two Standards” always compelled a following:

“We cling to a tawdry belief in the calculability of events”. Editor Theo Sommers warns. “Yet deep down, we know that it is the incalculable, the imponderable and the unforeseen that rule the course of history.”

johnnylmercado at gmail.com
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