WE ARE not EDSA-pwera. Because People Power was not only EDSA. People Power occurred all over the archipelago.
While People Power of 1986 culminated in five days of street actions and marches, the people power to oust a dictator sprung from the more than 21 years of the Filipino people shedding blood, sweat and tears. From extreme poverty, hunger and crisis, the Filipino people rose and aspired for an end to their suffering through collective action. From the most repressive conditions, Filipinos chose to be relevant, and confront what seemed to be the strong wall of Marcos tyranny and dictatorship at the risk of losing their lives and liberties.
Fast forward to the present, 38 years after People Power, Ferdinand Marcos Jr. wants to reduce this day to irrelevance. Last year, the Marcos Jr. government declared February 25 a holiday at the last minute. This year, it ultimately crossed out the date from the list of holidays – at the same time trying to erase the names of those killed, disappeared and imprisoned under martial rule.
While this move is hardly a surprise, coming from Marcos, it remains a travesty of history and a direct insult to the people. It is also a reflection of Marcos Jr.’s rule: he tries so hard to win the people over with his flowery speeches and “presidential” image, while doing everything in his power to make the people forget about the evils of Marcos Sr.’s rule.
Indeed, just like how Marcos Sr. and his ilk bribed delegates to the Constitutional Convention to agree to the amendments in favor of the Marcoses, the current Marcos administration backed a fake People’s Initiative using billions of pesos in funds. Their pretext is to focus on amending the Constitution’s economic provisions. But amending the political provisions, especially dropping term limits, has been a Marcos obsession, to enable them to stay in power indefinitely. Amendments to the constitutional provisions to abolish the party-list system, as well as the ban on foreign military bases on Philippine soil, are not far-fetched.
The administration views Charter Change as a priority while it insults the Filipino people’s intelligence through fake claims of growth and progress, similar to how it dangled the promise of 20-peso per kilo of rice to poor Filipinos. It is implementing the worst economic policies that are bound to bury us deeper in crisis. Yet, it continues to squander government coffers through many foreign trips that offer dubious returns.
The Maharlika Wealth Fund, a top priority of the Marcos Jr. government, is being implemented through public funds at the cost of budgetary cuts for social services and higher debt service.
Amid all of this, Marcos Jr. spent a whopping P16.8 million in public funds in launching Bagong Pilipinas, a cheap spin on his father’s Bagong Lipunan mantra. Like the martial law-era Bagong Lipunan, Bagong Pilipinas offers a bogus promise of progress with a gun pointed at the Filipino people’s heads. Continuing attacks on the people’s freedom of expression, and other human rights remind us that the struggle fought by the people under Marcos Sr.’s martial law is far from over.
We are keenly aware of the horrors of martial law coming back in our midst – the extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, political imprisonment by the hundreds, and the tagging and labelling as terrorist of thousands.
But if there is one thing that we learned from People Power – it is that no tyrant, no dictator remains in power forever.
People Power was not only EDSA. As long as injustice remains, and tyranny and dictatorship exist, People Power is and should be a continuing reality for our times. – CARMMA (Campaign Against the Return of the Marcoses and Martial Law)
