Dilawan: Rise and Fall of the EDSA Regime - Part 1

PART 1: ORIGIN STORY

From 1986 to 2016, the worldview of the yellow forces in our country dominated the thinking and actions of most Filipinos.

Yellowism or dilawan ideology is a system of moral, political and economic beliefs with normative prescriptions and modalities for regulating and regenerating Philippine society.

It provided a narrative, around which the life of the nation was structured. 

A whole new generation of young Filipinos has been brought up with this belief system.

In 2016, an epoch-making shift took place with the election of Pres. Rody Duterte. To many, this marked the end of the yellow orthodoxy.

In this episode of The Cusp, I’m gonna try to explain what happened. What led to the rise and collapse of the yellow doctrine and the ongoing search for something to replace it.

Videos referred to on the pitfalls of Marcos:
1. Lust for power https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uW4vigtWp08
2-3 Greed and hubris https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxdvmHDV9cA
4. Might makes right https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XwHLWWGGry8
5. Debt-driven growth strategy https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbB3DyfFOVg&t=22s

The Happy Prince

I wrote “The Happy Prince” when I was 8. It is a fable depicting life under Martial Law in the Philippines (although I did not realize this then). At the time it was written in 1978, my father, a promising lawyer and banker, turned his back on his wedding sponsor, then First Lady Imelda Marcos to join the late Sen Benigno Aquino, Jr in his fight to win seats in parliament. It was he who took it upon himself to publish the book in 1980. This year marks the 30th anniversary of its release by the mosquito press. It also marks the year in which Benigno III became elected president of the Philippines, making him in a way the happy prince foretold in the story.

Chapter I: The Orphan

Once there was a king who died in bed, not in battle, for he was a peace-loving ruler. He had only one son. Before his breath faded out, he gave his friend, Merham, the Wizard, his last wish.

“Merham,” he said, “raise my son as if he were your own.” 

“I can’t do that, your Majesty,” Merham replied.

The dying king was insistent. “Do you want my son to be lonely?” he asked.

“No!” Merham exclaimed. “But it is foolish for me to take care of the Prince.”

“I don’t have much time to live,” the king said. “You are to raise him to become a noble and great king.”

After saying his last words, the king died with a smile. Thus the King’s son became an orphan.

Chapter II: The Strange Ruler

After the funeral and burial of the king, Merham took the young King Matrahan II to the kingdom of the old king’s friend. On the way, Merham asked some villagers, “Pray, tell me, where is the palace of King Merchian?”

The villagers looked puzzled. “We have not heard of a King Merchian?”

“Then who is your ruler?” Merham asked.

“King Herdaka. He is our only ruler, and he will be our only ruler!”

Everywhere the pictures of King Herdaka were painted on the walls. “Even if he dies, it seems he will live on. With those ugly pictures, he will seem to be always alive and present in the kingdom.”

“Who is this strange ruler called King Herdaka?” The people merely turned away and kept their silence.

Chapter III: The Different King

As days went by, the young prince became known as King Matrahan II. He was a different king. He had no servants to attend to his personal needs. No slaves. No guards to protect his person and property. He loved his people and treated everyone as his friend.

Everybody loved him.

King Matrahan II was good of course. But he was sad because the villagers were unhappy. King Matrahan II wanted to know why and do something about it. He knew what he wanted for his people, but either day or night, the villagers were always unhappy.

Chapter IV: The Told Secrets

As time passed, the villagers became gloomier and gloomier. Until one day, King Matrahan asked them why they were so unhappy.

“Why are you always unhappy,” King Matrahan asked. “Is it because you hate me?”

“No,” replied a peasant called Canto. “It is because of King Herdaka, our ruler.”

“What?” exclaimed King Matrahan. “I thought I am your king!” 

Then Canto continued, “I’m sorry King Matrahan. We pretended you were our king.” He then proceeded to talk of the cruelty of their mean king Herdaka.

Afterwards, Merham suddenly spoke, “Matrahan, I am sorry. I am not your real father.”

“What?” cried King Matrahan.

“It is true. Your real father died when you were an infant. But before he died, he told me to bring you here to this city to find your father’s best friend, King Merchian.”

Then Canto interrupted. “Merham, remember when you did that years ago? My father was the one who told you there was no such king called Merchian here.”

An old man stood up and said, “Yes, but I do recall what an old gypsy once told me. He said that there were two brothers—two princes. They were having a contest, an election, on who was to be king. He told me one of the princes was called Herdaka. He also said that the other prince won.”

“Then the other prince should have been King Merchian,” said Canto.

“That is a possibility,” said King Matrahan II.

“It is a distinct possibility,” agreed Merham. “Why do you think your father told me to go to King Merchian?”

“Then where is he?”

“In the dungeon of the palace of King Herdaka, probably,” answered the old man.

Chapter V: The Victory

King Matrahan gathered his men. They rode to the palace of King Herdaka. They stormed the walls. After days of fighting, King Matrahan’s men finally broke through. They defeated the army of King Herdaka.

King Matrahan captured King Herdaka who was forced to lead them to the dungeon where King Merchian was imprisoned. The stairway was dark, for the dungeon was deep under the palace. King Matrahan freed King Merchian. The people were happy.

King Herdaka was punished for his crimes. He was ordered imprisoned in the dungeon. The survivors of his army were all banished. The gypsy, a spy for King Merchian, was rewarded with a place in the King’s court.

King Merchian adopted King Matrahan and gave him a kingdom in the East. Merham, the Wizard, became a minister of King Merchian.

After many years, King Matrahan died. But his people still remember him as the happy prince. 

Institutionalising People Power through an Ideas Summit

The challenge for him (Mr Aquino) will be to consolidate the movement ... "to ensure that the pattern of his mother’s administration – a non-corrupt president surrounded by a host of sometimes dodgy relatives and advisers – is not repeated."

For the soon to be proclaimed presidential frontrunner Sen Benigno "Noynoy" Aquino III of the Philippines whose ambition only began 9 months ago with the passing away of his mother, democracy icon Corazon C Aquino, the problem now is consolidating the different messages of his campaign into a coherent narrative to govern his administration over the coming six years.

Many political analysts including Paul D Hutchcroft of the Australian National University have said that the election of Mr Aquino was a "vote for change". Manolo Quezon blogs in the Daily Dose that "The Philippines is OK" after its successfully held elections. With the settling of the political environment, the prospects for future economic growth seem sound. The country posted a 7.3% growth in the first quarter, leading many analysts to believe a recovery from the global recession is on its way.

It is under such auspicious conditions that Senator Aquino is poised to take charge of a country of 90 million filipinos. The challenge for him will be to consolidate the movement that ushered him into the "limelight" as Hutchcroft calls it "to ensure that the pattern of his mother’s administration – a non-corrupt president surrounded by a host of sometimes dodgy relatives and advisers – is not repeated."

It will be quite easy for Mr Aquino to slip into the malaise of incumbency where the true voice of the people that he promised to champion seldon gets passed through the cordon of protocol.

Already there are numerous rumours circulating of infighting within his inner circle. Several unofficial cabinet line ups have been leaked. Amando Doronilla opines that rather than change, the supposed appointments signal more of the same and "bode ill" for the incoming administration. Alongside these developments are the midnight appointments of the outgoing president Gloria Arroyo which include the Chief Justice and Ombudsman. Her coalition also retains the largest number of seats in the lower house of Congress. These represent serious obstacles to Mr Aquino's pledge of prosecuting her for the many scandals that plagued her administration and to run an anti-corruption drive.

Pieces of unsolicited advice keep hugging the headlines which include everything from fulfilling his promise to quit smoking to imposing a permanent gun ban, to surrendering the lands of the Cojuangco-Aquino sugar estate to land distribution. Having had only 90 days to prepare his platform of government which was conducted by an inner circle of seasoned policy advisors behind closed doors, Aquino runs the risk of overinterpreting his mandate for change. The media driven campaign and the numerous debates with eight different candidates did not provide a proper platform for the discussion of serious policy challenges in detail.

In the Philippines, such a tradition of participative consultative coalition building is vigorously espoused by non-governmental sector organisations that have comprised the "parliament of the streets" since the days of the Marcos dictatorship.

It will be quite easy for Mr Aquino to slip into the malaise of incumbency where the true voice of the people that he promised to champion seldon gets passed through the cordon of protocol. In order to arrest such a slide, as a way of institutionalising "people power" that brand of democracy his family legacy made famous, it might serve his administration well to call for a people's summit to consult with various stakeholders and create a bottom-up approach to his governance style.

Such an attempt to frame a policy agenda for an incoming administration was made in Australia by the Federal Labor government of PM Kevin Rudd back in 2008. It drew from the ideas of 1 000 participants hailing from different sectors of society. Participants to the 2020 Summit as it was dubbed were selected by a 10 man steering committee. The summit was co-chaired by the prime minister and a leading policy expert from Melbourne University.

In the Philippines, such a tradition of participative consultative coalition building is vigorously espoused by non-governmental sector organisations that have comprised the "parliament of the streets" since the days of the Marcos dictatorship. Such a summit early in his administration could help keep Mr Aquino's change credentials healthy and provide a more rational systematic approach to dealing with the disparate ideas that are floating around.

The Market for Rules

A recent straw poll among the business elite in the Philippines showed that an overwhelming proportion of them support the candidacy of Benigno Aquino III, the son of former president Corazon Aquino who is campaigning based on a platform of rule of law and good governance.

The demand for the “rule of law” in the Philippines coming from the oligopolistic business community is quite puzzling considering that the literature points to reasons why this demand would normally be absent in such a context.

The argument goes that the elite often prefer a system in which they can bend the rules to suit their needs. They would have a comparative advantage in capturing a weak state since they command more resources compared to the owners of small and medium enterprises. They would in fact continue to see returns from their investments in capturing rules and regulations long after such investments have been made.

The founder of Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index, Johann Lambsdorff has in fact found that investors prefer “grand” corruption compared to petty corruption for the simple reason that under the former they feel part of an elite group that is able to influence laws and regulations.

So why are Aquino’s supporters pushing for the “rule of law”?

There are two possibilities: (a) they could be merely capitalising on public anger against corruption in government aimed at the present administration, or (b) they have seen how the absence of rule of law affects their interests and have learnt to compete on their own terms.

The first reason would cast the elite in their traditional role as opportunistic predators positioning themselves behind the leader that captures the zeitgeist during an election in order to exploit opportunities after the wave of public euphoria has passed. The second reason is a bit more interesting since it would suggest that a genuine market for rules is beginning to take shape.

Is there proof for either position?

History certainly favours the former. Studies comparing the Philippine state with that of its East Asian counterparts have categorised it as a weak incoherent state controlled by dominant business interests. The ability of the economic elite to capture state banking institutions and monetary authorities since their inception has been well documented by Prof Paul D Hutchcroft of the Australian National University.

The country’s failed attempts at implementing a genuine land reform program since the 1950s despite the backing of American aid missions and its susceptibility to protectionist crony capitalism under authoritarian rule in the 1970s to mid-80s despite the doting guidance of the IMF are proof that the legal-administrative system in the country has been under the tight control of landed and later industrial elites.

More recent history may be on the side of the latter. It was in the mid-80s after a major banking crisis and the assassination of the exiled leader of the opposition, Benigno Aquino Jr, that the business community withdrew its support to the autocratic regime of Ferdinand Marcos. This is when the yellow confetti rained down in the central business district of Manila during the height of the protest movement to depose him.

According to Emmanuel De Dios of the University of the Philippines the severe recession experienced in the 1980s led to a weakening of the import substituting industries that were standing in the way of reforms to open up the Philippine economy. Under the presidencies of Corazon Aquino and Fidel Ramos, the country began a process of liberalisation in its tradable goods and non-tradable sector (namely in telecommunications) as subsidies and protection were done away with.

As restrictions to foreign investments were gradually eliminated in all but a few sectors of the economy, a new set of economic elite comprised of small and medium sized exporters began to prosper according to De Dios. Industrialists began to see the opportunities of foreign markets as part of the benefits of increasing globalisation.

Then the Asian Crisis hit. A new populist president in the person of Joseph Estrada took office. While the country had initially outperformed its ASEAN neighbours at the height of the crisis, self-manufactured home-grown crises including insider trading and shady deals involving government pension funds in the takeover of prominent business interests were slowly unravelling the country’s image abroad.

It is in light of these events that the current actions of the business community should be assessed. The second people power revolt that unseated Mr Estrada because of his involvement in illegal racketeering was largely backed and funded by the business community. Seeing how such shenanigans connected to his maladministration affected their wealth via the stock market and how the unfair takeover of their businesses could take place under such a regime, they have begun to see the value of Western style rule of law.

The critics of “civil society” (a local euphemism for the business elite) point to the very methods used by them in unseating the former president as a violation of democratic principles and rule of law. This is where economic and political definitions of rule of law clash. The legalities of the extra-constitutional process as affirmed by the Supreme Court notwithstanding, the opponents of Mr Aquino see his support from the business community that stood with his mother since the mid-80s as a sign of his capture by vested interests.

Partly for this reason perhaps, a recent survey shows the trust rating of Aquino lagging behind the man who may win the election, property tycoon Manuel Villar, who styles himself as a champion of the poor from whose ranks he claims to come. The association of Aquino with a family owned sugar estate that has been mired in controversy ever since his mother made land reform the centrepiece program of her government does not help his case either.

Not that Mr Villar is free from criticisms himself. A censure motion was put forth by his colleagues in the Senate for a conflict of interest involving his properties that benefited from road works proposed by him as chair of the powerful finance committee. The manner by which he flouted the rules in the Senate to avoid bringing the motion to a vote bespeaks of the manipulative way in which he could govern the country. For this reason, enthusiasm for his candidacy from his counterparts in the business world appears to be dismal.

Second Chances Don't Come Easy

In the rough and tumble love/hate game that often entangles lovers, a falling out often occurs which then recedes into a distant memory. Later on, nostalgia can reawaken their bond as memories of the old hurt inflicted dissolves away into rememberances of the good times they shared.

So it is with politics.

Just as in relationships, when the spouses, sons and daughters of fallen or discredited leaders seek to reclaim the mantle of their prominent forebears, the nagging question that often remains in the mind of every conscientious voter is, why ought I give him (or her) another chance at this?

Often times as in romantic relationships, emotions trump reason. But not always. In the lead up to the Democrat presidential nomination, former first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton would have succeeded based on a nostalgia for the prosperous 90s when her husband Bill Clinton ran the White House. Had it not been for the impressive campaign waged by Sen Obama, things might have turned out differently for Mrs Clinton.

One could argue that although able to distinguish herself as a US senator, she was not able to differentiate herself from her husband, making his perceived weaknesses and frailties a liability for her unique brand. It might be easier in third world countries where patron-client networks prevail to perpetuate political dynasties. In the West where positions of power are more contestable, two conditions are needed for a political offspring or offshoot to "make it" in the eyes of voters.

One is to distinguish themselves as individuals. Two is to offer a substantial difference. The first one has to do with stepping out of the shadow of their prominent forebears without necessarily tarnishing their good name. The second is more important in countering perceived shortcomings of their patriarch.

John and John Quincy Adams were the first father and son to both serve as US presidents. John Sr succeeded George Washington and served for only one term due to the unpopularity of some of his decisions during the Anglo-French War. His son distinguished himself in international diplomacy before turning to politics.

George W Bush distinguished himself as governor of Texas first before being considered for higher office. He also countered perceived weaknesses in the image of his father George, Sr who promised "no new taxes" during his campaign, but reneged while in office. George Jr did this by following the mould of Ronald Reagan who cut taxes during the height of the Cold War (leading to the chronic deficits that his father had to correct, ironically).

In the Philippines, a former US colony with arguably the longest experience of democracy in Asia, despite an anti dynasty provision in its constitution, a small number of dominant families seems to rotate in occupying the halls of power. Senator Benigno Aquino III son of former president Corazon Aquino is running to succeed Mrs Gloria Arroyo daughter of the late former president Diosdado Macapagal. His running mate Sen Manuel Roxas II is a grandson and namesake of another former president.

Despite his lead in the polls (which many credit to public sympathy for his late mother, the icon of the people power era who passed away last year after a bout with cancer), he is facing a stiff challenge from his colleague in the Senate Manuel Villar who was the frontrunner before Aquino joined the race.

The columnist Tony Lopez, an ardent Aquino critic, cites two main reasons why he believes Aquino has been losing support in the polls. One, despite serving for three terms in the lower house and briefly in the Senate, Lopez says Aquino has failed to leave a distinguishing mark on either chamber. Two, he also suffers from perceived weaknesses in the Aquino brand foremost of which is failing to deliver on social justice with the flawed implementation of agrarian reform, Mrs Aquino's centerpiece program.

Yet despite these hindrances, Mr Aquino still has a good chance of clinching the plurality required in a multi-party field to win the presidency. This is due in large part to the alternatives that many see are equally if not more risky propositions. They include aside from Mr Villar, a self-made billionaire with questionable business and political dealings, a convicted former president Joseph Estrada, former Defense Sec Gilberto Teodoro, an ally of the unpopular Mrs Arroyo and a few more who have languished at the bottom of the polls.

For Mr Aquino, whose poll numbers have been slipping lately, to reclaim the momentum, he would need to address the two important issues raised here. Since he cannot do anything about the lack of tangible accomplishments in the past (the claim of not being tarnished with corruption as an achievement in itself notwithstanding), a good way to start would be to roll-out some well thought out policy prescriptions, which he has begun to do. Another would be to demonstrate how he would correct some of the failings that plagued his mother's administration.

One way he can concretely do just that would be to convince his clan comprised of more than 50 members to give up their stake in Hacienda Luisita, a sugar plantation where some 10,000 families work and live. This would signal to the vast majority belonging to the poorer social strata that he intends to make a clean break with the past. It would also signal to his oligarchic friends in the business world that they cannot curry favor with him.

Until he addresses these concerns, his slogan of bringing about people empowerment and the rule of law will continue to be viewed by many with the same scepticism of a star-crossed lover.