You’ve heard the sensible argument: “‘Hanggang 2010 na lang naman.’ [It’s only until 2010.] Why the rush?” My answer: If Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo stays in power until 2010, she will remain in power after 2010. She and her cabal have transgressed the law so often now while they are in the saddle. There is simply too much at stake at too high a risk for them to dismount and freely relinquish power to a new president. Imagine her thinking: Why will I allow myself to be in Joseph Estrada’s shoes? Surely she dreads the full wallop of karmic revenge.
Even if we go through the ritual of a presidential election in 2010, at the very least, she will ensure that a brand-new ombudsman will be in place to immunize her and her family from culpability for the next seven years. In other words, she will continue the prostitution of our republican institutions.
Just look at our law enforcement agencies. Rodolfo Noel Lozada Jr. testified under oath about a $130 million commission and Neri about a P200 million bribe (who reported it to the President, who in turn did nothing), about his kidnapping by the very police sworn to protect us, and now about the half-million pesos given to him by a Malacañang lawyer -- and what do they do? They talk about charging Lozada’s wife with perjury! Susmaryosep. By the time Ms Arroyo goes, she will have debased the Republic, and made a total wreck of our constitutional order.
The second argument is: “Away ng mga fixer lamang ’yan.” [“It’s just a brawl among fixers.”] Why indeed should we involve ourselves in a brawl over illicit commissions? My answer: Precisely because it takes a thief to catch a thief, and we must embrace this long-awaited fissure within the ruling elites. In fact, I’d like to see Rep. Jose de Venecia explain why the conspirators in the national broadband network (NBN) deal with China’s ZTE Corp. kept on insisting on “the NorthRail template,” the exact same swindle that ZTE wished to emulate, except that NorthRail was De Venecia’s baby and ZTE wasn’t. So the fixers are raring for a fight? That’s good news for all us victims. We must celebrate, we must fuel, we must spark the outrage.
The third argument is a sequel to the second: “Let us settle for the lesser evil.” I’ve actually found this argument most enticing, especially since Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo is by far the most highly educated of our presidents, and she wonderfully looks the part. The only problem is, going by what Romulo Neri allegedly said, she is “evil.” The law says Cabinet members are the alter ego of the president, and when the alternate ego brands the original ego as “evil,” he should know whereof he speaks. At the rate she’s going, just about every other option is the more “moderate” evil.
The fourth argument is: “Respect the rule of law lest you open a Pandora’s Box of power gone berserk.” My response: You mean, any more berserk than Arroyo’s Mafia sense of power? Whose Strong Republic is forceful in hounding its enemies, but weak in punishing its friends?
We must not lose sight of fundamentals. We value the legal document called the Constitution because we need neutral standards and mechanisms by which to settle the naked clash of power and interests. There are many ways to decide these contests. People can choose by voting. People can bargain and negotiate in the open market. Or people can ask a neutral judge to decide according to the Constitution. But our Constitution has been cheapened over and over again by Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, its letter turned and twisted to betray its spirit, perverted to suit her agenda. She has depleted the Constitution’s power to legitimize. Justice Jose Vitug, in the EDSA People Power II decision, asked: “Should [we] choose a literal and narrow view of the Constitution [and] invoke the rule of strict law …?” Or, he continued, should we stretch it a bit to respond to the call of the times? His conclusion: “Paradoxically, the first option would almost certainly imperil the Constitution, the second could save it.”
To those who say, “Let us preserve the rule of law,” I ask: Why, what’s left of it to preserve? I have written about the heartless evictions of vendors; I conceded the need for order in the streets but lamented that, by confiscating their goods -- the plastic trinkets, the “garapon” [jar] of sago, their makeshift tents -- we rob them of the tools of their honest toil and kill their entrepreneurial, almost divine, optimism. Why, what evil have these vendors committed that we can be so ruthless against them, yet be so excusing of those who steal us blind, in the range of $132 million and counting?
I agree that ousting Ms Arroyo won’t solve all our problems. Our ills are systemic. We must rebuild broken institutions. We must confront our shared flaws as a people, our lack of civic spirit, of communal discipline. (God sakes, in the La Salle Mass last Sunday, a matron overtook everyone during Communion! We had formed two queues before the priest, and Doña Buding simply decided to form her own “counter-flow”! Now I understand why the guillotine was invented. Such unholy thoughts.)
But the need for systemic change should not postpone the call for immediate measures. Now we face the 21st century equivalent of millenarianism -- like those revolutionaries of old, who said that we can postpone land reform, we can delay gender equality, because anyway after the crimson triumph, life will be beautiful.
For this, let me take refuge in the ringing oratory of John F. Kennedy: “All this will not be finished in the first 100 days. Nor will it be finished in the first 1,000 days, nor in the life of this administration, nor even perhaps in our lifetime on this planet. But let us begin.”
Resign. It’s not just an option; it is an imperative. That is the minimum, because to demand anything less is a cop-out and because in the end, it’s for us to decide, not hers.
