A TODAY editorial
27 July 2003
The importance of symbols for the military cannot be underestimated. The fact that the rebels have decided to call themselves the “Magdalo,” after the Cavite faction of the Katipunan controlled by Emilio Aguinaldo, is of great importance.
What is unclear, however, is what exactly the rebels hoped to signal by naming themselves after the Cavite faction that deposed Andres Bonifacio: is it an appeal to some sort of image of General Aguinaldo on a white horse, or a far less subtle indication of who they consider their political leadership (an interesting item is that during the beginning of Senator Lacson’s campaign he had supporters calling themselves The Magdalo proclaiming Cavite’s support for their favorite son).
The fact, too, that Rep. Prospero Pichay has told the media that they had intelligence that the rebels performed a blood compact in a house in San Juan last year, points to the obsession of these rebels with some sort of mystical connection with an imagined past; the final clue lies in their using the alibata “K” and the mythical sun of the Revolution in their arm bands.
Trappings of revolution -- and not just the revolution as a whole -- indicate the rebels’ frame of mind but do not answer who, in reality, support them or whom they consider their real leaders. As with the spiriting away of former President Estrada to confinement in Camp Aguinaldo only to return him immediately to the Veterans Memorial Medical Center -- as though Driving Miss Daisy -- it remains unclear who is the pawn and who the player is in the whole messy affair. Are the supporters of Estrada in tactical alliance with the rebels, who struck such noble poses decrying the corruption Estrada supremely represents? Or were Estrada’s riffraff just riding another swirling tide of events? Is Senator Honasan actually implicated or was his name just dragged in by rebels hoping to push him to cross the Rubicon?
What is undeniable is -- at least on a superficial level, which is the level mass propaganda operates on -- the skill with which the rebels have manipulated the media and public opinion. There is no horror and outrage on the part of the public; instead there is a general feeling that the gripes of the rebels are sensible, even if the leading gripe is preposterous on its face: to wit, that military fortunes were made selling bullets retail to the foe when they are made wholesale by generals’ mistresses selling uniforms and boots and Congress defense committee members peddling overpriced Simbas and training jets.
Articulate rebel officers, verging on the hysterical, remained slightly more articulate than the parade of old, embarrassingly pudgy officials trotted out to speak for the government but looking like the best arguments for toppling it instead. The rebels issued a manifesto in Filipino; the government replied in English. The rebels are manipulating the long-standing revulsion of the public with fat and corrupt officers, while appealing to the innate conservatism of the public, which tends to sympathize with clean-cut and trim-waisted soldiers. The rebels are young, the government is old; the rebels have fresh faces, the government… A congressman said it best, “Why are the fascists always better-looking than the democrats?”
Strategically, the ability of this small group of rebels to simply ignore the armed camps of the government and take the fight to the part of the metropolis where the government doesn’t have any advantage, and where media exposure calculated to embarrass the government is at its maximum, was quite breathtaking. As tanks and APC’s rumbled into the metropolis from the provinces, the rebels were coolly planting explosives in the Makati commercial district. And their withering contempt for their superior officers and the government echoed similar feelings among the public.
All these things the rebels have on their side: plus the uncertainty that, when push comes to shove, the Armed Forces will actually fire on their brethren in defense of the government. As the chief of the German general staff declared during the Kapp Putsch, “Soldiers don’t fire on soldiers.” This remains to be seen. Lisandro Abadia doubted that the chain of command could outlast an order to fire on the rebels. Yet Abadia is living proof that it can; he fired his artillery pointblank at his fellow officers -- and thereby catapulted himself to the highest military rank in the land courtesy of a grateful president. Government had to nip this flower in the bud before the chain of command disintegrated completely.
The nation will wake up today to see whether the rebels have the force of their supposed convictions, and hold out against all odds; and whether their brethren in the armed forces have the guts to do their duty. The loyalty, too, of the public to the government will be sorely tested, with two alternative governments ostensibly waiting in the wings -- the undefined one demanded by the rebels, and the discredited one of Estrada, who will be the first to be shot if the first one succeeds.
The rebels have demonstrated flair; the government has shown resolve but no dynamism; even the traditional power of prayer has been eroded with forces at the EDSA shrine having to appeal to the media to return to cover them instead of focusing everything on Makati.
The reputation of the country, damaged by the al-Ghozi escape, is hitting its nadir. The question the citizen must ask is that with things such a mess, what would make this country worth wanting to rule?
TODAY was a Philippine daily news broadsheet. It ceased publication in 2004.
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