The True Faces of Dissent today

FV is back. Let me repost what I wrote there some minutes ago.

A shadowy group, which named itself S4, (which sounds like that famous all-male Taiwanese rock band some years back), is now a subject of intense discussion among coffee shop habitues for some time now. The group, described as an organization composed of former Arroyo associates and anti-Arroyo personalities, says that what we have right now is a digital presidency. The group believes that the previous election was rigged and that the true expression of the Filipino’s voice was suppressed during that democratic exercise. Hence, it wants the Armed Forces of the Philippines to intervene and protect the welfare of the Filipino People.

The group posted their views in a full-page ad recently.

Malacanang just brushed it off, saying that the AFP is solidly behind the new administration. Other legislative allies of the present dispensation also came out from the woodwork and denounced the group.

The reason why I am writing about the group right now is simple–where did the idea of using the word sovereignty came about? I mean, sovereignty for me is a heavy word with a heavier meaning that losing it in an election seems more than an illusion rather than fact.

Sovereignty means losing the legal authority to govern a state. You either lose it through invasion or through subversion. Is the group saying that we lost our sovereignty when the wrong guy was elected into office?

What we lost is not sovereignty since we, the Filipino People, the true sovereign, still reigns supreme. If at all we lost something last 2010 elections, is initiative.

Initiative in the sense that our Constitution gave us the democratic way out of a hopeless governance, and only to end up catering to a more hopeless dispensation. We lost the chance to really elect a government that is as serious as the Masses in seeing real change happen in these lands.

I heard Linda Montayre, the convenor of the group in an interview over RMN yesterday that the reason why they are slowly re-appearing in the public sphere is simply their desire to really see real change happen in our country. The question is–under whose idea or ideological platform?

Is the group an expert in what the Masses think and want? What is the Filipino dream, do they know?

Montayre claims that the new administration is the same one with a more refreshing face. That a few days before the elections, both the old regime and the incoming one met in one meeting and decided to once again team up for the sake of bourgeois democracy. In Montayre’s mind, the elites won that elections, not the masses.

If at all there was a conspiracy to maintain the old order between Aquino and Arroyo, this is expected since they belong to the same deceitful group that bartered the true spirit of EDSA. Their forebears were the traitors of the First National Revolution who killed the embers of the Katipunan and want nothing more than elite-led democracy to rule these lands. They again re-appeared in History when they snatched the initiative towards radical change in 1986.

The masses are intelligent. They know and feel that nothing has changed. In fact, the steady stream of Filipinos leaving our shores is proof positive that the Masses expect nothing to change. That the straight road that Noynoy spoke of, is nothing but an illusion, a masterstroke, to deceive those among us who still cling to that hope of change.

Now the only question that remains–is this the only reason why a group such as S4 would spend a quarter of a million pesos for an ad just to say that we live in a digital democracy ruled by a digital president with digital cabinet men? Is there something new to what they are telling us?

None.

The same faces of dissent that have hugged our newspapers and our airtimes for decades are the same ones that continue to shout and tell the world of how damned we are. Yes, we know we are damned, yet no one seems interested anymore in going to the streets to do something about it. No one has the strength to even pick a stone and throw to the new Judases sitting in Malacanang. We only have our pens and our laptops to say that we are disgusted by the way the administration has paved the roads, purportedly straight, but in fact, crooked and as twisted as a Rubick’s cube.

And the reason is simple—those who shout hell were formerly its occupants. Where are the true angels that will rouse the Patriots from their stupor and thereafter, smash the Establishment with their righteous might? Where are the true Patriots who committed their lives to the Cause of True Democracy? Are they so star-struck and so misty eyed by the illusory words of the Inaugural that they already forgot the ideals they so promised to pursue under the banner of the Bagong Katipunan?

If at all, we need change, we need it to re-define the Filipino Soul, then later, societal change.

S4 is S$ (Singularly Green Bucks)

Who on earth would wish ill to the new administration?


A revolution faces two daunting challenges: First, in its first few years, the challenges brought by counter-revolutionaries and second, in its last years, the struggle against being more traditional than the former dispensation.


President Noynoy Aquino has, time and again, said that he is spearheading a revolution. He will now face the daunting challenge of having counter-revolutionaries questioning the very integrity of his administration. 


Who on earth would wish ill or damn the new administration?


Definitely those who prospered during the past or previous dispensation, for one. Those who are now out of power and are now feeling the heat so to speak, are naturally, counter-revolutionaries. They have all the reasons in the world to wish ill or damn the new administration. The only question is--do they have the gumption to act against it?


Normally these people are compromisers. You don't survive nine years without ever learning the Art of Survival. They just need a pat in the back or an assurance that their personal interests would not be harmed, then, they will just sulk in one corner and weather the storm. 


Others who most probably would act counter to the interests of the administration are the criminally minded. Those who operate illegal enterprises and are now feeling the heat, are worse than the compromisers. They are criminals. And criminals do fight when threatened. They deserve death, if you ask me, because people of the criminally minded stuff who wear barongs and Americanas and parley their wealth before the world, knowing full well that they got their wealth from illegal sources, deserve nothing but our derision and death. 


The most lethal counter-revolutionaries are those motivated by ideologies. Ideologically motivated people are most determined individuals. They seek not the riches of this world, but the very thought that their ideas can actually, change things. Some ideologues, however, are motivated not just by this, but by the thought of Power.


Ah, power. This elixir corrupts the soul. Those who have enjoyed power for so long, even though it was ill-gotten, are the worse enemies. They see themselves as saviors. When people think that they are saviors, they are of the worse kind because they think highly of themselves, as if they are superior beings, of higher intellect. 


An ideologue who already tasted power will go to great lengths to again, taste the trappings of Power. An ideologue deprived of his natural environment, would resist. 


This is how the S4 position themselves. They want the Filipino People to think that they are ideologues out to question the very legitimacy of this administration on the basis of sovereignty. They think that we lost sovereignty when we gave Power to a motley crue of yellows and produced what they described as a digital presidency.


Those who spend 250,000 pesos for a full page ad surely have the resources to do what they think is fair, and just, and honorable. They are most probably determined to see the damnation of this administration.


Honestly, something in us feel the same feelings as those of S4. We feel that we are being led by fools who position themselves as political innovators only to realize that they are the same people whom we want ousted in the past dispensation. 


S4 really is not the name of this administration. Type the name and you'll notice that a mis-typing will actually render the name S$, which, for me, means Singaporean dollars. (4 equals $ in the QUERTY)


Why use the solemn issue of sovereignty? Who is really the sovereign in these lands?


Are the political families the true sovereigns? ARe the military cliques the sovereign? Are the businessmen who lost or will lose their shirts due to the loss of power, the sovereign?


S4 does not even explain their notion of sovereignty. They just sparingly use the term because it is cute, and nationalist sounding.


The very fact is, they will always seek the sovereign and will always fight whoever is in power because the very idea of sovereignty eludes them.


Are we being threatened by foreign powers? Yes, we are. 


We are being threatened by China's rising economic power. We should always be on guard against Singapore and Malaysia, two of our neighbours who always want to be ahead of the economic and political game in the region. 


The sovereign, for me, has always been and will definitely be, the Filipino People. There is no stirring movement, no visual revolt, nor are there rallies in the streets or anywhere that suggest that the Filipino Masses are revolting against the loss of their sovereignty.


No one revolted against the allegations of massive electoral fraud, not in the dimension of 2004, when I and my family went out of our house to protest against the loss of sovereignty when Arroyo declared herself winner in a very fraudulent elections. 


2004 was evidently, the time when we, the Filipino People, lost not just our shame, our honor and our integrity, but moreso, our sovereignty. From 2004 up to the very last time when Arroyo walked that concrete road in Quirino grandstand, we felt we were not in control of our futures--the ruling elites were. 


Now, we still feel that we are being played upon by the new elites and are being made to believe that changes are in order when all we see are the same greying stuff that the nine year Arroyo administration created. 


President Noynoy and his factotums, for all their fancy statements and their posturings of being change agents, are definitely not the real deal. They are masters of the Illusion. They weave imaginings.


Yet, despite they being pseudo-nationalist, they have one singular thing which makes them worthy of being in the halls of power--they have the will to effect change.


President Noynoy, for one, believes that he needs to work to better the lives of people. That is more than enough for me. It is worst when even the head of state believes that she deserves to be rich and deserves to be a billionaire because she believes she and her family were deprived of these riches when her father lost the political game to a more powerful man. 


President Noynoy is just a simple man, with a simple mission---prove to the world that we Filipinos, are capable of changing ourselves for the better. That is enough for me. I will not demand more than this because this is simply what the Filipinos want. 


The Filipinos do not want to tackle the issue of sovereignty because evidently, we are as sovereign as any other nation. There is no singular foreign power that dominates our affairs. There is, however, a perception, that the US does manage our affairs, but, these are all perceptions.


When Arroyo was in power, the very perception that the Chinese government dominate our affairs was as palpable as my pulse. Every contract in government was granted to Chinese firms. The president even played golf with them. 


All Filipinos want is a fair share of his contributions to society. We pay our taxes and it is just fair that we get good governance. 


We follow the laws and it is just fair that those who have will also follow them to the letter. 


We respect the authority of some over others and it is just fair that they who were vested of this authority respect the rights of those below them.


The bottomline is simple--those who will seek the destruction of this administration will do so out of their very evil intention of regaining what they lost. 


And when a government faces this challenge from people who think highly of themselves it is best for the people to support that government than support people with irreverent designs. 


The only thing that will lead to the downfall of this government is simply, the incompetence of its people. 


What people do not know is simply this--this administration, for all its weakness, has the Filipino People behind it. Any and all attempts at destabilization and or weakening the Power it has right now, will all be perceived as naked power grabs. 


By the way, even if they succeed know this---the inevitable civil war looms in the horizon. This civil war will not be in the name of any ideology nor motivated by nationalism or the fight for freedom. No.


This war will definitely be a war where competing economic and political forces will fight themselves to the death, knowing full well that the prize is a trillion dollar. Whoever wins, becomes a billionaire. This is a parable. Whoever has ears, listen. Whoever has eyes, look. 

S4 or Solidarity for Sovereignty

Yesterday, an alleged anti-Aquino group published a full page ad calling on the Armed Forces of the Philippines to do its mandate and protect the interest of the Filipino People. It claims that the recent May 10, 2010 elections was a farce and unconstitutional. It claims that all elective posts should be declared vacant owing to the unconstitutionality of the polls. 


Crap.


Who legitimizes every electoral exercise but the Filipino masses? Who gives legitimacy to a democratic exercise but the very people whom the government serves?


Surely, any attempt to destabilize and/or create situations that would lead to the downfall of this government would end in disaster. For any attempt should be supported by a large majority of the People.


An intelligence source says that the group, which calls itself S4, is just monitoring the people's emotions and views. When Aquino's ratings fall, that, says the source, would be the opportune time for the group to move. 


Why destabilize a government with good intentions? I admit, I am one of those disappointed with the way things are in this government. But, I am not about to go to the streets and call for its downfall. No.


There are still several ways for this government to redeem itself. One of those is remind all these incompetents within Aquino's cabinet to get themselves a conscience and boot themselves out of office, for the sake of Pnoy. 


If at all, this government would fall, it would surely fall by the weight of incompetence of its own people.


And definitely the YOU will not be a part of such an enterprise to declare this government illegitimate. YOU listens to the views and opinions of people. No one right now has the wrong mind to say that this government is illegal. No.


Which government was declared and considered largely illegal by the people? It was the former government of Arroyo who allegedly won the 2004 elections through fraudulent means. 


The YOU will definitely stand by the Filipino People.