Archive for the ‘ninoy’ Category
not yet, noynoy
huwag ka sanang magpadala kay conrado de quiros o kay alex magno o kay bongbong marcos (strange bedfellows, eh?) na hinahamon kang tumakbo for president sa 2010, na para bang if you dont seize the day ay tipong you will miss the bus altogether.
i so disagree. while it is true that you could win because of the ninoy-cory-kris connection, are you really ready? the nation would expect great things of you. the nation would expect you to be a president extraordinaire who would at the very least bring about a palpable improvement in the lives of millions of filipinos looking for jobs here at home and food on the table three times a day. that won’t happen just because you aren’t a liar, a cheat, or a thief.
i agree with tony abaya, what we need is a forward-looking president, a truly revolutionary president, someone with the attributes and visions of lee kwan yew, mahathir mohamad and gen. park chung hee.
… it is someone who has the qualities of these three foreign leaders that the Philippines badly needs in order to overcome decades of consistently poor governance, restore our badly battered self esteem, and draw for us a credible vision of what we want our country to be.
We need someone like Lee Kwan Yew who was/is personally incorruptible and at the same time was/is so conversant with economics and international relations that he could speak ex-tempore and defend his policies before an assembly of multinational CEOs and diplomats and made/make solid sense, whether they agreed/agree with him or not.
In addition we need the strong sense of nationalism of Mahathir Mohamad who in the 1980s drew a vision – Malaysia Vision 2020, that sought and seeks to transform Malaysia into a fully industrialized country by the year 2020 – that he was able to convince the multi-ethnic, multi-cultural, and multi-religious people of Malaysia to embrace as worthy of their national loyalty, beyond the narrow appeals of their tribes and ethnic groups. No mean feat, considering the catastrophic demise of equally multi-ethnic, multi-cultural, multi-religious federal Yugoslavia in the 1990s that cost hundreds of thousands of lives.
Mahathir’s nationalism also expressed itself in his readiness to fearlessly fire back at other countries, other world leaders, as well as international agencies whenever he felt they were trampling on the national self-interests of Malaysia.
We also need the single-minded determination of Gen. Park Chung Hee to transform his impoverished, resource-poor and inconsequential Republic of Korea from 1961 to 1979 (when he was assassinated) into a fully industrialized country that is now one of the ten biggest economies in the world.
… this is what the Philippines needs, a leader who can start and lead a revolution, a peaceful one, as much as possible; a violent one, if necessary.
you could be that leader, noynoy. given your parents, the history, the genes, the values, you, more than any other filipino, can do it, can be it. but not without serious preparation for the role, which would mean learning not just from your mother’s successes but also from her mistakes — e.g., land reform, foreign debts, atbp. — and, most importantly, by being truly your father’s son not just in terms of his sacrifice but also of his political ideology.
when your father came home in ‘83 he had a program of action that he drafted while in exile in boston. surely that program of action is worth looking into — other than the dismantling of military rule, things haven’t changed much, except gotten worse, since the 80s — and hopefully, you will be up to the revolutionary challenges it poses.
forget de quiros and other hopeless romantics who urge you to run in 2010. to do so, and to fail at non-violent revolution because you are not ready, would be the end of you. in effect, you’d be neutralized, which would be a shame.
THE UNNAMED ENEMY
Satur Sulit
August 21, 2007
twenty-four years
since the gundown
a coward’s doing
begets a hero.
we imagine a hero
against all odds
facing a dreaded enemy
and dying or prevailing
in the instance.
but there on the tarmac
that sunday noon
the enemy was invisible
is unnamed even now
the one who could not face him
who wanted him dead.
ninoy knew it
knew his enemies that way
he said if they wanted to
it wouldn’t take long
twenty seconds max
and it was.
he went to a not unscheduled death
not to slay but to expose
the heart of his enemy.
ninoy did not rush into battle
he knelt to his death
to free us
and freed us
from an enemy
unnamed even now.
people power, rain or shine
it was a memorable day that we all got to share, thanks to the marvel of television. the cathedral rites were beautiful, fr. arevalo’s eulogy sublime, and the military honors stately and dignified. the family continued to amaze and warm the heart, sharing their mom, sharing their grief, never mind that it meant being exposed to the cruel glare of lights and cameras and nosy, sometimes uncouth, media. thank you, ballsy, pinky, noynoy, viel, and kris!
but the best was yet to come. and it happened out in the streets, the people’s turf, where yellow crowds gathered in great numbers, lining the streets or marching with the casket, flashing the Laban sign and chanting “Co-ry! Co-ry! Co-ry!” it reminded me so much of the snap election campaign, when nakarating kami ng mga magulang ko hanggang lucena, quezon para lang maki-rally kay cory.
there was a brief moment when i asked myself, where were all these people, where were we, when cory was leading street protests asking gloria to resign post-garci and later in support of jun lozada? why were we not there for cory then? but now i see that it doesn’t really matter anymore. what matters is that we have rediscovered cory & ninoy and what they stood for. and i have no doubt that when the time is right, People Power will rise again, rain or shine.