Calling it his “last performance”, Joseph Ejercito Estrada announces his 2010 bid to regain the presidency but is it really all smoke and mirrors?

Pauline Kael, famed New Yorker film critic, holding court in arch-liberal Manhattan shortly after the 1972 U.S. presidential elections where the darling of progressives, Democrat George McGovern, went down in record-setting defeat with only 37% of the vote. Kael snipes, “I don’t know how Richard Nixon could have won. I don’t know anybody who voted for him.”

I am certain that many people with whom I am friendly with voted Joseph “Erap” Estrada into the presidency in 1998, but I’d be hard-pressed to name any of my friends or even my peers then in college who did so. Even then, I may have already stood apart among my set just by willing to consider voting for him. This same set would march joyously towards EDSA in January 2001, initiating the first text revolution in the world, earning moral victory (as in my case) in defying a professor who had the temerity to insist on holding class while everybody with a social conscience (so I thought) held camp at Ortigas corner EDSA, laughing over jibes at John Osmena and Tessie Aquino-Oreta and singing “Handog ng Pilipino sa Mundo.” It was us, the students mingling in the streets whom then-AFP Chief of Staff Gen. Angelo Reyes cited as the reason why he had to deliver the fatal blow to the Estrada presidency by withdrawing allegiance to the president duly elected under the Constitution.

The first signs of my own remorse emerged very quickly, even just as Gloria Macapagal Arroyo was preparing to take her presidential oath of office at the EDSA Shrine. At that moment, I was on an unairconditioned G-Liner bus, on my way to Mendiola to meet up with my fellow student revolutionaries who were preparing “the final push” that would expel the disgraced President out of Malacanang. The commuters were journeying not to change the nation; they were reporting to work. They were glum. Whenever the bus passed by groups of protestors, the passengers glared at them. And when a newspaper vendor clambered onto the bus, hawking a tabloid that screamed of the death of the Erap presidency, a lady cried out, quite in sorrow, “Ano ba itong ginagawa nila kay Erap, wala namang kasalanan ang tao.” People murmured, then paused. They might as well have been silently reciting the prayers for the dead. As I got off the bus, I felt an urge to speak up – evangelist style – and apologize to my fellow passengers, for having the gall to presume that all my sacrifice, I was doing for them. Instead I held my tongue, and when a few hours it was announced that Erap had left the building, I was with people who jumped for joy at the news. I did cheer, but with some hollowness knowing that the insulating bubble that fed my adrenalin those days had burst.

Erap knew, and knows, of the people like me who never liked him, considered him an embarrassment to the social graces, pounced on him every opportunity we could. No other post-war Filipino had thrived so successfully using the us-versus-them theme, and we were “them”. Today, freed from the relatively ornate prison that jailed him for six years, he speaks out with the fervor of the paranoid man whose fears had correctly come to pass. He is envigorated by moral ascendancy as he speaks of “yung mga elitista” who persecuted him as they robbed the masses blind.

The crowds he mostly preaches to these days are mostly the converted – you will hardly find him in an academic-sponsored symposium or a business club forum. The rally where he proclaimed his candidacy for the presidency in 2010 last October 21 was staged in Tondo, the district that once was home to Manila royalty but has since been defined by its slums and a mountain built on sediments of rich people’s garbage. For those watching on television, it was the perfect happening for radio. His friends and supporters crowded the stage, popping in and out of the frame, the glistening of their sweat under the harsh klieg lights providing a distracting backdrop as Erap spoke. The speech was way too long, dragged down by bits where he was reduced to a commonplace emcee introducing his senatorial candidates. The emcee they did hire, however effective his carnival barking played to the crowd that was there, proved an irritating voice on TV. It seemingly was an event that was designed without any consideration at all for the people watching on television, while providing maximal entertainment if you were actually there. The strains of the marching band offered incongruity for the home audience, yet undoubted pep for those there to chant along. Elitista lang ang nanonood ng ANC, so screw them.

Still, those blinded into dismissiveness did miss one hell of a show. Among the classes of politicians I have witnessed in my lifetime, there simply is no more effective public speaker than Erap Estrada. His speeches are not staged for the diplomatic corps or the CNN set, hardly emblematic of the Filipino nation as it addresses the community of nations. Yet they stand out for a distinct trait lacking of many of our other politicians – the ability to go for the jugular. History will forever debate how sincere he was when he thundered, “Huwag ninyo akong subukan!”, yet can anyone conjure any other string of words that could better convey to the Filipino-speaking nation, that warning to those who might abuse the President’s confidence? The most apt compliment to Erap’s political skills – kuha niya ang kiliti ng tao.

It is becoming clear though that Erap Estrada is not as considerable a political force as he was in 1998, or even when he was ousted in 2001. The current surveys have consistently ranked him within the lower tier of presidential candidates in 2010. For all his vaunted mandate in 1998, it must be remembered that such bragging rights were all relative – 60% of the electorate did vote for someone else as president, and Gloria Macapagal Arroyo won the vice-presidency by an even wider margin. While he and his successor have proven extremely polarizing figures as well as political rivals, the present reality is that there are very credible alternatives for those who dislike President Arroyo, or both those presidents for that matter. Much as he may presume it so, Estrada is not the only outlet to vent frustration at the current administration. Us-versus-them politics gets trickier when “them” consists of several distinct subsets.

The current conventional wisdom writes out Estrada as a spent political force. Conventional wisdom has been his sworn enemy, and I fear it will dictate the writing of his eventual obituaries. Yet conventional wisdom has been lazy and wrong about Estrada before. For example, conventional wisdom had tagged him as a mere “B-movie actor”, never mind that prior to his election as president, Estrada had held elected public office for nearly thirty years, a lengthier public record than Ramon Magsaysay, Ferdinand Marcos, Corazon Aquino, Fidel Ramos and both Macapagals. For that matter, one may also raise questions whether a five-time FAMAS winner is truly a “B-movie actor”.

The current conventional wisdom also labels Estrada as a crook, a thief. Many of his supporters today ascribe to his innocence as an article of faith. Yet on September 29, 2007, the Sandiganbayan decided Criminal Case No. 26558, concluding as follows:

After a thorough evaluation of the established facts, we hold that the prosecution has proven beyond reasonable doubt the elements of plunder as follows:

(a) The principal accused Joseph Ejercito Estrada, at the time of the commission of the acts charged in the Amended Information was the President of the Republic of the Philippines;
(b) He acted in connivance with then Governor Luis “Chavit” Singson, who was granted immunity from suit by the Office of the Ombudsman, and with the participation of other persons named by prosecution witnesses in the course of the trial of this case, in amassing, accumulating and acquiring ill-gotten wealth as follows:

(i) by a series of acts of receiving bi-monthly collections from “jueteng”, a form of illegal gambling, during the period beginning November 1998 to August 2000 in the aggregate amount of Five Hundred Forty Five Million Two Hundred Ninety One Thousand Pesos (P545,291,000.00), Two Hundred Million Pesos (P200,000,000.00) of which was deposited in the Erap Muslim Youth Foundation; and
(ii) by a series consisting of two (2) acts of ordering the GSIS and the SSS to purchase shares of stock of Belle Corporation and collecting or receiving commission from the sales of Belle Shares in the amount of One Hundred Eighty Nine Million Seven Hundred Thousand Pesos (P189,700,000.00) which was deposited in the Jose Velarde account.

Conclusions of fact in final court decisions do not merely provide narratives to guide the writers of history. They are, by themselves, enforceable in a court of law. They have equal legal potency as whatever state of facts the representatives of the people in Congress choose to incorporate in the statutes they pass. If you made a bet in a bar claiming that Estrada did not commit the crime of plunder then refuse to pay up, insisting upon his innocence, the courts will make you pay. In the eyes of the legal order – the same legal order which sets forth the operative guidelines that governs our daily lives – the fact that Estrada is guilty of plunder is as settled as the laws of gravity.

Estrada had the opportunity to appeal his conviction by the Sandiganbayan, but he chose not to. Instead, he accepted “executive clemency” granted to him by President Arroyo. Clemency was justified by the President in her order for three reasons: that her administration had a policy of releasing inmates who had reached the age of seventy; that Estrada had been under detention for six and a half years, and that Estrada “has publicly committed to no longer seek any elective position or office”. Nothing about Estrada not really being guilty, or Estrada repenting. Pardon in this case, provided a reprieve from prison, not from disgrace.

This indelible scarlet mark may yet prove no more personally inconvenient to Estrada than an old unwanted tattoo. He enjoys his freedom, a condition more palpable than being sinless in the eyes of the law. He has reconnected with family and his associates, eaten home-cooked meals prepared by the cooks that he trusts, attended fiestas and sponsored weddings he was able to attend. Most importantly to him, he was able to stay by his mother’s side during her final months. The intimate Kodak moments he has been able to witness in the two years since his release from prison will mean much more to him than his 2001 mugshot will mean to his haters. He may ultimately end up as smug as Edison recording sound, Ford and his Lizzie, Hershey and his chocolate bar.

There is a final storm brewing, one which serves as the perfect vehicle for those intent on imposing consequence to Estrada’s legal status as a convicted criminal. It is a tempest which Estrada has invited himself, by declaring his candidacy for President in 2010. Unless he demurs from running, it will ultimately up to the Supreme Court to decide whether Joseph Ejercito Estrada, 13th President of the Philippines, is eligible to become the 15th President as well. Lawyers will be paid good money to argue both sides of that coin. Yet given the polling and the general feeling in the air that the Erap era has passed, the utility of resolving that question becomes less a matter of enabling a new Erap presidency, and more of ascertaining the number of votes to be lost or gained by the other candidates. In the end, as Erap himself would admit, his 2010 campaign will be writ up as his last hurrah – a rite of passage that will captivate the public imagination only if he has a realistic chance of winning. His detractors will hope that his moment passes, and he transitions to irrelevance in the political scene.

There is a potential for a dynamic and eminently beneficial post-presidency for Erap, the one he could have glided into had his term not been rudely interrupted. One could easily envision Erap the action hero during our recent flood disasters, leading his entourage and volunteers past the storm waters to deliver aid, cutting the bureaucracy with a well-timed line or two. This phase will not happen until Estrada’s 2010 ambitions are forestalled, whether voluntarily or involuntarily. Still, after Estrada’s political career is punctuated with finality, one question will remain. Can Erap-style politics, rife with unembarrassed populism and class warfare spearheaded by a less-than-slick bumpkin, thrive in the antiseptic 21st century? Those minded to answer “no” better look to South America, where in the years since Estrada, several leaders have been elected to the presidency on the strength of “masa” support, feeding on elite resentment, thriving despite a perceived lack of social refinement or even middle-class moral fiber. Lula of Brazil, Chavez of Venezuela, Morales of Bolivia, Correa of Ecuador, Bishop Lugo of Paraguay. Estrada may have eschewed the leftist ideologies professed by these leaders, yet it is the same populist strain that propelled these leaders into office.

For all his political skills and personal charm, Estrada became a potent force in Philippine politics for reasons other than his persona. Many politicians before him had been able to obtain the affections of the “masa”, but it was Estrada who was able to channel the poor’s long-simmering resentment of their plight in life, and translate it into an aggressive voice within the corridors of power. For as long as income inequality in the Philippines remains flagrant, the emergence of an Erap-like figure with a similar base is almost foreordained. Such a new leader may engender the same kind of resentment from the upper-crust society that Estrada did, may harp on the same class resentments, may stumble on the same ill-informed premises. Still, this new leader will likely have learned from the mistakes of the Estrada years, and may even be bolstered by a coherent political ideology that Estrada never had. And if this leader is able to demonstrate a healthy respect for the rule of law and the basic democratic institutions, his or her base may prove more expansive and less fickle.

By Oliver X.A. Reyes

* This article was first published in the Philippines Free Press Nov. 9,2009

It would be a cliché to observe that it all played out like a movie crime cliché. The armed robbers were costumed as cops, and by virtue of their badge they marched into a plush mall whose shops catered well beyond most civil servants’ paygrades. They stopped at a retail store which sold watches that cost as much as an automobile or three. Emboldened by the aura of their uniforms and a lot of chutzpah, they smashed the display cases and seized the watches. Two real policemen happened to be nearby, and a gunfight ensued. One of the fake cops died on the scene, his corpse abandoned by his fellow gang members as they ran past terrified families of shoppers, diners and churchgoers. The mall’s soft ambient lighting guided their way as they glided on marble tiles accustomed to a more genteel set of pedestrians. The corridors of Greenbelt 5 were not intended to echo screams or gunfire, yet those sounds did resonate within the mall on Sunday noon, October 18, 2009, a day which ended with janitorial services bleaching the floors to rid it of the blood of a criminal.

The official police investigation of the Greenbelt 5 incident remains ongoing. Already, a fearsome set of suspects have been named – the Alvin Flores group cited as responsible for a series of visible robberies in Metro Manila these last several months. Chances are that the incident would be adjudged as nothing more sinister than a robbery. Yet in the hours after the assault on Greenbelt 5, speculation was rife online, and probably inside taxicabs too, that it couldn’t just have been a robbery. If the motive was simply to steal property of value, why stage the heist at the poetic yet inconvenient hour of high noon when witnesses would be at a maximum, when the lunch hour traffic poses a hurdle for a speedy getaway. Why be burdened with an increased degree of difficulty by selecting a target inside a guarded shopping mall, on the second floor to wit? There is also the fact that genuine Rolex watches are especially difficult to fence for optimal value as these are marked with serial numbers and thus easily identifiable as stolen merchandise.

If it were a robbery, it appears it was conceived in a bowl of stupid. For that reason, many of us with the mental acuity to design a more efficient robbery entertained the theory that a different motive was in play. What had struck me was how the plan seemed to be the result of a crude word association game. Swanky mall = Greenbelt 5. Rich enclave = Makati City. Family time = Sunday lunch. Luxury item = Rolex. If the masterminds had predetermined to inflict fear and paranoia in the hearts and minds of the wealthy class, at a time and place when they and their families would feel most secure, what transpired at Greenbelt proved an easy fit. And for the historical-minded, Rolex watches have symbolized darker implications, these having been the gifts offered by President Marcos to his favored generals just as martial law was about to be declared.

The confluence of many other people’s plans rarely reveal a grand rational design even as our brains and gut resist the notion that illogic is the driving force behind much of history’s events. As of now, there really has been no concrete evidence that has emerged this was anything more than a brazen yet ill-conceived attempt to steal expensive watches. What is certain is that the incident supplies predicates for those so-minded to assume the ulterior motive of sowing fear, specifically among the upper and middle classes. It would be easy to assume that the Sunday shooting had dented the psyches of those who heard the shots and ducked under dining tables, cowered beside toilets or ran away from what they thought was death; those who frantically paced as they awaited their loved ones to reply via text that they were OK; those who sat through the radio bulletins and mined through their Twitter feeds thinking, hell this could have been me in there. Even if indeliberately inflicted by the Greenbelt 5 gang, the fears they have generated should not be discounted lightly.

“People react to fear, not love; they don’t teach that in Sunday school but it’s true.” So preached Richard Nixon in secret at a moment before his own paranoia ultimately destroyed his presidency. It is an extremely provocative quote, especially for those who ascribe to 1 Corinthians 13. Lives dedicated to defeating that proposition are hailed as those worth living. Yet it presents manifest temptation to those who, by virtue of their careers or causes, need to elicit the reactions from others in order to meet success. Do you send out the company memo pleading for the respect due every person, or the one simply threatening a regime of fines and suspensions. Do you wear the disappointed face, or just spank the child. From the comfort of theory it is easier to assert the more civilized humane option, yet when faced with the expectations and demands of those depending on your decision, the necessity of the “darker” choice often looms as imperative.

Taken to logical extremes, this Nixonian philosophy justifies terrorist acts in the name of causes one may perceive as correct and redemptive. Terrorism does not merely encompass the deliberate infliction of hurt, it also utilizes violence as a coercive bargaining tool for an ulterior political end. Indeed, the statutory definition of terrorism in our country (under the Human Security Act of 2007) involves a set of retail crimes such as murder or kidnapping, coupled with the intent of “sowing and creating a condition of widespread and extraordinary fear and panic among the populace, in order to coerce the government to give in to an unlawful demand.” The inevitable irony is that the fear of more severe punishment has been employed to dissuade people from committing terrorist acts which “sow and create widespread and extraordinary fear and panic”. Realistically though, isn’t there really any other way to fight fear than with, fear itself?

Our own national experience is rife with events where fear was employed, whether by States and its political actors or by elements on the fringe, to effect momentous reactions. One horiffic yet creative example came during the Hukbalahap insurgency, when rebels were first slain then inflicted with gruesome mutilations so as to indicate to the rural peasantry that the dead had been victimized by the dread aswang. Godless commies meet godless monsters; and there are few more potent fears than those of supernatural predators. Fortunately, the best-remembered of these moments are those which spectacularly backfired. The public executions of the Gomburza priests, of Jose Rizal, and of Ninoy Aquino, were intended to cower a subjugated population into submission, yet they instead galvanized revolutions that led to the ouster of totalitarian rulers. What is believed to be the worst terrorist attack on Philippine soil – the 2004 bombing of Superferry 14 which killed 116 people – failed to paralyze the national life, or even regular shipping traffic. That attack had initially been thought to have been caused by an accidental gas explosion, and it was only five months later, when the urgency of the disaster had faded in the public eye, that it was ruled as a deliberate act. In contrast, the September 11 attacks were precisely designed by Al Qaeda so as the second tower would be hit as the television sets around the world were broadcasting the first tower in flames, maximizing such panic and fear that resulted into two wars and numerous insurgent movements.

Then there is Joe’s Department Store, once along Carriedo Street in Manila. On September 5, 1972, at 8:30 pm, a bomb exploded at Joe’s Department Store, killing at least one, wounding over 40 others. In the next two weeks, there would be many other bombs that would explode all around what is now Metro Manila. Water mains in San Juan, Meralco substations in Pasig and Makati. Both the Manila City Hall and the Quezon City Hall. One bomb fortunately was defused at the Good Earth Emporium in Santa Cruz. No one thought it the handiwork of a deranged mad bomber a la Unabomber. President Marcos accused the communist rebels, Senator Aquino accused the President and his military. That debate ended decisively with the declaration of martial law on September 21, a date when fear became systemic in the rule of law. Three months later, the point would be punctuated with the public execution – broadcast live on television – of a drug dealer. Ominous acronyms such as the ASSO (Arrest, Search and Seizure Order) and the PCO (Presidential Commitment Order) gave legal color for the practice of disappearing people in the middle of the night – not that unvarnished disappearances did not happen too. Fear of retaliation, exile or arrest allowed for the cession of many business enterprises and media outlets to the President and his cronies.

Our post-1986 polity was founded on a charter that preached freedom from fear by renewing emphasis on rights. Yet the most potent mass movements that have arisen since then were animated by fears that the amendment or revision of this Constitution would lead to a restoration of dictatorial rule. In recent years, it had proven especially convenient for the opposition to draw parallels between the dreaded Marcosian past and the Arroyo present as if the latter were a paint-by-numbers sequel. State of emergency = martial law. Hermon Lagman = Jonas Burgos. We Forum = Daily Tribune. The truth is imminently more complex than the syllogisms would suggest, yet the reductionist popular depictions of the current administration do align with the gut feeling, if not instinct, of a considerable majority of Filipinos that our leadership is not to be trusted.

As things appear now, the defining premise of the presumed presidential candidates for 2010 has been hopeful – that they do not embody a second term for Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. The conditions are such that it would be difficult for any presidential candidate to intimidate the electorate to vote him or her into power, as none have been able to since 1986. We may still be stuck in an outmoded form of retail politics shorn of concrete ideologies but at least it is joyful, one that promises hope and wealth, couched in song, dance, and the occasional harmonica playing. Philippine campaigns have never really exploited the us-versus-them theme above the level of playful joshing; never engendered a bunker mentality that foments paranoia among supporters. Negative campaign ads with sinister histrionics are part and parcel of American politics, but they have hardly penetrated here, and when they do, they fail quite thumpingly (see, e.g., anti-Estrada themed ads during the opposition-dominated 2007 senatorial elections). We enjoy our politics, and the fear-mongers are wet blankets.

Still, the vast majority of us live lives fraught with insecurity. We are under a fragile economy, under fragile weather. The food supply is not as assured as we would like. Health costs are high and catastrophic medical emergencies hardly succored by government insurance. And concerns over public safety erupt every so often, as it did with the Greenbelt 5 incident, amplified by a mass media captive to a dramatic story. It would be wrong, even foolish, to be dismissive of this instinct to be afraid. Fear, it should be remembered, was a necessary ingredient for our evolution as a species, for our dominion over the earth. In the days of prehistory, it was fear which kept us wary and agile against predators, and it is that same instinct carried over from our ancestors that jostles us from sleep when we are startled by loud noises such as the ringing of the alarm clock. Fear, for all its unedifying facets, allowed for the survival of the species. It is the fear of our death that drives us to invent vaccines, to explore new worlds in space, to care about climate change.

Our collecive insecurities as a society are open and ripe for exploitation by the current and future generations of politicians. To diminish these worries through self-hypnosis diminishes too our humanity and blinds us to the realities cast by a less delusional world. Nonetheless, the duty of proving Nixon wrong lies in our discernment over how best to respond to these fears. To combat the insecurities which plague us, some of our would-be leaders will call to action by urging forth our inner demons, others by appealing to our aspirations. Grant us the serene wisdom to know the difference.

by Oli Reyes
*originally published in the Philippines Free Press (Oct.25, 2009)