19 years ago, one man held all the power in the Philippines.
The regime of Ferdinand Marcos had lasted over 20 years.
It was a regime characterized by the declaration of martial law, the prevalence of human rights violations, and massive corruption.
One man held all the power.
Thousands were killed.
Millions were silenced.
Billions were stolen.
19 years ago the rule of the dictator was broken, and the Filipino people regained their freedom.
Not a shot was fired in what came to be known as the "People Power" Revolution.
Millions of people went to the streets to defend the soldiers who had had enough of the dictatorship.
Millions of people stood in front of the tanks deployed to crush the rebellion.
Millions of people cheered when Marcos fled the country in the face of mounting international criticism and the withdrawal of American support.
19 years ago a new government was formed, with the first ever woman president in the world as its leader.
The country rejoiced, the world watched in awe, as this new government took steps to ensure a better future for the Filipino people.
However, it was all too good to be true.
19 years, 4 presidents, and several coups d' etat later, it would seem that we are now in a far worse situation than we were before the People Power revolution.
The government of Corazon Aquino tried to undo the damage wrought by the dictatorship, but the continued presence of Marcos' cronies in the government ensured that not much was accomplished.
Aquino's government also had little political will to do anything; they could have refused to pay the debts incurred during Marcos' time, due to the criminal nature of those debts, and the still applauding world would have agreed with us.
But no, now we still have to pay a 6 trillion peso debt.
They could have enacted real land reforms then, but the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program did nothing for our farmers, since the influence of landowners, most especially the family of President Aquino, ensured that it would benefit the landowners more.
They could have mended conflicts with the Moros in Mindanao, but the rebellion in the south still continues today.
19 years later, the Republic of the Philippines still suffers.
Those wasted opportunities still haunt us today, as illustrated by the events at Hacienda Luisita, the Valentine's Day bombings, the impending fiscal crisis, the huge foreign debt, and the division of the Filipino people.
The People Power Revolution showed us what could happen if we all believed in ourselves, and if we all came together to fight for a common goal.
The people in EDSA on February 25, 1986 all believed that Marcos lost all legitimacy, that his rule had ended, and that it was time for change.
They were united in their common interest; to restore freedom in the Philippines.
The lessons of People Power should never be forgotten.
The Filipino people of today should regain the unity we once had.
We should be united in our common interest, and once again fight for our freedom.
Not from tyranny, but from poverty.
Not from oppression, but from corruption.
Not from persecution, but from division.
Our country today is bound by the many evils born out of our society.
It is time to rise up again, not against a dictator, but against ourselves.
We should change ourselves; our way of thinking, our values, and our goals.
We should plan for long term solutions, instead of for short term profits.
We should prioritize the good of all, instead of only ourselves.
But most of all, we should remember that we are all Filipinos, regardless of ethnicity, religion, ideology, affiliation, educational attainment, or economic status.
Let us all now, when it is most needed, unite as one people, as one nation, and once again fight for our freedom!
2 comments:
*deleted comment*
but how can we do it?next post nalang :D
feel free to suggest anything :D
First: Treat it as you would a normal case study. Use a scientific, rigorous analytical approach.
a.diagnose the problem, what is it really?. A: it is a government failure, a failure in the Representative Gov't to be exact. Due to the problem of Shortened Time Horizon. We elect representatives and delegate power to them so that they can make policies that 1.reflect the will of the people(w/c means interests and preferences)2.are socially efficient(means benefits must outweight the cost, and the costs and benefits must be shouldered by the whole society and not just inflicted on particular groups of individuals). But the problem is that the incentives that the representatives face does not lead them to make the social optimal choice. We must operate based on the assumption that all citizens are utility maximizing, self-seeking individuals. They are FORCED (and I do not use the term lightly, because what greater force can there be than self-interest?) The time horizon refers to their term of office-this causes them to place more importance on short term impacts because it is the one that citizens pay attention to. They are all faced with the vulnerability of reelection, thus they face no incentive to pass policies that may inflict short term cost but reap much larger long term benefits because they would probably not be around any longer to get credit for it. When you examine it that way, it has logic, (I do not say it has sense-because sense is affected by ethics and mores, but logic is in the realm of the mind, unaffected by social restraints-so, it has logic). Second problem, there is oversupply of negative externality-this is because all the decisions (whether it is transformed into actual action or inaction) are public decisions, we have reached a stage that is like a mutated, hideous version of the concept of pareto-optimum. It states there that any further reallocation would result in making someone worse off->our version is that whether we allocate or not someone is worse off and will be worse-worse off. Its a damned if you and damned if you don't kind of thing, again a mutated version because it is now given the new meaning of whatever decision you make it results in something bad.
b. possible solutions? 1. the government COULD be subtly restructured so that we can force the people to internalyze the externalities-(im using the word subtly because no one will agree to restructuring it, no matter what they say, no one would voluntarily give up their power). 2.Use incentive structures (I'll leave that to your imagination)
c.evaluation? 1. are the proposals feasible? No. Why? Because even if it makes logic or has sense (for the ethically-cnscious), people will not rally towards any change. Again, why? Because it is not feasible. The only ones that will rally for it would be the ones that would be directly affected, and to make a decision based on their opinion alone would be problematic because it is biased, because the will of a noisy minority does not necessarily reflect the will of the majority. And because the will of the majority can never really be known because almost all of them will experience diffused impacts of the policy, meaning that if they participate, it will exact a much higher cost on them, a bigger cost than what they stand to gain with the policy.
d. who wins? no one. its like a zero sum game. Sad but true.
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