Will A War Bring The Nation Together?

As I write this column, the latest news on the ABS-CBN News Channel is of the closure of Cotabato City airport. Apparently, the war in Mindanao has started to spread to major centers of population. Foreign war correspondents have started to descend upon us and we have 60 percent of our armed forces in Mindanao.

A friend of mine told me that a few days ago, he was stuck in a really bad traffic jam at the Villamor Air Base. Traffic was detoured to the side roads and residents told him the jam was caused by the arrival of the Mindanao casualties. Looks like the body count has started to rise and despite media's seemingly ubiquitous presence, we are not being told how bad things have become.

Oh well, I guess that's part of fighting a war. Information is part of psywar considerations. It is difficult to fight a war with television news crews behind your army's back and news anchors asking the defense secretary to discuss strategy. And there is no doubt the MILF and the Abu Sayyaf are masters of propaganda. They now have worldwide attention, for better or for worse. That much they have won so far with all that hostage taking.

There has got to be a silver lining to all of this bleakness and the only one I can see is the possibility that war will finally unite this fractious nation of ours. And one more thing... maybe the crisis will get Erap's adrenaline really going and finally be the national leader he should have been two years ago.

Because the war in Mindanao is being fought in our living rooms everyday, it should shock our people to action or desensitize us to its horrors, until the war finally knocks on our doors. There should be enough MILF and Abu Sayyaf sympathizers among the Muslims living in Metro Manila. The soldiers who are dying in Mindanao have families living around here too. The casualties from the armed forces are also starting to bring the horrors of the battlefront in a very personal way to families based outside of Mindanao.

It feels like the early 70s, somebody observed over lunch the other day. Kokoy is back. The cronies are lording it over. There is a war in Mindanao. The economy is faltering. Even the red-leaning demonstrators are again marching in the streets. If we get the floods come June or July, only the real Macoy will be missing.

Hey, I thought. That's exactly what my friend Zenaida Seva the astrologer was telling me late last year. She said we are going back to the cycle which brought us the events of the 70s. And it does not help that the dragon in this year's dragon year is not a nice dragon that brings wealth but a war dragon. Unless you are in the business of selling military hardware, it isn't going to be a good year in business too.

If you think the stock market has hit bottom, I remember her saying, you haven't seen anything yet. Wait until about mid-July to August and you will know what low is.

For now, the war in Mindanao will hopefully unite the nation, even if it means giving Erap the benefit of the doubt for now, until the crisis is over.

A Malaysian tourism official was on CNN Wednesday evening and he all but blamed the Philippines for the Sipadan hostage incident. Wait a minute here, whose security forces were caught napping, enabling the Abu Sayyaf bandits to strike? And whose navy failed to stop the bandits from leaving Malaysian waters?

Actually, if you think of it a little bit more, Malaysia is just reaping the whirlwind of past indiscretions. Who was helping supply arms to the secessionists and bandits in the South who call themselves Abu Sayyaf, MILF or whatever?

It was galling to hear the Malaysian tourism official say tourists are safe in Malaysia but they didn't figure on foreigners coming over to make trouble. He made reference to the political troubles in the Philippines. The question is, who abetted the troubles there in the first place? Especially when relations between Manila and Kuala Lumpur were frosty, the Malaysians gleefully helped arm the so called rebels, and it is likely those who raided Sipadan may have even used some of those armaments.

I can understand why the Malaysian tourism official appeared pretty defensive on CNN. Tourism is a big revenue generator for Malaysia. By his own count, he claimed eight million tourists visited Malaysia last year. He has to downplay Sipadan and blame the Philippines for it if he is to save Malaysia's image as a tourist destination. After all, those Sipadan hostages went to Malaysia as tourists, not to the Philippines.

But you can see how alert the Malaysian tourism bureaucracy is to protect that industry. On the other hand, what could Tourism Secretary Gemma Cruz tell CNN if she were interviewed? Maybe, she can tell them that Talipao, Sulu and Basilan are far away from Manila or Boracay or Palawan. But the problem is, if you were an American or a European who saw all those CNN reports, would you still risk going to the Philippines?

Maybe it is best to lie low for the moment until we can bring back peace and order in these islands. It is sheer waste of money to try to promote Philippine tourism abroad now to people other than balikbayans.

A STAR reader sent this e-mail on TV commercials. Even as I am with this industry, I sympathize with the laments of this reader. Sometimes TV networks do go too far and take their viewers for granted. Here is that e-mail.

I have learned to have a peaceful coexistence with TV commercials. I must admit that I do understand why TV networks tend to squeeze so much ads into one TV show: it's only one of several shows that turn in a profit in their programming, so they capitalize on that.

So I patiently watch Ally McBeal on RPN 9, a one hour show that stretches to 86 minutes. Or Friends on ABC 5, a half hour show that ends after 45 minutes. And there's The X-Files, which is in the same position as Ally McBeal (not to mention on the same network). Then I notice one thing about these shows being broadcast on the said networks. A practice that infuriates me so much, I want to storm into their offices with a hatchet, swinging in the direction of their program supervisors.

I saw an episode of Friends before it was shown on ABC 5 on the RCTI network (Sky Cable) aside from seeing it on video too (these shows are also shown here hopelessly late). I found out that ABC 5 actually deletes whole sequences from Friends, and I can only speculate that they do this to accommodate more commercials.

A friend of mine taped one whole episode of Friends from ABC 5, including the ads and you can clearly see the deleted scenes. So goes with Channel 9. Writer Jessica Zafra already wrote about this problem (specifically about The X-Files) in a column several years ago.

For Ally McBeal, I can only infer that they do it. Why? I have a brain. When the cast refers to puzzling incidents that seem to never have appeared on TV, I can only say that it must have disappeared from the local network's copy of the show.

The day after government made an appeal for responsible texting, I got this text message on my Globe handyphone. I know I said we have to unite and give Erap the benefit of the doubt, but this is too good an example of the Filipino sense of humor to let pass. So, here's that text message I received.

Let's put a stop to lies being spread thru text against d church, d country, d president, & lately, d banks! Just concentrate on the president!

(Boo Chanco's e-mail address is [email protected])