Our own 9/11

Today many people around the world commemorate 9/11-2001 when 2,996 individuals of different race or ethnicity were killed as a result of a terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in New York City. It was a day of infamy, chaos and pain for people not just in New York City but around the world.

Sadly, what happened on 9/11 rippled through time, all over the world and continues in the form of retribution, warfare and deeper hate and greater hurt. Just like 9/11, today’s victims are also innocent civilians who are in the wrong place or have the “wrong ethnicity.”

While Filipinos can be thankful that we have not experienced an equal form of 9/11 as the US has, I dare say that our current state of affairs in the Philippines has slowly manifested the aftereffects similar to those experienced by innocent civilians abroad.

We now have a slow and long-form political 9/11 that classifies as a constitutional crisis that no one has called out.

Both houses of Congress have taken upon themselves the position and power of “law enforcement & criminal investigators,” conducting hearings that look and sound more like interrogations and cross examinations. They have conducted themselves in like manner as state prosecutors, they have used their power to detain and threaten individuals with incarceration at local or state penitentiary for contempt.

The problem with the congressional concept of “contempt” is it translates to “I’m not happy with your answer” or “you are not saying what we want to hear.” They are essentially squeezing confessions and admissions from their “resource person.”

They have publicly disregarded certain rights of individuals, ignored privacy laws, ignored rights against self-incrimination, interrogated or cross-examined witnesses far beyond the norm of “legislative investigation” of resource persons. In applying contempt charges and detention, they have taken on the powers of the judiciary and have acted like judges and justices as well as the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology.

In one case, legislators demanded that a resource person submit income tax returns dating back to several years, corporate documents as well as private papers related to family matters.

The last time I heard of such demands was during the martial law years when the powers-that-be used or forced the BIR to “investigate” (harass) opposition members and members of the media by sending demand letters to submit income tax returns of the last five to ten years.

We can only hope that some of the senators and congressmen will remember that they or their fathers were once in the opposition and were subjected to such abuse, detention and harassment during martial law.

What started out as “investigations in aid of legislation” has gone from subpoenas to manhunts, to international police cooperation, where national resources and officials and personnel have been deployed. Even the news media has played the game to the point that there is no escaping continued coverages on Senate/congressional hearings on radio/TV/internet and print.

A couple of senators expressed their anger at Alice Guo and stated that they were pissed off and that the witness had no right to tell the senators what to do. Just in case their staff are not telling them the truth, many people are already getting turned off by the high-handed conduct of certain legislators in both houses. The people are also getting fed up with the grandstanding.

In the meantime, Chinese patrol boats ram Philippine Coast Guard vessels with regularity, thousands of Filipinos have been made even poorer by Typhoon Enteng, the price of rice has gone up, vegetable prices as well, several provinces and cities have declared dengue outbreaks or state of calamities because the DOH won’t. Then the latest stats say that unemployment has gone up.

Meanwhile, more and more barangays are getting hit with the African swine fever, further reducing the production output of the hog raising industry. In the meantime, a lawyer in government has told me that the Food and Drug Administration is caught between a rock and a hard place. Two groups are jockeying for position for their ASF vaccine to be the first to be licensed by the FDA. One group is being linked to an Ilocano politician businessman while the other group is being linked to a lady senator.

Drivers in Metro Manila are driving even slower than before due to potholes, road resurfacing and having nightmares about the upcoming rehabilitation of the Guadalupe bridge. Then we read about a Vietnamese lady getting raped in a ride-hailing app vehicle, a restaurant in Quezon City that shut down after robbers walked in and divested diners of cash and jewelry.

While fellow columnists Tony Lopez and Boo Chanco have pointed out the symptoms of a failed state, I am worried about the defeated spirit of Filipinos. If people who have more than they need in life are talking about moving to a better place, to a different country, it is hard to imagine what the average Filipino is thinking.

Yesterday, as I took a Grab ride from Rockwell to Pasig City, I exchanged views with the driver about life as a Filipino. The one thing he said that really made a mark was: “As for me, I never got anything from the government, no benefits, nothing. So, I just rely on myself.”

That is the tragedy of our political 9/11. Essential services are being forgotten and every citizen now has to rely on himself or herself to survive. Yes, Kuya Tony and Kuya Boo, Bagsak na ang Bansa!

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