Foreign media comments on Erap jueteng case — ROSES AND THORNS by Alejandro R. Roces

In an editorial entitled "Estrada’s Moment of Truth," The Asian Wall Street Journal said:

"Maladministration has damaged the economy. The peso has sunk to record lows against the US Dollar, while the stock market is at its worst levels in two years. The International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank have expressed serious concern about the country’s financial health. The ADB’s biannual report released yesterday warned that the Philippines likely will not reach the bare minimum growth rate of 4% to 5% it set for the year. Its efforts to land a $300 million loan from the IMF have been stalled by its financial disarray, so the government faces a significant budget shortfall.

"The president is being accused of diverting public funds to illegal uses and taking bribes from criminal gambling syndicates. Even if he dodges the impeachment bullet, it is difficult to imagine Mr. Estrada serving out the four years remaining of his six-year term."

Commenting on the very same question, the October 20 issue of Asiaweek says:

"Is his number up? That is really the only question. Long dogged by charges of cronyism and corruption, Philippine President Joseph Ejercito Estrada now stands accused of taking millions of pesos in kickbacks from an illegal gambling racket. The peso has crashed to record low against the US dollar. The world’s fifth-worst performing stock market has swooned afresh. Among opposition congressmen, impeachment is the sentiment. Even Estrada’s chief of staff concedes that the presidency might be crippled – whatever the outcome of the latest scandal."

Undoubtedly, the future of this country at the moment will rest on whether the President will respond to the people’s call for him to resign or whether he will continue to stay in office. He has dismissed the rally in Makati City as the work of peninsulares and insulares, two terms that were in common use during Spanish times. Peninsulares referred to Spaniards born in the Spanish peninsula; insulares were Spaniards born in the Philippines. The great majority of insulares where mestizos because there were very, very few Spanish girls in the Philippines. They could not stand the ardous travel across two oceans. Pres. Estrada himself obviously is a descendant of the insular class. All one has to do is to talk to his mother who is very much alive at the age of 92. Those who knew his father Don Emilio Ejercito also know that both his parents spoke fluent Spanish. Pres. Estrada himself speaks Spanish and it is with the same fluency as his English.

In no way can you attribute last Thursday’s rally in Makati to peninsulares and insulares and in no way were the masses who attended paid to attend the rally. If anything the rally was a peaceful demonstration of the people to show their stand on the jueteng controversy. The Filipino-Spanish War ended more than a century ago. Let us not blame the jueteng controversy on our Spanish past. How disoriented can one get?