EDITORIAL - Once again, coup jitters

The e-mail and text message brigades have been active for the past few days, spreading the story that disgruntled soldiers are once again plotting a coup. But a warning to the plotters from President Arroyo herself, with the embattled Chief Justice chiming in about military intervention, could rattle the markets further this coming week and send embassy personnel scrambling to revise travel advisories on the Philippines. With national leaders like these, who needs destabilizers?

There could in fact be some truth to the latest coup rumors. Since EDSA Dos, when it became clear that in this democracy, power could be taken through extraconstitutional means from a duly elected president, not a day has passed without some group plotting to launch a similar military-backed revolt. Often the plotting is nothing more than wishful thinking or drunken banter of men going through mid-life crisis. Occasionally a plot is set into motion, although the results can be pathetically comic, such as the mutiny last July 27.

There is always the off chance that anti-administration forces could muster enough warm bodies for EDSA IV, although for this the forces will need the cooperation of El Shaddai and Iglesia Ni Cristo. The two groups, however, do not appear inclined these days to participate in such political cataclysms.

Failing to muster the crowds won’t stop misguided officers and their opportunist civilian supporters from staging another coup. This could turn out to be another tragicomedy, but it is nevertheless destabilizing for an already unstable nation. The government can’t afford to take chances; such plotters must be neutralized. But does the President herself have to announce the threat?

With the elections just six months away and all the presidential candidates and their running mates officially known next month, Filipinos are unlikely to support any coup. The mutiny in Makati, for all the leaders’ charisma and some legitimate grievances that they aired, collapsed because of zero support from the citizenry. That support is even more unlikely at this time if a similar power grab is attempted. So why scare the people with fresh rumors of a brewing coup? We just love shooting ourselves in the foot. Seeing the go-vernment rattled and the markets shaken by coup rumors is victory enough for the plotters.