Two presidential ‘inaugurations’ on June 30 will spell ‘fiasco’ for RP

Fernando Poe Jr. and his KNP Opposition militants plan to hold FPJ’s "Presidential Inauguration" in Rizal Park on June 30 – the date of expiration of the current term of the incumbent President.

La Presidenta GMA, however, has already sent out invitations for her "Presidential Inauguration" on the same day, June 30 – this time in Cebu City. In short, with the Congressional "canvass" still creeping along ("no walk-out", promises KNP’s Senator Edgardo Angara), GMA is in no doubt she’s won re-election.

The Ambassadors of the different countries accredited to the Philippines will be flown out to Cebu on a turn-about basis – if the President’s inauguration there goes on as scheduled. My Foreign Office sources tell me they’re worried about this "security problem".

Will any Ambassadors decide to attend the Poe "inauguration instead? Who knows? But this doesn’t seem likely. If you ask me, they’re busy biting their nails and trying to gauge whether the armed forces and police will remain loyal to GMA and consider her, by June 30, still their "commander-in-chief".

A few days ago, La Emperadora quietly held a "Night of the Generals" in Malacañang, designed to exact loyalty pledges and count heads – i.e., to determine who’ll stand up to be counted.

Everybody knows what really happened to former President Joseph "Erap" Estrada on January 20, 2001. Erap didn't abdicate, nor was he overthrown by the "People Power" demonstration of EDSA DOS. His generals deserted him, including his Armed Forces Chief of Staff, Angelo T. Reyes, who had been assuring Erap of his fealty only hours before.

His policemen also deserted Erap, leaving then Police Chief, General Panfilo "Ping" Lacson, without a police command.

Once again, the military’s and the PNP’s loyalty is crucial. If they remain true to GMA, the contemplated "inauguration" of FPJ will be kaput, including the gala "reception" planned after the Quirino Grandstand event in the Luneta – a formal Barong Tagalog affair in the Manila Hotel. If the troops and cops crack down on the FPJ production, it will be classified as one of those "only in Hollywood" type of events.

Perhaps the official Congressional "canvass" will grind to a conclusion before such a Keystone Cops sort of collision occurs – a weird scenario undreamed of by even that eccentric moviemaker Mack Sennett in the 1920s.

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In the meantime, the fact that both GMA and FPJ are scheduling their inauguration before the canvass proclaims a winner is a formula for destabilization.

GMA, being the incumbent Chief Executive and reputedly "winning" in the vote-count, holds the high ground, naturally. This is defiantly being contested by Ronnie Poe, whose adherents have begun addressing him as "Mr. President".

This reminds us of February 25, 1986. Having won the EDSA battle of the of the barricades, we had rushed over to the Club Filipino in Greenhills in our jogging togs, mind you, to attend the "inauguration", as President, of Corazon C. Aquino in the Kalayaan Hall there.

The place was surrounded by soldiers, and protective helicopters flew overhead – and I was let in with my group only because the officers and soldiers in guard detail recognized me.

I embraced the late Ninoy’s mother, the late Doña Aurora Aquino, with tears in my eyes, exclaiming: "Mommy! This is Ninoy’s day!"

Across Metro Manila, in Malacañang by the Pasig, President Ferdinand E. Marcos and his First Lady Imeldific, and their "loyalists" were attempting to head off the Cory inauguration by rushing their own Presidential "inauguration" ceremony for Macoy. Alas for the ailing Dictator, just as the "oath of office" was being administered to him, a "rebel" helicopter gunship blasted the TV tower broadcasting the event – and Marcos was blown off the air. The rest is history. A US helicopter plucked him and his family out of the Palace, to "save" him from the angry mobs which were besieging Malacañang, hammering at the Palace Gates, and beginning to bolt over the wall.

The furious mob stormed into the abandoned building, to find only left-behind demijohns of caviar, which the soldiers thought was bagoong, many huge jars of expensive French perfume, thousands of Imeldita’s abandoned shoes, strewn-about documents and assorted stuff – plus a pile of jewellery, which somehow went elsewhere.

What will happen on June 30? The situation is worse than Greek tragedy or Greek comedy – or even the Greek Olympics. It’s Pinoy Farce.

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In the meantime, our country is going down the tube.

What’s occurring has so damaged our nation worldwide that it may take years to recover. Imagine a country which can’t even complete a "canvass", which is a mere counting of COCs and where two candidates, without a shred of evidence to back up their claims, insist on having "won" – and where the Opposition leader, even before the canvass ends, is angrily claiming to have been "cheated", assailing his opponent a "fake President" and preening himself as "Mr. President."

This is a country in chaos, with potential violence brewing.

Tuesday night, I went to the Forbes Park reception commemorating Russia’s national day, held by Russian Ambassador Anatoly Nebogatov and his charming lady, Valentina. On one wall was the resurrected escutcheon of old Russia, the renewed symbol of the New Russia, the Double-Headed Eagle of the Romanov Czars.

Perhaps we ought to adopt the same kind of symbol for our country (although our national bird Haribon is the Monkey-eating Eagle). It would signify our current state of confusion. The "Double-Headed Egos." As for the monkeys, they’re not being eaten, but are ranting aloud on TV.

Business is almost at a complete standstill. No investment is coming in. No businessmen, bankers, or potential investors are arriving.

Outside of a brief several days during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meetings, in which the Makati Shangri-La was full of delegates from overseas (they couldn’t help coming – but quickly departed), our 5-star hotels, and even 4-star hostelries are hurting.

There are very few foreign visitors. In fact, like the United States, some countries have put out advisories to their citizens not to come to the Philippines during the turbulent post-election period. Until when? If trouble erupts, we might as well kiss foreign investment, and for that matter, foreign interest goodbye.

Who wants to risk themselves in an "unstable" archipelago, where people can’t even elect a President in an efficient, clear-cut manner, and where politicians are daily threatening to unleash the dogs of war and bring down the curses of the Apocalypse?

No wonder the influential Cable News Network (CNN) is reportedly preparing a blockbuster on the Philippine tragic-comedy entitled The Fiasco. This will, if it’s true this opus is in the making, spell disaster for us. The respected CNN Senior Correspondent, Maria Ressa, who certainly knows this country, is said to be writing and doing the production – and we cannot deny our democracy is a "fiasco".

If this is democracy, then – many are already grousing – it sucks.

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President GMA has called for a renewed investigation into the murder of not just four, but seven judges murdered in the last five years. These are – aside from Executive Judge Voltaire "Butch" Rosales, a youthful 48, assassinated in cold-blood in Tanauan, Batangas last Thursday – Executive Judge Paterno G. Tiamson, of RTC Binangonan, Rizal; Presiding Judge of RTC Tayug, Pangasinan, Oscar Gaby M. Uson; Presiding Judge Ariston L. Rubio of RTC Branch 17, Batac, Ilocos Norte; Presiding Judge Hassan T. Ibnohaji of RTC Branch 45, San Jose, Occidental Mindoro; and Presiding Judge Celso F. Lorenzo Sr. of RTC Branch 1, Borongan, Eastern Samar.

The death toll is higher than my own body count!

What’s pathetic, it’s apparent, is the fact the our public has grown so inured to murder and violent death that it has begun to accept such happenings as an everyday inevitability. This cannot be so! We must rage – and we must fight back. With every legal weapon at our command. And, as many now say with vehemence, with every illegal weapon, even, we can muster. Shoot to kill those murderous turds, is an increasingly widespread sentiment, especially among the poor people who have been victimized by the bullies and gangsters.

In the case of the cruelly assassinated Judge Rosales, here’s what his sister-in-law, herself a barangay captain of Dasmariñas Village, Makati City for the past 15 years – and a doctor (a practicing dermatologist) – Dr. Carrie Legaspi, said: "I am appalled. Somehow the death of my brother-in-law was a headline only in the tabloids, while the major dailies relegated the news to the inner-back pages of the newspaper. Our daily lives in the Philippines are full of politics – too much politics. In truth, all businesses have been put on ‘pause’ pending the final month of our national election. The quarrels of Rosanna Roces and the like rate front-page coverage together with our never-ending election canvassing. This is for me a reflection of a thought process that now believes DEATH IN THE PHILIPPINES IS SO COMMONPLACE THAT IT IS NOT NEWS. We are a society that tolerates killings because there is no solution in sight and, after a brief flash in the media, murders are filed in the UNSOLVED CASES SECTION. I grew up believing that my country is worth dying for, but somehow I am having second thoughts. As a society I think we should be angry and fight for our rights so that all criminals will be caught and sentenced to death as need be. Our problem as a people is that we are afflicted with the cancer of an extremely SHORT MEMORY. We are angry for one minute then we forget, and worse of all we allow the plunderers, the murderers and the criminals once more to repeat their crimes. I cry for public outrage for the ambush-slaying of Judge Butch Rosales!

"If we cannot protect our judges, who serve our nation, then perhaps the man in the street, you and I, will be even less protected. Our lives will become worthless, and all of us will be damned."

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This cri de coeur cannot, must not be ignored. For, if we fail to respond, we ourselves might become the next victims of the killer gangs.

Many years ago, my wife and I spent a week and a half touring Sardinia, that Mediterranean island of Italy where Italy’s hero of the resorgimento, Garibaldi, had his home, and where the fabled resort Costa Smeralda stands. (It has now elected a multi-billionaire Governor, Renato Soru, founder of Internet and telecoms company Tiscali).

We tarried for a while in both the capital, Cagliari, and in Sassari, where our friends, Ferdinand and his lovely wife Leocadia, were our hosts. They are now based in England. Just off Sassari was a famous prison island, where Italy’s most-feared criminals were held. The trouble is that one of the most notorious inmates, the head of one of the Mafia nuovo famiglias from Napoli, was being held in incarceration in luxury. He not only had the warden and jail guards fawning on him, and enjoyed both commodious quarters, an extensive wardrobe and larder, and fine dining. Worst of all, he continued to manage his "empire of crime" by telephone from his prison "cell". When we were there, he was even planning a grand wedding for himself and his fiancée, a fetching lass known for her innocence and beauty, named Inmaculata.

Is it possible that Judge Rosales’ murderer was planned and ordered by cellphone from a prison cell? Perhaps probable, not just possible. I hate to suggest that the murderous mastermind suffer an attack of bangungot, i.e. die in his sleep. That would be too good for him.