EDITORIAL - The closest Aquino got to the brink

After waiting for three days before facing the nation regarding the massacre of 44 members of the Philippine National Police Special Action Force by Muslim rebels, and after failing to show up at Villamor Air Base for the arrival of their remains, preferring instead to grace the inauguration of a Mitsubishi car plant in Laguna, President Aquino came late and kept everybody waiting at the necrological rites in Camp BagongDiwa.

It was reported later that he tried to make up by spending the rest of the day talking with each of the families of the slain heroes. Whatever pain, anger and disappointment the families may feel, Aquino is still the president, and there is not much anyone can do when your leader reaches out and talks with you. The sheer power and authority of the office first puts everyone in awe, and then in his proper place. Before such might you are bowed, and then calmed.

It is therefore safe to assume that Aquino may have succeeded in ironing out the immediate wrinkles that tormented his presidency like no other. At no time had his presidency been in any real danger than the past few days, and if he did not get any sleep in all of that time, it should come as no surprise. If Aquino escaped at all, it was only by the skin of his teeth.

But the families of the slain heroes he sent on a dangerous mission do not pose the biggest threat to his hold on to power. It is the sensitivity of the vast majority of Filipinos who have been awakened to a reality they have not seen or did not care to see before. Aquino's countrymen are now watching him very closely. Even those who have always opted to give him the benefit of the doubt have been jolted by the fact that not everything is hunky-dory in the Yellow Camelot.

All of a sudden, Aquino has found himself in a situation where he cannot afford to make another mistake. If a survey is to be made right at this very moment, chances are his ratings will see a nosedive the kind of which no one has seen before. Very clearly, the only way out safely for Aquino is to reverse the direction he has been pursuing before.

He can start with Alan Purisima. Purisima is very close to Aquino. He used to be the bodyguard of Aquino during the difficult times that Aquino's mother held the reins of government. When Aquino became president, it was not to take long before he appointed Purisima to the top of the heap. But the honeymoon was not to last long. Purisima soon got entangled in controversies involving unexplained wealth and was eventually suspended by the Ombudsman.

And then the massacre happened and it did not take long before it was found out Purisima was behind the operation that led to the tragedy. Worse, it now appears the operation had Aquino's blessings. If Aquino is to keep the presidency, he should worry less about the emotional fallout and think of what real and concrete steps he needs to do to stay in power. First is screw Purisima and reinstate the SAF chief he used as scapegoat. Then he must try to win back his men in uniform.