WHAT IS THE COST, SIR?
Congratulations MGen Jonathan Martir, Sir, on your recent promotion from Colonel to Brigadier General to Major General at such a phenomenal speed!
In congress, attempts to present legal evidences which could have proved legally the initial report that the Armed Forces of the Philippines was used in the tampering of the 2004 election results by GMA have been suppressed. By the sheer number of congressmen allies of GMA against the presentation of evidences, they have not even been presented at all. If evidences were suppressed, does this mean that the initial report regarding the Filipino soldiers having been used in the tampering of election results by GMA, is not true?
Members of the Armed Forces of the Philippines were prevented by GMA to testify before the senate inquiry on the initial report. Is this not again, suppression of evidences? Again, does this mean that the initial report that the Armed Forces of the Philippines was used in the tampering of election results by GMA, is not true?
The Mayuga Report on the circumstances surrounding incident in the military several years back in the Philippines which would determine the guilt or innocence of those Filipino soldiers among us as prisoners, was never released. Is this not again, suppression of evidences? Does this mean then, that the charges of the GMA government against the Filipino soldiers among us in prison, have basis?
Then, why arbitrarily but systematically suppress? With no credible answer available, this suppression of legal evidences to legally prove the initial report, is a validation of that report that the Armed forces of the Philippines was indeed used in the tampering of the 2004 election results by GMA.
WHAT IS THE COST TO YOU, SIR?
Are the comforts of home, family, promotion and position, the cost of loyalty to: GMA; the tampering of our election; the suppression of its investigation; and the suppression of attempts of the people to peacefully assemble to protest against this suppression of investigation? Is this the cost of loyalty to the suppression of evidences supporting the charges of involvement of GMA in the stealing of our money from the funds for the farm fertilizer and the national broadband transaction with the Chinese?
WHAT IS THE COST TO GMA AND ALLIES, SIR?
This suppression of evidences by GMA allies may have provided them some additional space for legitimacy evasion. Meanwhile, they could consolidate once again their resources and concoct some new constitutional tricks to reestablish their political ground.
WHAT IS THE COST TO US FILIPINOS, SIR?
GMA is just one of the corrupted cells that grew out of our corrupted development in history. This has something to do with our nation having been systematically corrupted by that American invasion, control and consolidation in the 1900s, caused the dropping of our Malolos Constitution and institutionalized for replication, that invasion to the present time. But that would already be on the issue of the underlying cause of our present problem. Let us momentarily focus on the present symptom which is as it is, is already unbearable for millions of us Filipinos.
As cost of real estate properties rise due to it’s inherent development dynamics, so is the cost of GMA and this tampering of election results. This is the further corruption of our institutions. Corruption in any form becomes a seed, the cost of which, rises as it develops into a more complex unit of life. The different systems within it, naturally becomes also corrupted.
We are now reaping the cost of GMA and the corruption of election. It has bred development of more corruption. As they developed, the cost has increased:
- 27,600,000 million is the number of us Filipinos in 2006 which increased by 2.9% from 2003, who could not afford to sustain ourselves with minimum basic needs for food, health, education and shelter.[1]
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- Our towns were buried in mud, tens of thousands among us were left homeless, or some 1,500 of us either died or were left missing by the flood that hit Aurora and neighboring provinces. These were caused by Chinese families allowed by the GMA government to continue logging.[2] [3]
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- Small retailers in Clark Pampanga were displaced not by a fellow Filipino businessman among us, but a Chinese whose SM company was allowed by the GMA government to operate in the area.[4]
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- A Filipina among us was raped and the American marine who has been convicted of rape is now nowhere to be found in any Philippine jail- a continuing of GMA of the historical status of the criminal cases the American soldiers have committed against us but have never been jailed.[5]
As the increase of cost, we Filipinos have been paying because of those seeds- GMA and corruption of election, many of us who could no longer bear it, as naturally as in immune cells, had to resist that corruption of our national body. This latter stages of development of those seeds which developed earlier into more complex units of corrupted national life, led to further rise of the cost. This is the latter stage of that rise in cost:
- 800 of us Filipino journalists, students or ordinary folks who were guilty or were suspected of having defended in our own way, human rights abuses and a fertilizer scam witness against the GMA government have been killed since 2001 as of today.[6]
- Many of the soldiers among us Filipinos- your fellow soldiers and comrades, have paid a high cost in Mindanao protecting us brother Filipinos against ruthless terrorists. The families of the soldiers among us, also had to bear the cost. This time, these same soldiers among us had to respond to the call of the most basic of duty- to protect our helpless civilian brothers who are human rights defenders and corruption witnesses against the GMA government, and who are to become also the next victims of the pattern of systematic killings under the said government. This time, the soldiers among us, had to be in communion with the defenseless millions of us Filipinos mentioned even earlier, whose very lives have been threatened by poverty resulted from corruption. As a consequence of that communion with the millions of us helpless Filipinos, the soldiers among us, your fellow soldiers and comrades are now in prison. Your brother soldiers among us Filipinos have been charged with whatever phrases, words, letter and characters the GMA government could pick-up from whatever pages they could find in law books that would benefit GMA. In prison, soldiers among us, your brother soldiers your comrades, have lost physical freedom, professional opportunities, and career growth. Soldiers among us, in prison, suffered health breakdown and economic breakdown. The families of your brother soldiers among us have also suffered.
- Need I still include the latest cost among us, Jun Lozada? He was jailed for having refused to deny that he was kidnapped by the GMA government agents to prevent him from testifying before an investigation on the GMA involvement in the $330 Million dollar corrupted deal with the Chinese in providing for the broadband network for the Philippines which could give the Chinese access to our information and communication?[7] The very ethical values of his children among us, is now in danger of being eroded.
Are we supposed to accept this as the due process? Is it because it has passed technically the constitutional process that made it acceptable inspite of the truth having been suppressed? So it is then that suppression of the truth has now become acceptable in this country because it has passed the legal requirements? Is it also because it has already been the prevailing practice in our country? Is it because those who are in power even if they suppress evidences, in this country should be allowed to do so because they are in power at present? Is this what many of the government officials call institution? Is this the letter of the constitution?
HOWEVER, IS THIS THE SPIRIT OF OUR ORIGINAL AND ORGANIC CONSTITUTION?
A constitution is supposed to be a framework on which a society can function efficiently in maintaining it’s national life. However, in a society where primal ethical values have been lost, laws become arbitrary set of elaborate abstract guidelines for the good but powerless to follow the will of the bad but powerful. We can study properly our history. Then we can appreciate the difference between a constitution framed under a natural condition of free, healthy and sovereign nation to benefit that nation and, a constitution framed under an artificial condition of controlled, injured and denationalized people to benefit the hidden controlling group. Where confusion or contradictions arise, the bad but powerful, produces an arbitrary interpretation of, or compliance to, the letter of the constitution. The constitution has become a legitimacy tool of the bad but powerful to maintain control over the good but powerless. The good but powerless could eventually be led to believe that bad if powerful must indeed be good after all.
Where is honor, Sir? What is the cost, Sir?
[1] Annual Per Capita Poverty Thresholds, Poverty Incidence and Magnitude of Poor Population: 2000, 2003 and 2006, Philippine, (posted 05 March 2008), Poverty Statistics, National Statistical Coordination Board (NSCB).; http://www.nscb.gov.ph/poverty/2006_05ma
[2] RIMBAN, Luz, Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism, GOING SOFT, PLAYING SAFE, Major players elude campaign vs illegal logging in Aurora, First posted 02:34am (Mla time) Jan 31, 2005, Inquirer News Service, Editor's Note: Published on page A1 of the Jan. 31, 2005 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer
[3] MALLARI, Delfin Jr., Palace restores permit to log in Sierra Madre, say NGOs, Inquirer, Last updated 08:00pm (Mla time) 08/12/2006, http://newsinfo.inq7.net/breakingnews/me
[5] MindaNews, Suspend US military deployments to Mindanao pending probe, Wednesday, 10 September 2008 10:47
http://www.mindanews.com/index.php?optio
[6] ALSTON, Philip, Report of the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, 16 April 2008, PROMOTION AND PROTECTION OF ALL HUMAN
http://www.extrajudicialexecutions.org/r
José Miguel Garcia
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