Monday, March 03, 2008 Next 'People Power' will heavily use high tech: lawmaker By Ernie N. Olson Jr.
THERE is a very big possibility the next "people power" revolution in the country will be organized and take full advantage of the use of high-technology.
This was disclosed last Sunday by Senator Francis Escudero, who was with United Opposition (UNO) spokesman Adel Tamano, to attend an induction ceremony at the Baguio Country Club.
Escudero said he would not discount the possibility that the next people power or Edsa revolution would be run with high-tech devices such as cellular telephones, computer email services and the like because if the circumstances surrounding the first two were carefully studied, there were some guns fired and some takeover of installations in Edsa 1, while in Edsa 2, civil society, the military and everybody else just converged without any violence or bloodshed at the Edsa Shrine.
"The country [is] getting smaller because of cellular phones and other high-tech devices used nowadays. What is happening in one end of the country will be known in the other end in a matter of hours or even minutes because of these technologies," he said.
Escudero said in the past weeks, more people were seen to be going against the continued stay in power of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo because in the mass rally held last February 15, they estimated around 15,000 people were present, while the number of protestors rose to 80,000 during last Friday's rally.
Tamano, for his part, said while they still have not set a date yet for another mass action this month, "the next anti-Arroyo rally will definitely be larger and more organized."
"We are not against her (President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo) continued stay in power because we want to replace her with ourselves in Malacañang. We are against her continued stay in her position because she is not fit to be seated as our President," Escudero continued.
"She was put up to her position by a people's revolt during Edsa 2, but now she is in power, she says it would be illegal to do that again? If it can work for her, surely it could also work against her," he pointed out.
"She could be right when she said the people of the world would not accept another 'People Power' revolution in the Philippines. Because if she said it was the Filipino people themselves who would not want another 'People Power' revolution to make her step down, then that would have been the lie," the senator added.
