Tuesday, February 26, 2008 Editorial: A nation in a quicksand
WHATEVER our national leaders plan to do today, tomorrow or the coming days, the fact remains that right now, we are a nation in trouble. The national condition is drifting toward an inevitable political disaster, as if we are falling into a quicksand. It is a circumstance that ought not to have been, but for a systemic weakness of our leadership and governance.
In the few months since the new set of elected leaders assumed office, there has been no let up in the charges and countercharges of malfeasance in public office, of political obstructionism by the opposition, of graft and corruption in high places of government, as well as the opposition’s continuous efforts to undermine public confidence in the duly constituted national leadership.
Hardly had the furor of the “Hello, Garci” tape — which purports to show that the President won through electoral fraud —died down that the NBN scandal erupted.
The latter case has placed the whole nation in a very precarious situation, a terrible political bind that is slowly pulling the country to the brink of another political disaster that could destroy the economic gains it has earned in the past months. A political analyst assessing the ongoing political crisis claims that the Filipinos have lost the “fire” of political ascendancy they had in Edsa I and II.
The Filipino masses had twice gone out to the streets, the analysis went, “to throw out Marcos and later Joseph Estrada. They were promised change and an end to corruption, but nothing changed.” The third time around, this time with President Arroyo, the same situation is prevailing. Entrapped in yet another corruption scandal, Arroyo is facing renewed calls for her resignation from a weak opposition and a divided Church.
It is perhaps this fragmentation of the Catholic church and the political opposition that is saving the Arroyo regime from immediate disintegration. The lack of fire from the people, who may be feeling a sense of hopelessness and indifference that springs from the ineffectual result of the two previous people power, and the inability of succeeding leadership to effectively generate social and political reforms is saving GMA.
That we have not sunk in the quicksand, we should thank the people’s loss of faith in “the political noise.”
