Here I am and gloria is my country’s sitting president

I have been an activist for 15 years already.  Since I’ve been concienticized and politicized I felt this increasing fury at the abject state of my country.  But never under two previous administrations have I felt the kind of rage I now have against the arroyo regime.  I never thought I’d be confronted with the horrors older activists suffered under martial law.  But here I am and gloria is my country’s sitting president.

            The more I learn about how arroyo is “at the center of this ecosystem of corruption” the more I hate her and her minions.  Yes, Romulo Neri, “She is evil.”  So come clean, you sonofagun!

            My dark mood is not helped by other players in this zarzuela. 

For example, I am terribly disappointed with senator Joker Arroyo.  Tumatanda ng paurong!  After his stellar role as a human rights defender during martial law, how could he bring himself to defend arroyo?  This boggles my mind no end.  This is a complete turning of the leaf.

Some people now embrace former speaker Jose De Venecia and son Joey as “victims” if not fucking heroes.  I don’t know.  I’ve lost count on how many times JDV had saved gloria’s hide.  If he “faced the light” earlier, there would have been less corruption, poll cheating, killings and enforced disappearances.  If Joey was given his share of the ZTE commissions, we might not have heard from both of them at all.

            Also, many Filipinos still put their faith on the Roman Catholic Church leadership in the Philippines.  Sure, many bishops are now calling for a “people power of a new kind”--whatever the heck that means.  Well, how many times in the past have we asked the church to be more categorical in its pronouncements?  Were they for or against truth and justice?  If they called for gloria’s ouster some years back, more activists, lawyers, doctors, churchpeople, human rights workers might be alive today.

          Still, I have relatives saying that the only thing missing to force gma to step down is a stronger response from the military.  Believe it or not, I think that to let the military lead this course of action would be worse than letting the “evil” woman stay until 2010.  At best, I may be amenable to let them follow the people’s lead on this one and not for them to take the driver’s seat.  They’ll just be killing more more activists, lawyers, doctors, churchpeople, human rights workers, and ordinary folks when they come to power.  And I know they are as corrupt as the fake president we are trying to kick out of office.

            What saddens me more is that I know we need the likes of de Venecia, the bishops, and key members of the military for another uprising to work. But I can never agree to them being in power after this is accomplished.  They should stay the hell back to give this country a genuine chance to reform. 

When that happens, the people’s genuine interests should be at the forefront and no one else’s.