“After 36 years, People Power has lost its relevance and meaning to the majority of the Filipino people, supposedly its main beneficiary.”
This Friday, Feb. 25, 2022, the nation marks what has been called the People Power or EDSA I revolution of Feb. 22-25, 1986.
People Power ended the 20-year reign of Ferdinand Edralin Marcos and installed housewife-turned-politician Corazon Cojuangco Aquino. Her presidency is the most troubled in history—eight coup attempts, the worst volcano eruption, the worst earthquake, the worst maritime accident death toll, and the worst communist insurgency —of the century.
Cory’s husband, opposition leader Benigno S.Aquino Jr., was assassinated by the military in 1983 while coming down from his plane’s stairs.
After 1986, more than 30 other countries ruled by tyrants or dictators sought democracy and underwent peaceful regime change, inspired by the Philippine People Power. These included the peaceful Velvet Revolution of Czechoslovakia in 1989. Sadly, the majority of them have returned to dictatorship, a regime change in reverse.
Normally, revolutions are violent, just like the French Revolution where the monarch, ruler, and his family are eliminated for good. Revolutions should be violent, otherwise, people and their rulers do not learn their lesson.
After 36 years, People Power has lost its relevance and meaning to the majority of the Filipino people, supposedly its main beneficiary. It didn’t bring any economic miracle. In 1966, poverty incidence was more than 50 percent. In 2022, 79 percent of the people said they were poor or borderline poor. Poverty worsened.
“The accumulated resentments against elite rule under the banner of Edsa produced Rodrigo Duterte, the cultural antithesis of the polished Edsa politician. Such resentments have a long shelf life, and right now they favor the return of the Marcoses, who have successfully portrayed themselves as victims. Perhaps no one knows this better than the adaptable Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, a certified Edsa beneficiary who has turned full circle by cobbling together a Marcos-Duterte alliance,” wrote political pundit Randy David in his column, Sunday, Feb. 20, in the Inquirer.
The Cojuangco-Aquino family of BS Aquino III appropriated Edsa People Power as if it were their brand, their franchise, their business.
Cory had little role in People Power. She was in Cebu hiding in a convent during the first and most dangerous night of People Power, on Feb. 22, 1986, a Saturday. Her young son then, Noynoy Aquino, was too engrossed with many other things to have participated, too. I was at People Power I as a foreign correspondent.
The Aquino family has been the biggest beneficiary of People Power. It was awarded two presidencies totaling 12 years and 4 months, more than enough compensation for what opposition leader Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino Jr. did in his political lifetime, which was to heckle and needle President Marcos Sr., during 17 of his 20-year presidency. Ninoy died from a military bullet in August 1983. And what did the people get for having two Aquino presidents?
In 1983, Cory blamed Marcos for her husband’s assassination and launched a destabilization campaign. Upon United States prodding, the strongman was forced to call a snap election to end bring the crisis, in February 1986. Marcos was confident he would win the election.
In 1982, Marcos still had the support of US President Ronald Reagan. The Philippine economy was stable, having weathered what could have been a crippling downturn. Basic services were in place. Reagan loved Marcos’ “adherence to democratic principles and practices”.
Marcos is the only president in history to have scored near-9 percent GDP growth rates, twice, 8.92 percent in 1973, and 8.8 percent in 1976. Because of the robust 1973 and 1976 growth rates, Marcos averaged 5.53 percent economic growth in the first ten full years of martial law, from 1973 to 1982. This is the Golden Era of Marcos’s martial rule, a fact not conceded by his bitter critics, even today. The 5.53 percent Philippine economic growth paced developing Asia’s growth which was averaging 4 percent per year, double the 2 percent per year of the rest of developing countries.
Compare Marcos’ 5.53 percent average ten-year growth rate with the 3.86 percent average economic gain during the six years of Corazon Aquino—3.4 in 1986, 4.3 in 1987, 6.7 in 1988, 6.2 in 1989, 3.0 in 1990 and -.57 in 1991.
Ninoy’s murder turned things upside down for the then already ailing Marcos. Economic growth turned negative at -7.32 percent in 1984 and -7.3 percent in 1985. As a result, Marcos’s average economic growth during his 20-year presidency slumped to 3.83 percent—almost the same as Cory’s 3.86 percent in six years.
Cory was succeeded to the presidency by Fidel V. Ramos, the West Point-trained enforcer of martial law, under his cousin, Marcos. The 12th president of the Philippines averaged just 3.76 percent growth during his six-year presidency—0.33 percent in 1992, 2.11 in 1993, 4.38 in 1994, 4.67 in 1995, 5.84 in 1996, and 5.18 percent in 1997.
Ramos, however, brought peace to the land. He amnestied the RAM military rebels, sought ceasefire with the communist guerillas, and worked out a modus vivendi with the Muslim separatists by installing MNLF chief Nur Misuari governor of the Autonomous Region for Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) with an annual budget of P18 billion. Little of that money went to development but Ramos justified it as spending less than the P50 billion the army spent annually to run after the guerillas who turned terrorists.
Ramos firmly believed democracy and development went together.
Judging by the record, that is not necessarily true.
Cory, the mother of democracy, performed badly on the economic front. Her son, B.S. Aquino, also a democrat, averaged 6.25 percent economic growth during his six years as president: 7.33 percent in 2010, 3.85 in 2011, 6.89 in 2012, 6.75 in 2013, 6.43 in 2014, and 6.34 in 2015.
Rodrigo Duterte, supposedly a tyrant, easily surpassed Noynoy’s 6.25 percent, with a sterling 6.63 percent average during his first four years as president: 7.1 in 2016, 6.93 in 2017, 6.34 in 2018, and 6.11 percent in 2019.
Of course, the economy slumped by a whopping 9.57 percent in 2020 due the pandemic. It is expected to recover in 2021 with 5.1 percent, if not higher, growth rate, and 7.5 percent in 2022. In six years, Duterte should average 4.56 percent in net economic gain. Not bad.
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