NEW YORK CITY—Despite threats of an ISIS terrorist strike in New York, there is no lock down in this bustling city. Police visibility is evident in Times Square, at Penn Station and Grand Central, the city’s two major railway hubs, as part of the heightened security alert. The same was true at JFK International Airport where I came in on a Delta flight from Manila.The police were alert but kept a low profile so as not give a picture of a city under siege. Across the Atlantic, Paris is still recovering from the Friday-the-13th terrorist attacks while police raided several places in Brussels which IS suspects used as a base and refuge.
ISIS and migration have taken traction in the US presidential elections The fear of ISIS blending with refugees to sow terror is widespread in both the US and Europe. This is why Donald Trump has a double-digit margin over his nearest Republican rival, Ben Carson The brash businessman has been a hardliner against allowing more migrants into the US. Earlier, Trump targeted Mexicans as he threatened to build a wall across the Texas-Mexican border. With the Paris attack, Trump now seeks to bar Syrians and wants the federal government to have a data base of all Muslim immigrants already in the country. Trump by no means is a buffoon. He’s attuned to what Americans want to hear and he says them.
I lived and worked in Brussels with the Philippine Embassy for four years. Belgium is known as the crossroads of Europe. Brussels is the seat of the European Union bureaucracy and the European Parliament. From Brussels, it takes only under three hours, more or less, by car or train to travel to Paris, Bonn or Amsterdam. In a Europe without borders under the Schengen Treaty, terrorists can stage a synchronized, simultaneous day of terror in those four European capitals.
A prescient Pope Francis described the Paris attack as “the piecemeal start of World War III.” It really is an undeclared war triggered by the civil strife in Syria. ISIS gained ground in Syria and in Iraq where they captured oil fields to finance their military operations by selling oil in the black market. When France joined the US air strikes on ISIS-controlled areas, IS brought the war to the front yard of France.
French President Francois Hollande and British Prime Minister David Cameron are set to map out counter attacks against ISIS. They are not ruling out the sending of ground troops.
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So, it’s going to be a four-way race for president in 2016, after all. Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte’s late entry makes this race more interesting. But real interest still lies on how the Supreme Court will decide on Grace Poe’s residency/ citizenship issue. Senator Poe may have won the first round, 5-4, in the Senate Electoral Tribunal, but it may be too soon to celebrate. If the vote of SC Justices Antonio Carpio, Arturo Brion and Teresita de Castro is any indication—the other members of the high court could cast the same votes as their colleagues. Never mind that Senator Nancy Binay voted with the justices. She is, after all, only in the Senate to protect her father’s interest, nothing more and nothing less. Of the five senators who voted that Poe is a natural-born Filipino—Paolo Aquino, Loren Legarda, Tito Sotto, Cynthia Villar and Pia Cayetano—only Cayetano is a lawyer who really understands the law.
The law is the law. If Poe is short of three months or three days in the residency requirement of the Constitution, she is not qualified to run as president of the Republic. The Supreme Court, for the sake of the country and those who will vote for Poe only to see their votes voided, must resolve this issue as soon as possible. Poe’s fate must not be left to the people. A vox populi, vox dei (the voice of the people, is the voice of god) situation must not be allowed to prevail lest we might have an American president. This happened in Peru because of its vague citizenship requirement. Peruvians didn’t realize they had Fujimori, a Japanese, for president who served three terms. It wasn’t until much later when the succeeding government looked into Fujimori’s background and found out he was still a Japanese citizen that the people realized they had a Japanese leader.
Meanwhile, big business are hedging their bets and some are not yet placing money on Poe until after the Supreme Court ruling. They are also still waiting to see if Duterte is going to make a dent in the next Social Weather Stations and Pulse Asia poll surveys.