Since 1986, I don’t recall any AFP officer who has focused more on counter-insurgency and dealing with it head on than Gen. Antonio Parlade. Despite his short stint as head of the NTF-ELCAC and Deputy Executive Director of the National Security Council, Parlade has been relentless and confrontational in going head-to-head with both the underground and mainstream front organizations of the Communist Party of the Philippines.
In our last TwitSpace, Col. George Avila recalled his experience in fighting the NPA in Quezon, the Bicol Region, Samar and Leyte as a Battalion Commander. He also spoke of how as a staff officer at Camp Aguinaldo, his group was tasked with developing the national counter-insurgency plan.
He revealed how during the Ramos administration, the amnesty given to the communist surrenderrees, as part of the peace efforts, led to disillusionment among officers and men fighting in the field despite the lack of resources in terms of equipment, materiel and food. There was also the corruption brought about by the practice of conversion which was the logical outcome of the lack of a supply chain logistics system in the AFP. The Logistics Command was nothing more than a purchasing and warehousing arm.
Parlade has brought to fore the historical revisionism of the oligarchs and politicians, particularly Ninoy Aquino, who took advantage of his early experience in dealing with the original version of the communists, the Huks, into organizing them as a potent force under the leadership of Jose Maria Sison. The Communist Party of the Philippines wasn’t born out of the Partido Komunista ng Pilipinas which was founded in 1930. It evolved out of the Kabataang Makabayan formed by Sison in 1964. Aquino would later tap the remnants of the PKP scattered in Luzon to help Sison strengthen the fledgling CPP and eventually, the NPA, leading the First Quarter Storm, which led to the declaration of Martial Law in 1972 after the turbulence created by Sison in 1971.
Col. Avila delved into the details of the propaganda war, which the CPP-NPA-NDF has the advantage on, owing to its close relationship with the Liberal Party and the Lopez family. The Bantayog ng mga Bayani, the constant reminder of martial law by ABS-CBN and how it has controlled the masses and evolved to what political strategist Ms. Malou Tiquia has described as “the largest political party” in the country at its peak. It is no wonder then that the leftist-militant groups have taken up the cudgels for ABS-CBN and the Lopez’s in the network being given a new franchise by the House of Representatives and why its anchors have been insisting that its closure is an election, freedom of expression and freedom of the press, issue, even if it has been proven that there is basis for the majority of the 18th Congress in denying its application for a new franchise to operate.
What we have in the country aren’t patriotic groups but power blocs fighting for their piece of the power and money pie. The people are the pawns in the political chess games being played. This is true for the educated as we fall prey to the lure of the system to make a fast peso. It is not what you know, but whom you know, which counts.
The most probable scenario to explain what happened in the country from 1983 – 1986 is based on the premise that Ninoy Aquino became expendable because of his failing heart. He couldn’t get a heart transplant without becoming a US citizen. There is also the reality that even if he did survive, he still couldn’t succeed in ousting Marcos because he had the excess baggage of being the same traditional warlord politician as was the norm of his time.
To better the chances of success, why not concoct a narrative based on his widow as the central figure, fighting against a dictatorship, fully backed by the United States?
Think of a conspiracy with a man who was one of the most powerful in the country even if he wasn’t a politician. A man who commanded a service command of the AFP whose loyalty won’t immediately be questioned because of his blood ties to the President. A man who was the chief implementor of martial law. A man whose loyalty to the US was beyond reproach.
It was a simple plan. Assassinate the symbol of the opposition upon his return from exile. Pin it on the dictator and his trusted political and military lieutenants. Reinforce the narrative with extensive foreign media coverage. The dictator would then fall easily, driven out by a popular people’s revolt which would hide the hand of the former colonial master who never really left. It couldn’t have come at a better time because the dictator was seriously ill and fighting for his life.
But the best laid plans of men often go awry. This one did. The opposition couldn’t put up a united front so there was plethora of acronyms for each organization or aggrupation fighting the dictator. This failed to create the momentum for the expected outcome of the former colonial master and its trusted agent. What’s worse, the dictator made it through his serious illness and was strong enough to continue in his role as the President. Three years passed and there wasn’t even a standoff between the two protagonists.
But all was not well in the dictator’s camp. The principal players had splintered into factions which were all competing for the anointment by the dictator to be his successor. There was the wife allied with the principal military lieutenant, the chief political lieutenant with his vaunted wealth and own military faction, the defense minister with his wealth and military clique which served as his political vehicle in venting resentment among the ranks of the armed forces and the general, who was the foreign agent with his own praetorian guard, who turned the scenario of the colonial master into reality.
The dictator made a mistake brought on by hubris which would cost him dearly. He was ousted by the combined elements of the Defense Minister, the armed forces and the former colonial master with their trusted agent representing them. The illusion of a successful bloodless revolution was sold to the gullible audience who lapped it all up. The widow basked in the glory of ousting the dictator who had no choice but to be taken in by his former backers as a refugee. Hubris resulted in an ignominious exit which left him looking like a fool despite his brilliance.
The bloodless people’s revolution wasn’t really one of the people but by the elites. It wasn’t long before it exposed the truth that the people weren’t solidly behind the new leader. Electoral fraud became the fashion because it could be sold to the gullible international audience. The people were sidetracked.
The restoration of the dictator by proxy could’ve occurred earlier in the first election cycle after his ouster but those in power wouldn’t have any of it so it became a cycle of electoral fraud every election cycle, even if it meant trashing the Constitution and resorting to mob rule. The formula was tested and proven to work.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions as the maxim goes and eventually, those in power ran out of luck. It began with the election of the boy-king as President. His provenance as the scion of “democracy and freedom fighters” was dusted off for his campaign. It did help that his mother died at the most opportune time. Despite subtle claims of fraud, the boy-king “won” the Presidency and again set to to rule. But he was too much of a bumbling idiot to get anything done right. The fact was, he didn’t care. What was important to him was carrying out his agenda of political vendetta because he realized, his would be the last chance the family would get to square things out with their political enemies.
While he did manage to survive his term despite his incompetence, the pushback would be the candidate who would come out of nowhere and shake the political foundations of the country by throwing out long held stereotypes and playbooks. After thirty years in power, the fall was very hard as the trusted agent of the former colonial master thought he had a malleable hillbilly in his hands to get power back but this was not to be. The hillbilly was smarter than the mentor.
The hillbilly would defy political convention which left his detractors and enemies spinning in their seats. He would employ his own political playbook in the midterm election and run his own messaging without benefit of polling numbers because he knew his audience well, too well, in fact. He literally got away with murder in his drug war. He played footsies with the communists and when they wouldn’t dance to his tune, he let out the police and military against them. He would unmask them before the public and narrate why he did what he did in order to make his hometown progressive, employing the same strategy against them after he became President.
The other significant development was the rise of the son of the dictator. The restoration of the dictator would be the biggest slap on the face of the the “defenders of freedom and democracy” in their lifetime. It has been easy because those who ousted dictator never outdid the dictator in terms of achievements. It’s easy to tally how much the dictator “stole” but there has been no tally as to how much was lost to corruption in the thirty years the successors were in power. If thirty-percent was the norm then one would only need to compute the average national budget for the past thirty years and use to the percentage to come up with an estimate. This wouldn’t include corruption redounding to the benefit of crony’s since they were never eliminated. Only the names changed along with the label from crony back to oligarch.
This handout photo taken on November 18, 20916 and released by the office of Governor Imee Marcos shows former first lady Imelda Marcos (in black) prepare to offer flowers with son Bongbong (3rd L), daughters Governor Imee (3rd R) and Irene (2nd L) during the burial of the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos at the heroes’ cemetery in Manila. Ex-Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos was buried at the national heroes’ cemetery in a secretive ceremony November 18, outraging opponents who said it whitewashed his brutal rule and tainted the famous 1986 “People Power” revolution that toppled him. / AFP PHOTO / Office of Governor Imee Marcos / HO
The sages say that everything in life comes full circle. We are at that stage now. The successors to the dictator are now fighting for their political lives. A loss would render them extinct. Their political enemies have banded together. The fraud perpetrated on the son of the dictator works in his favor. The thought of seeing the dictator’s family back in Malacanan turns the stomachs of those who never thought it would be possible for them to stage a comeback, much more, be vindicated by the people.
The defenders of freedom and democracy are now fighting in the trenches with the true fascists and dictators who are their communist allies. The communists who are bereft of ideology and reduced to being political mercenaries who feed off the poor just like the liberals. They will not go down easily because there is much at stake. It is their survival.
Things haven’t gone well for the hillbilly President either as he has been brought down by the infighting between his loyal aide and children who have come into their own as power-brokers. The two younger siblings are completely behind their elder as she is in the fight of her political life, back stopping the son of the dictator, ably advised by the daughter of the President, whose father was also cut down by the dictator, during their time.
There are political debts to be settled once and for all. It’s sad to think that the people are the losers in the games being played. They will settle for the crumbs given to them. But the people have realized that it is not about good versus evil. It is only a choice of the lesser evil which is offered to them.
And so, to paraphrase that great journalist, His Immenseness, life goes on in the Republic of Banana, where politics is always stranger than fiction and political truth, only a figment of one’s imagination.
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