Two views on bloodless EDSA 1

Maybe, Gringo is correct but then, what if JPE is also correct—that the healing process would take longer once force is unleashed and there is no controlled use of weapons to preserve lives? Of course, this is already moot—like the issue on why then President Cory did not even bother to ask our creditors to write off our loans…The other day, I heard President Benigno Aquino 3rd lash at Marcos for incurring such a big foreign debt. Well, the debt should not have been that huge after EDSA. President Cory had the opportunity to ease that burden but she bungled it. Columnist Efren Danao opines;

Two views on bloodless EDSA 1

“The Philippines waged in February 1986 the very first ousting of a strong man with virtually no blood-letting. It is very seldom that democracy was regained or won at virtually no loss of life. If I remember right, the only death was that of a soldier-sniper at the Channel 4 tower. And even then, there were murmurings that that soldier should not have been shot dead.

Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile, one of the heroes in those four historic days in EDSA, said one of the lessons that Libya could learn from EDSA 1 was how to successfully unseat a strongman with controlled use of weapons to preserve lives.
“Once you use bullets, you unleash force; you’ll create a long healing divide in your society. If the government will use bullets, the possibility of the people’s arming themselves to defend and assert their rights is not farfetched,” he explained.
He recalled that the first thing his group did when they announced their rebellion against the regime of President Ferdinand Marcos was to see to it that unnecessary bloodshed would be avoided.

“The first thing I did when I arrived in Camp Aguinaldo that afternoon, Saturday, February 22, was to call Gen. Pedro Balbanero, he head of the Military Police brigade in Camp Aguinaldo. I told him that we were going to do what we did and please do not attempt to arrest or even indicate any use of force against my men because they are ready to die,” JPE related.

The lessons of EDSA could no longer be thought to those in Egypt, where hundreds died before Hosni Mubarak would yield his power, or in Libya where thousands had died, with Libyan dictator Moammar Kaddhafi vowing to fight to the finish.

Sen. Gringo Honasan, who was then an Army lieutenant colonel and a leader of the Reform the Armed Forces Movement (RAM), also had good words for the bloodless ouster of Marcos. He said that it should be a source of pride for the Philippines that it was the first to succeed with that unorthodox manner.

At the same time, he considers this bloodless victory one of the reasons why the fervor of EDSA 1 is no longer burning in the hearts of Filipinos as intensely as before.

“There was no catharsis. It was over in just four days with little bloodshed. We bought our freedom at so cheap a price that we don’t seem to cherish it,” he said.
During the first years after the ouster of Marcos, Filipinos basked in the glory of EDSA 1. The very mention of EDSA then results in a sudden surge of national pride. A few years later, EDSA seemed like a mere footnote in history with the lack of meaningful commemoration and absence of mass participation.

It is the thesis of Gringo that had there been more blood shed in EDSA, the regaining of democracy would have stirred a longer memory and a stronger passion. He refuses to consider what took place at EDSA a revolution. He said that democracy was restored, a dictator was unseated but a revolution, it wasn’t.

Maybe, Gringo is correct but then, what if JPE is also correct—that the healing process would take longer once force is unleashed and there is no controlled use of weapons to preserve lives? Of course, this is already moot—like the issue on why then President Cory did not even bother to ask our creditors to write off our loans.

The Philippines and Cory were then the toast of the world. A word from her for a write-off of our debts would have been approved with alacrity by our debtors. It would not have been morally reprehensible to do so since she had been very critical on where our debts went. Until now, I still can’t understand why her administration honored our debt for the construction of the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant. The other day, I heard President Benigno Aquino 3rd lash at Marcos for incurring such a big foreign debt. Well, the debt should not have been that huge after EDSA. President Cory had the opportunity to ease that burden but she bungled it.”