Going against the Dutertes at this time: Marcos’ major political error

FERDINAND Marcos Jr.’s all-out political and propaganda attack against Vice President Sara Duterte, planned early this year and made public when she resigned as education secretary in October, will be the accidental president’s biggest political error. It may seem a good move in the future, when the Dutertes’ political star has faded — but not now.

Marcos kicked out former president Rodrigo Duterte, the most popular Philippine president in the post-war era, from his huge political tent. Duterte had developed such charisma with the masses as we have not seen in this era. Thrown out with him was his daughter, Sara, whose popularity ratings have beaten Marcos in every legitimate and honest poll before the incumbent president launched an intense propaganda campaign against her.

To further weaken Sara, Marcos ordered his cousin, House Speaker Martin Romualdez, to pass a budget bill that allocated not a single centavo in confidential funds to Sara’s office as vice president, which in practice limits an office’s flexibility to undertake its tasks. The original proposal was for P500 million.

To undermine Duterte’s popularity, the Romualdez cousin mobilized four committees of the House of Representatives (subsequently called the quad committee) to act as a sort of kangaroo court to prosecute the former president. Their proceedings were even televised late into the night.

Under the guise of its constitutional power to undertake “investigations in aid of legislation,” the committee regurgitated charges against Duterte and his police officials, alleging that their war on illegal drugs from 2016 to 2018 resulted in extrajudicial killings. However, the committee has yet to provide an estimate of these killings.

Travesty

The hearings are a travesty of justice and of our rule of law, especially the court system developed by the best minds of our species. Indeed, Article VI, Section 21 of the Constitution says:

“The Senate or the House of Representatives, or any of its respective committees may conduct inquiries in aid of legislation in accordance with its duly published rules of procedure.”

But the provision hastens to point out: “The rights of persons appearing in or affected by such inquiries shall be respected.”

That the Constitution considers the “rights of persons” more important than Congress’ power to investigate is evident in that this is enshrined in the third article of a constitution with 18 articles.\

The quad committee brazenly trampled on the rights of individuals summoned as “resource persons.”

Party-list Rep. Joseph Paduano, a former member of the communist assassination squad Alex Boncayao Brigade, seemed to be in a twilight zone of sorts, thinking the revolution won and he was a prosecutor in a Red kangaroo court. At least those courts did not pretend to respect individual rights. With his eyes “nanlilisik” (to use a Filipino term), he threatened police captains and colonels, demanding that they tell the truth. When he didn’t like the answer, he moved for the officer to be declared in or face contempt and imprisonment.

Resource

Yes, the “resource persons” (the accused) were allowed to have a lawyer with them, but only to whisper some useless advice. Any competent lawyer, had the committee allowed him to speak, could have demolished probably 98 percent of the allegations raised in the hearings through the process called “cross-examination,” a key feature of a court of law.

The inquisitors, of course, claim that the hearings are not a court of law and therefore do not require court rules. In the US, there is a ban on televising trials or even taking photos in courtrooms. Here, the hearings have been broadcast live, with naive columnists praising them.

This is the travesty here. The hearings are not a court of law, but they have damaged the reputations of, by my count, over 30 individuals. Many of them come from the lower classes and struggled to graduate from the Philippine Military Academy or the Philippine National Police Academy. For years, even decades, they risked their lives to protect citizens. Their path to higher ranks, especially to becoming general, is now totally closed off. If I were the chairman of any of the committees that made up the quad, I’d be looking over my shoulder from now on.

And for what? Do Marcos and his gang seriously think they can unearth evidence to convict and imprison former president Duterte and his officials for extrajudicial killings that occurred six years ago during the antidrug war, which most Filipinos believe dealt a major blow to this scourge that many developing countries have succumbed to?

A recent article in The New York Times, with the eye-catching headline “Why the Philippines’ vice president talked about beheading her boss,” insightfully pointed out: “The infighting has kept the government from dealing with many of the structural problems, like unemployment and poverty, that plague this country of roughly 110 million.”

Past

Marcos should have learned from the recent past. The Aquino III regime undertook a major anti-corruption drive by filing charges in 2013 against 120 officials and private individuals involved in the so-called pork-barrel scam. How many have been convicted? After a decade of investigations and court hearings, only two: Janet Lim Napoles and Richard Cambe, Sen. Ramon Revilla’s chief of staff, who died in prison. Revilla was acquitted along with another senator, Jinggoy Estrada, and recently, former senator Juan Ponce Enrile.

In short, these investigations “in aid of legislation” undertaken by Congress, especially by the pompous quad committee, are totally useless, either in convicting the guilty or pinning down Duterte. While small-minded writers may be entertained by what they think are akin to telenovelas, they are exactly that, as William Shakespeare described in medieval England, “told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”

We will forget these telenovelas just a few days after the hearings end, after their directors will line up to get their Congress unprogrammed allocations in time for the campaign period for their candidacies or that of their wives or children.

Marcos’ siege of the Duterte house, of which these investigations are a part, will likely backfire on him. Filipinos detest an incumbent president bullying one who had just stepped down, and who even helped him get the job. President Benigno Aquino III’s persecution of former president Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, to the point that he had her jailed for seven months, gnawed at his respectability and political base.

The nagging question about Marcos’ betrayal of the Dutertes, without whom he wouldn’t have become president, is: Why now? Why now when his past two years lack solid accomplishments, and he is not a formidable force? Why now, when the US elections could see Trump win, and he might ask him to reverse his belligerent stance against China?

I’ve heard only one credible explanation. Speaker Romualdez and his clan are worried that, for one reason or another, he might want to step down, with Sara assuming power. This entire siege against the Dutertes, the intense propaganda using Congress as a weapon, is aimed at impeaching her and removing her from office. The House of Representatives is easily manipulated, but not the Senate. And my off-the-cuff assessment of the incoming Senate after the 2025 elections is that it will be a Club of Very Independent Wanna-be-Presidents, who don’t owe Marcos anything, and wouldn’t want to be tainted by the image of another Marcos thrown out of Malacañang.

Why would they even think Marcos may step down for Sara to assume the presidency? “He’s 66 and has had only one kidney for 40 years,” an insider said. “He’s in a high-pressure job, both in and out of Malacañang, and if the reports are true, he has been taxing his one kidney with toxins. Wouldn’t you be worried if you were a cousin?” Marcos’ plot against the Duterte’s may have backfired in a big way: seriousness has been planted in many political actors’ minds over his health and whether he could continue his term.

And it is questions like that which make up major factors in the political calculus.

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Going against the Dutertes at this time: Marcos’ major political error
Source: Breaking News PH