The Marcos curse, again
MYRIAL reasons have been advanced as to why our country has remained a poor country, overtaken by Thailand in 1995 and by Vietnam in 2020. There is one incontrovertible factor: the economy collapsed in 1984 by 7.3 percent and in 1985 by 6.8 percent, under the Marcos dictatorship. That set back the economy by six years and it was only in 1989 that our GDP surpassed its 1983 level.
Only in 2020 did the economy perform worse, contracting by 9.5 percent, but that was because the government practically stopped most economic activity to contain the spread of Covid-19.
In contrast, the 1984 to 1985 economic crisis was due to Marcos Sr.’s gross mismanagement of the economy as he built up its foreign debt to unsustainable levels that ultimately led to a default on the country’s loans. Foreign banks stopped all flow of dollars into the country, nearly freezing all its imports.
The crisis was also due to the political instability in the wake of the assassination in 1983 of the opposition leader Benigno Aquino Jr., and the dictator’s clinging on to power despite his worsening health due to his worsening lupus erythematosus that damaged his kidney that it had to be replaced in August 1983 — with one of the current president’s kidneys.
The elder Marcos’ fall unleashed a torrent of exposés on how kleptocratic his regime was. The sensationalist Guinness Book of World Records claimed that the Marcoses undertook the “largest ever theft from a government estimated between $5 to $10 billion.” That seems to be even a low estimate as the government actually recovered so far about $4 billion.
Nuclear
Huge government projects, such as the building of a nuclear plant, were contracted to a crony which had to be aborted because of its graft-laden high costs. Victims of Marcos’ military apparatus filed a successful case in a US Hawaii court for the Marcos estate to pay $2 billion in damages to around 9,539 victims. The Marcos estate has been in contempt for refusing to pay the award, which stands until 2031, the last extension given by the court.
With the catastrophe of a Marcos regime, its kleptocracy, why or how the hell did the son get to win the presidency in the 2022 elections?
Surveys in 2021 showed Sara Duterte and Ferdinand Marcos Jr. as the top two contenders for president. If they both run for president, the “Solid North” (Marcos) and “Solid South” (Duterte) vote bases could have split, weakening both and possibly allowing another candidate (e.g. Robredo, Lacson, Moreno) to overtake them.
By sliding down to vice president, Sara unified their support blocs, creating the powerful Marcos-Duterte tandem that went on to dominate the elections.
Reports suggest that both Marcos loyalists and her father’s allies (Rodrigo Duterte) were involved in negotiations. Marcos’ cousin, House Speaker Martin Romualdez, and other influential figures reportedly pushed for a Marcos-Duterte team-up.
Sara Duterte was only 43 in 2021. Running for vice president allowed her to gain national exposure and political capital while avoiding the risks of a high-stakes presidential race. By 2028, at age 50, she could run for president at the peak of her mental and physical capacities, with stronger machinery, possibly inheriting both the Duterte and Marcos networks.
Duterte
Rodrigo Duterte at times discouraged his daughter from running for president, saying the presidency was “not for women” (a remark he later softened). He also reportedly had his own concerns about how the Marcos family would treat him after his term, but the Marcos-Duterte alliance gave him some political protection.
In short: Sara Duterte slid down to the vice presidency because it was a strategic compromise that united Marcos’ northern base and Duterte’s southern base, ensured an almost unbeatable alliance, and positioned her for a stronger presidential bid in the future.
That would be the biggest political mistake made in Philippine history, Marcos’ Great Swindle.
It turned out Marcos and his cousin Martin Romualdez all along were fooling the Dutertes. While the agreement had been for former president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, a close ally of Sara to be House Speaker, Marcos had his cousin Martin appointed to the post through his traditional powers as the most powerful official in the land as soon as he started his term in 2022.
The Marcos-Romualdez duo pretended to honor the alliance with the Duterte camp, with Sara appointed as education secretary and Arroyo as senior deputy speaker.
Duo
However, the Marcos-Romualdez duo all this while was strengthening its hold on the House of Representatives, in order — as revealed only recently — for the speaker’s scheme of inserting budget allocations without the knowledge of House and Senate members, to be hijacked for ghost flood projects or other projects his main minion appropriations committee chairman Zaldy Co could extract kickbacks from. The Romualdez-Co duo, sources have claimed, hijacked at least P10 billion from the budget yearly from 2022 to 2024.
Some of these funds were used by Romualdez to undertake in January 2024 the so-called “people’s initiative” (called Pirma) to amend the Constitution to create a parliamentary system, in which he would be elected prime minister. Because of his lack of mass appeal, this was the only way for Romualdez to succeed Marcos as head of state/government.
The Pirma plot was aborted though in two months’ time, after it was revealed that the proponent group was bribing signatories. The Senate also vehemently opposed the move as it would obviously lead to its dismantling under a unicameral body.
Sara quit as education secretary in July 2024, after reports circulated that Romualdez was planning to get the House to impeach her, in order to prevent her from running for the presidency in 2028. Arroyo was removed as deputy speaker, and given an unimportant chairmanship. Romualdez also undertook a propaganda campaign to blacken Sara’s reputation through various hearings in Congress in 2024.
Cruel
In a most cruel move to demolish the Duterte brand in Philippine politics, Marcos in March this year had the 80-year-old former president — without whom he would not have become president — hijacked to a Dutch prison to be tried by a foreign court called the International Criminal Court that the Philippines and other countries like the US, China, Russia and India do not recognize.
Three impeachment complaints were filed against Sara in December 2024, including that by communist fronts and by the Yellow forces. Romualdez apparently thought these could make it appear that there was a widespread sentiment to impeach Sara from different sectors which would make his real complaint, signed in February by 215 bribed House members, unstoppable.
Romualdez was wrong. The Supreme Court ruled that this complaint was the fourth, which was in violation of the Constitution provision limiting impeachment proceedings to only one per year.
I cannot fathom why Marcos and Romualdez weren’t just grateful that the nation practically forgave them for the catastrophe the elder Marcos had brought on the country, even as they refused to return the billions that the dictator and his wife stole from the Treasury, and just devote all their resources to making the country a better place to live — rather than plotting to remain in power in 2028 and beyond.
Such incomprehensible greed and hubris, as it is cruel, this Marcos curse. Will it have the same end?
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The Marcos curse, again
Source: Breaking News PH
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