Still the sick man of Asia

The Wall Street Journal once referred to the Philippines as the “perpetual sick man of Asia,” a moniker the country earned because of the pervasiveness of graft and corruption in its political institutions, and in society in general.

Observers point out that without exception, the whole Philippine government, from the Executive to the Legislative to the Judiciary, has been immersed in the culture of open and pervasive graft and plunder. The cancer of corruption has also shamefully earned us the stigma of being “the most corrupt country in Asia.”

While there is good news of the country’s recent economic performance, suggesting an unexpected recovery from its usual frail status, like a four-year low 6.4 per cent in unemployment rate and an upgrade in its credit rating from the New York-based Standard & Poor (S&P) Ratings Services, the political climate in the Philippines remains unclear, if not surreal.

President Noynoy Aquino greets Supreme Court Chief Justice Renato Corona
during National Criminal Justice Summit in Manila. AP Photo/Malacanang Photo.
Click link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1jd7iP9mDI&feature=related to
view "Chief Justice Corona: "I am your defender!"

The imprisonment of former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo on charges of election sabotage and corruption, and the impeachment of her appointee, Renato Corona, as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, for his bias in the court’s rulings in favour of Mrs. Arroyo, are distracting the reform agenda of the incumbent government of President Noynoy Aquino. President Aquino considers these two personalities as the main obstacles in his objective of cleaning the government of corruption that will enable him to deliver on his election campaign promise.

But in singling out his predecessor and the current Chief Justice, President Aquino’s strategy may miscarry and thrust his administration into a deeper hole where there is no possible escape.

Aquino’s zeal in eliminating corruption is already seen by many as risky and may plunge the country into instability. A Corona acquittal will inevitably erode President’s Aquino’s popularity and could engender more hostility from the judiciary.

The uncertainties of the impeachment process and the politicalization of the judiciary that it brings upon the courts could dampen economic growth and drive away foreign investment. Sluggish exports this year are already predicted to slow down the economy. Impeachment is also diverting political leaders from the more serious problems of unemployment, slow growth and inflation.

Impeachment of any sitting president or the highest magistrate could bring paralysis to the state.

With the Senate about to indict former President Joseph Estrada in 2001, a people power uprising saved the senators from convicting the first Filipino president impeached by Congress. But this kind of uprising is not possible this time. It’s like “cache-22.” If Corona is successfully impeached, Aquino will be accused of coercing the judiciary into submission. If Corona is acquitted, Aquino's public support will take a big hit. And should former President Arroyo escape conviction, President Aquino might be seen as damaged goods forever. This will further wear down his presidential cape, which the military might exploit if the situation becomes uncontrollable by civilian authority.

Or, a reversal of fortune.

With President Aquino’s triumphal disposal of his predecessor and the Chief Justice, he might be emboldened to install constitutional authoritarianism, a “creeping dictatorship” feared by some as already happening.

Corona, for the record, is the first Chief Justice and Justice of the Philippine Supreme Court to be impeached by the House of Representatives. At least 95 signatures (one-third of all members of the House) are required to impeach, and 188 of the 284 members of the House voted to impeach Corona.

Benigno "Noynoy" Aquino III, 15th President of the Philippines and 5th President
of the Republic. Click link to view "Viral Video 'Attacks' Aquino-Cojuangco Family
 http://www.newmedia.com.ph/viral-video-hits-aquino-cojuangco-family/

There are rumours circulating that President Aquino was personally involved in hatching the impeachment proposal, some alleging that the President was castigated by elders of his family, the Cojuangco clan, for being responsible for the loss of Hacienda Luisita. The court presided by Corona made the decision to transfer ownership of Hacienda Luisita to the hands of the farmers, which obviously disgusted the Cojuangco clan who has been in possession and control of the disputed lands for more than sixty years.

But the Senate would be a totally different scenario, however. The number of senators is smaller compared to the House of Representatives, and they are elected at large by the entire electorate. Senators have a national rather than a district constituency, thus are expected to have a broader outlook of the problems of the country, instead of being restricted by narrow viewpoints and interests. They are likely to be considered as more circumspect, or at least less impulsive than members of the House.

To indict the Chief Justice, two-thirds of the total 24 senators are required to vote in favour. This would be a tall order, and with members mostly from the legal profession, it is unlikely that the Senate would vote against a fellow member of the bar.

Corona’s impeachment will probably draw references from the experience of the United States, whose constitutional practices and provisions were written into the Philippine Constitution almost verbatim. American case law is also usually cited in the Philippine judicial system.

Only one member of the United States Supreme Court, Justice Samuel Chase, had ever been subjected to the impeachment process. Chase was accused of showing his extreme Federalist bias that led to his treating defendants and their counsel in a deliberately unfair manner. The Senate acquitted Chase, holding the view that grounds for impeachment should be either based on criminality or abuse of office, rather than partisanship, thus preventing the overt politicalization of the process.

It is therefore up to the Philippine Senate to rise to the challenge. Whether it can rise beyond political partisanship remains to be seen. Corona was a “midnight appointment” to the position of Chief Justice, and a former chief of staff to President Arroyo and Presidential Legal Counsel to former President Fidel Ramos. But the legality of Corona’s “midnight appointment” has already been addressed by Congress and the Office of the President, including the other issues which are being challenged for Corona’s impartiality toward his former boss, Mrs. Arroyo.

In one of his public speeches, President Aquino has admitted that the Chief Justice remains to be the last stumbling block to his reform agenda. It will be interesting to find how the Senate will ignore political alliances and decide on the merits of the case. Otherwise, this important trial will peter out in another political scandal that will further drive the country down into an abysmal chaos. If there is any conviction, it must be clear cut, not just on the grounds of mere suspicions of wrongdoing.

But the handwriting on the wall appears unmistakably clear. In the end, partisan politics, entrenched interests, and personal greed will win over common sense and doing the right thing. It would be another sad day for Filipinos, but what could we expect from our irresponsible and oligarchic elite?

Philippine Congress in joint session. Photo courtesy of Bikoy. Click link
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_uTFfvxLrw to view "Pinoy Politicians:
Wealthy Liars, Rich Traitors & Media Darlings!" 

Paul Hutchcroft, an American political scientist, wrote in “Oligarchs and Cronies in the Philippine State: the Politics of Patrimonial Plunder,” that the Philippine oligarchic elite, where most if not all members of the Senate come from, are “booty capitalists” who prey on the weak state for its rent-extraction. They have very little incentive to demand a more predictable order, according to Hutchcroft. The principal preoccupation of these oligarchs is to gain favourable proximity to the political machinery.

With former President Arroyo out of the picture, these oligarchs and even those not closely affiliated with the present Aquino regime would be more interested in currying favours to the current occupant of Malacañang rather than demanding profound structural changes, such as strengthening an independent judiciary or keeping a transparent and responsible bureaucracy.

The Philippines is the “sick man of Asia”—and for this stigma, to paraphrase one political commentator, we should be grateful to our irresponsible elite.

On the verge of a breakdown

 

On March 16, 1998, the Philippine government (GRP) and the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDF) signed the Comprehensive Agreement on Respect for Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law (CARHRIHL). Hailed by both sides as a unique and landmark agreement, CARHRIHL is actually a superfluous agreement.

The GRP and the NDF panels set the objectives of CARHRIHL as follows:

1. To guarantee the protection of human rights to all Filipinos under all circumstances, especially the workers, peasants, and other poor people;

2. To affirm and apply the principles of international humanitarian law to protect the civilian population and individual civilians, as well as persons who do not take direct part or who have ceased to take part in the armed hostilities, including persons deprived of their liberty for reasons related to the armed conflict;

3. To establish effective mechanisms and measures for realizing, monitoring, verifying, and ensuring compliance with the provisions of this Agreement; and

4. To pave the way for comprehensive agreements on economic, social, and political reforms that will ensure the attainment of a just and lasting peace.

Members of the New People's Army (NPA) belonging to the Pulang Bagani Command
 celebrate the 40th Founding Anniversary of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP).
 Photo courtesy of AKP Images. Clic klink to view "Inside the Philippines New People's
 Army," http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vOnm0tTz_m8

CARHRIHL in fact contained provisions already covered by various international declarations and conventions on human rights and international humanitarian law, which the Philippine government had long signed and ratified and which the NDF had also in principle adhered to.

Among the most important international declarations and conventions that the Philippines has agreed to or ratified are the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948), the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (both of which entered into force in 1976), the Geneva Conventions (1949), and Protocol II (1977). In addition, both the GRP and the NDF acknowledged that CARHRIHL includes principles of human rights and international humanitarian law embodied in these instruments.

The Philippines has also in place a Commission on Human Rights and there is a wide network of human-rights groups aligned or sympathetic with the NDF, all human rights bodies that are supposed to address human rights violations.

Even the Rules for Combatants (1989) of the Philippine military direct all military personnel in the field to strictly observe and apply humanitarian principles in the performance of their duties.

So, why the need for CARHRIHL?

After almost 14 years from its adoption, CARHRIHL has barely passed through the first stage of the agreement while the GRP and the NDF panels continue to struggle with their effort to broker a peace agreement.

The spokesperson for the government panel clearly sums up its position on alleged violations of human rights by the government: “So long as there is conflict, there will always be circumstances that can be perceived as human rights violations.”

To the government only the absence of conflict would end violations to human rights. It is a state of war from their point of view. If that would be the case, the laws of war would apply. Should the government be proved culpable of violations of international humanitarian law, the government must be brought to the international criminal court for war crimes. President Noynoy Aquino and his predecessor, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo could be prosecuted as war criminals under the doctrine of command responsibility for extra-judicial killings and enforced disappearances.

Government chief negotiator Alexander Padilla underlined the role of the military and
police  in pursuing a negotiated political settlement with the Communist Party of the
Philippines-New People's Army-National Democratic Front Panel (CPP-NPA-NDF).

So much about the impeachment of the Supreme Court Chief Justice, the prosecution of former President Gloria Arroyo for election sabotage and corruption, or the imminent imposition of an authoritarian government by President Aquino. The government must be teetering on the verge of a political breakdown—this is the looming crisis in our hands.

But back to CARHRIHL.

The NDF panel disagrees with the government’s position. Unless the government addresses the root causes of conflict, the NDF maintains that there will always be armed resistance by the people. Hence, the NDF believes that the government should respect human rights and resume negotiations for lasting peace.

The government, however, is not playing naïve. It believes that the NDF is using human rights violations and the CARHRIHL as a ploy to achieve belligerent status under international law. Currently, however, nations refrain from explicitly recognizing rebels as belligerents to maintain their flexibility in dealing with the parties in conflict. The only alternative for the NDF is to force the government back to the negotiations table with a foreign government as intermediary, thus creating the illusion of two sovereign powers trying to negotiate for peace.

Organizational structure of the NDF. Photo courtesy of by nina de amado. Click
link to view interview with Luis Jalandoni, chairperson of the NDF Panel, by an
Australian reporter,  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3D9aHcyUEw

But lasting peace is not even in the horizon. Here we have a government that is best described as a “cacique” democracy, dominated by a politico-economic elite composed of power families that manipulate elections through patronage, corruption and violence. On the other end of the spectrum, is a dissident organization that seeks to overthrow the government and establish a “people’s democracy” along the lines of a Stalinist-Maoist one-party dictatorship. Both are scary options, and the people who have been numbed by decades of failed experiments in democratic government would, perhaps, simply choose the status quo. With that in mind, the government is wielding its heavy military stick to preserve itself.

Both the government and the NDF would rather destroy each other militarily as well as use the peace talks as a diversionary tactic. Neither side has demonstrated genuine sincerity to the peace process.

Not to mention, the Philippines is also besieged on its southern flank by a secessionist Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), a war waged for self-determination by Filipino Moslems who have never been subjugated either by colonial power or by the central government for more than five centuries. The Moslem separatists appear to have a better chance in creating their own well-delineated Bangsamoro nation, except for the military intervention by U.S. Special Forces under the guise of counterterrorism, which has been allowed by the previous and present Philippine governments.

Now the incumbent government of President Aquino is beset by opposition from the branch of government that is, under the principle of separation of powers, a co-equal branch of the executive. We have a government besieged from the left, from the right and centre, and perhaps, even from its private cordon sanitaire that is responsible for containing the president’s limited ability to govern.

Not just the peace talks with the NDF and the MILF, the entrenched politico-economic elite that dominates the state also appears to handicap President Aquino in governing the country. The impeachment of the Supreme Court Chief Justice and the imprisonment of a former president are manifestations of a bitter contest between these elitist elements, while the majority of the marginalized classes continue to pine for genuine political and economic reforms.

This contest between various sectors of the society could be a linchpin for another “people power” uprising, similar to the popular uprising against the Marcos dictatorship in 1986, and against corruption in the Estrada government in 2001. Or, perhaps, military mutinies like the failed putsches against the administration of President Corazon Aquino. It has been said that a weak government is always an effective reason for a coup d'état.

President Noynoy Aquino’s hands are full nowadays. Two years in his presidency, Aquino has yet to deliver on his election campaign promise to rid the government of corruption. Two insurgencies are testing his leadership as Commander-in- Chief. What is he going to do when the politico-economic elite that dominates the present oligarchic state turns its back against him?