Insights
Democracy at gunpoint
The siege at the provincial capitol turned every cop into a criminal. Induced to act like a gang thugs, bludgeoning unarmed civilians, shoving with the barrel of a rifle anyone along their path, acting like a crew of thieves breaking in the Capitol. Diabolically, used as a tool to terrorize the critics of the government, exploited to sow fear among the people, deplorably reduced to a bunch terrorists sponsored by the state.
What happened in the Provincial Capitol was a wicked product and a profound reflection of our society, its mirror image. The police force involved in the siege at the capitol was treated as a mercenary group, regarded as a political militia, considered as personal bodyguards of the administration. Deplorably, instructed and obeyed to illegal orders from their promotion-hungry superiors, who wish to ingratiate themselves to an illegitimate leader. The capitol serving as a microcosm of the government, a miniature version of an object every one wants to grab.
There are those who dishonored the democratic elections to become a queen with absolute power, who chose to speak to Garci, instead seeking consent from the citizenry. Ironically, harassing and bringing down individuals who were voted overwhelmingly into office, like Pasay Mayor Peewee Trinidad, whose only misfortune is to be associated with an elected king who was never given the chance to rule, and Governor Neil Tupas, whose doom was spelled when he stood by the principled stand of a Senate President who drilled on and frankly fought the incorrigible ways of the powers and glories that be. Unfortunately, even with the clear mandate from the people they are starting to fall like dominoes in a row.
If the human rights of a governor could be trampled upon so easily and blatantly for all the world to see, are we not supposed to feel deeply threatened of the new dictatorial reality we are confronted with? From an empirical perspective, we should be morally awakened to the fact that we are as guilty as the assault group and the masterminds, for allowing such inhumane treachery, bestial brutality to happen right before our apathetic eyes. That anyone of us could be mugged or beaten for our political beliefs, threatened at gunpoint for speaking our minds, incarcerated without trial, or worse slaughtered for our intellectual dissent to a dictatorial regime.
The powerful and indelible images seen not only across the country but across the world by the international community, of a family coerced at gunpoint during the assault at the capitol because of their political conviction, which is considered normal for countries like North Korea and Myanmar. Irreconcilably, the country known in the entire world as the birthplace of EDSA People Power, has degenerated into a totalitarian state, never before seen in Philippine history. An Orwellian nightmare, wherein the administration wants to revise and redefine not only the Constitution to suit its autocratic purposes, but the entire English language for political manipulation. Haven't we heard someone just recently argue, that the assault was all a "charade"? That everything at the siege of the capitol was "Normal", including the bludgeoning and gun pointing of unarmed and defenseless people. Now that is classic example of an Orwellian Language! When injustice is justice, when illegal is legal and when insanity is sanity.