Consumers Domain
The rule of law according to GMA and the PNP
"The giant bird has gone thousands of miles
to reach the southern sea
and then regrets the long distance traveled."
- an excerpt from a zen verse
Reading the news the past few weeks is really disheartening. It made me contemplate on what has been happening in the country for the past year. It made me feel so sick. I am having mixed feelings of anger, frustration, pity, hopelessness and outraged.
Indeed, it is still a long long way for the majority of Filipinos to realize their inherent power as a people and responsibility as a nation. We saw the basic rights trampled upon by those who weld authority, but there is not much outrage from the people despite the fact that majority of them despise the current administration as repeatedly shown by surveys.
We see the right to speech blatantly curtailed but it seems that it doesn't matter that much anymore. The policies of Gloria Arroyo to ensure its survival are getting bolder. Invoking the right of the state to defend it itself, the administration of Arroyo has gone too far, even to the point of violating the word and spirit of the Philippine constitution.
First, Gloria Arroyo is not the state. And she in fact cannot even claim to represent it as her mandate was clearly a product of electoral fraud and massive corruption. Second, granting even that she is the state or its legitimate President, this does not give her license to violate the constitution of the land.
It's just appalling that Gloria and those who implement her high-handed policies invoke the "rule of law" when clearly they are the ones who have act as if they are above the law. Take for example the recent arrest of those who merely exercise their freedom to air out their grievances.
In the previous week's women's day rally in Manila, Akbayan PartyList Representative Risa Hontiveros-Baraquel was arrested and the peaceful rally dispersed. The PNP then said she was merely invited for questioning and later they said they were actually "protecting" her from harm, as they are about to disperse the rally. The ground for the arrest and the dispersal is that they don't have a permit.
What happened to the people's inviolable right enshrined in the Constitution? The gathering was not violent. They have applied for a permit but after 2 days there was no action on their application. But even without such a permit, what of it that will warrant the intimidation and arrest of the group's leader?
Then in the recent arrest of Dinky Soliman, a PNP spokesman named Samuel Pagdilao said the arrest "manifests the strong commitment of the PNP to enforce the law without fear or favor." And further said that, "the rule of law is supreme and must prevail at all times"! Can you believe that? And the only rationale behind Soliman's arrest along with another leader of their movement was that they are all wearing black shirts printed with Anti-Arroyo slogans.
Their group of about twenty people were not even having a protest rally but were merely airing and wearing their views by walking together along Baywalk in Roxas Boulevard. They don't even have placards or streamers. Since when did wearing protest t-shirts become illegal in this country?
I think the members of the Philippine National Police, and yes we can include Gloria Arroyo herself, ought to be refreshed once again about basic and elementary human rights. They are not protecting the state by what they are doing. They are not acting within the bounds of law and the Philippine charter.
They are in fact plunging the country back to the Marcos' Martial Law years or even back to Spanish period when people are not allowed to speak up against the government, when exercising one's right to speech and assembly are criminal acts.
I can only sigh in annoyance and disbelief with all that has been happening in the country recently. Despite all these however, I am confident that sooner or later, more and more Filipinos will wake up from their slumber and actively put up a united front against those who abuse the power that emanated from them in the first place.
(Send your comments and reactions to: for text messages to 0919-348-6337; for e-mails to ianseruelo@yahoo.com; and for blogs to http://consumersdomain.blogspot.com.)