AS we remember the September 21 martial-law anniversary and see people polarized again into partisan tugs-of-war that is sucking us into political quagmires that could dangerously escalate into conflicts beyond control and repeat the specter of martial rule, President Duterte must heed the mounting people’s cry to give value and dignity to every individual life and to learn from the lessons of history.
A déjà vu? Amid the series of extrajudicial killings (EJKs) and abuses by the police, people who witnessed martial law’s cruelties will feel a déjà vu, or a perceived repeat of the dark hideous past.
This reminds us of Spanish poet George Santayana who said: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” Simply put, if we can’t learn from history, we are bound to repeat the same mistakes and nightmares, although the situation is different.
Nonetheless, it helps to learn from history, which is replete and fraught with senseless wars resulting mainly from the follies and hubris of leaders who have fallen into political booby-traps, mostly of their own making.
At this juncture of intensified partisan politics, the trajectory in the political atmosphere is an escalation of diatribes and verbal attacks, even going gutter, as sycophants and believers on both extremes trade barbs and expletives on social media. People affected will continue to push and advocate for what is legitimate right and express themselves within the limits allowed by law—free press, free speech and freedom of assembly.
And on both extremes, there will be hotheads, who can’t take criticisms and will try to resolve conflicts through force. Some want another people power revolution, and will even welcome masochistically a martial law, as their ironic way to hasten mass discontent. On the other extreme are trigger-happy loyal law enforcers, who welcome martial law to be able to lord over again and quell discontent.
The French term déjà vu brings us lessons from the French Revolution of 1789, which was believed infiltrated by British intelligence as the British empire didn’t want a repeat of the American Revolution a decade earlier. Its leader, Maximilien Robespierre, was swayed even into the rise of the Jacobin Reign of Terror that slaughtered thousands of the revolution’s sons and daughters, including progressives and intellectuals like chemist Antoine Lavoisier and later even Robespierre himself, who was guillotined to death without trial.
The ends can’t justify the means. Although it is people’s movements that move history, our politically unorthodox bad-mouthing President, now known worldwide for his figurative oral diarrhea and foot-in-mouth disease, has the power and influence to do a reversal not only by softening his gutter and incendiary language, but to pursue meaningful, and not just cosmetic reforms.
Initially, he was considered an enigmatic leader for captivating and mesmerizing the downtrodden hoi polloi with his “Change is Coming” battlecry that catapulted him to victory with 16 million votes. His ratings even hit 91 percent as people pinned their hopes on real change— stopping drugs, corruption, achieving peace with rebels, dismantling cartels and rent-seeking oligarchs and wiping out poverty.
So far, what’s prominent is the rise in EJKs and is manifesting Saint Bernard of Clairvaux’s (1090–1153) saying that the “Road to Hell is paved with good intentions.”
Duterte cited Niccolo Machiavelli, and must have embraced the latter’s notorious quotation, “The end justifies the means,” which justified dishonesty and killing of innocents to achieve control. Unfortunately, the advances in civilization,
technology, democracy, respect for due process and rule of law, have made Machiavellian ideas mere relics of the warring past.
He could not invoke what he says is “retribution”, which smacks of Old Testament “eye-for-eye, tooth-for-tooth” justice system, as the world is now governed by the civilized principles of the Westphalian Treaties of 1648, now enshrined in the United Nations.
Learn Westphalian treaty doctrines. For almost a century and a half, starting with Torquemada’s Grand Inquisition of 1492, there were internecine wars all over Europe, which finally ended in the series of treaties of Wesphalia, Germany, from May to October 1648 upon the diplomatic efforts of genius Cardinal Mazarin, who gathered 109 delegations and 94 states and kingdoms all over Europe.
Immediately before Westphalian lasting peace, there was the Thirty Years’ war (1618 to 1648) all over Europe, and earlier the “Eighty Years’ War (1568-1648). Millions were killed in all these wars fueled by the unending retributive “eye-for-an-eye” justice system.
Apart from their religious undertones, the wars among kingdoms and states, particularly those using shared rivers, were triggered after they out-taxed each other. And because resources like rivers are shared, Mazarin brilliantly called for the Westphalian doctrine of “Doing the Advantage for the Others” that finally led to lasting peace.
The same Westphalian principles on state sovereignty, equality of states, nonintervention on each other’s, but helping others when in need, are the same that have been adopted by the UN.
Costs of blind idolatry. The President’s perceived empathy for people created blind rabid loyal adherents, sycophants and minions, who even rejoice when he curses even big names and institutions, like US President Obama, the US Ambassador, the UN, Pope Francis, etc.
Having been trampled upon for so long, the masses saw in Duterte their savior. Anthropology shows that in the ancient tribal ways, insulting one’s dignity was a higher crime than murder itself, that is why statements like Niyurakan ang pagkatao (trample one’s dignity) carry so much value-laden weight even today.
They are even tolerant of his abuses that Duterte has been carried away and blinded himself by the trappings of power, forgotten the rule of law and even ignored the Senate’s recommendations over the Albuera mayor murder and pardoned the guilty from murder.
It is likely his real opponents, out to destabilize him, may do the extreme like in the French revolution, and blame it on him, but he cannot blame anyone than himself for his tactless tolerance for abuses. Sadly, most of the victims of the war on drugs are the urban poor, who are mostly his supporters. He must be aware that the masses supporting former President Joseph E. Estrada were the same mob that helped bring him down.
I hope the current exodus of Korean manufacturers to Vietnam and the recent 62-percent drop in foreign direct investments are not mainly because of the political insecurities, partly blamed on his posturings.
E-mail: mikealunan@yahoo.com