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A PINCH OF SALT BY NINEZ CACHO OLIVARES
IF for 13 years and two administrations after Edsa, the Marcos family members have steadfastly refused to admit and apologize for Ferdinand Marcos's misdeeds, they
are certainly not going to do so now, even with Jaime Cardinal Sin and Corazon Aquino haranguing them. Aquino spoke of the many people who suffered during martial
law through torture, salvaging or disappearances and said the least the Marcoses can do is to apologize to them and their relatives. Referring to the Marcoses, the
Cardinal said he was "pained by the lack of repentance in the hearts of those who plundered our nation for two decades." He also expressed disgust over how
"the spirit of Edsa has been reduced to negotiations for money."
But wasn't Edsa mostly about money? While it was true that Filipinos weren't thinking money when they shielded the rebel military with their bodies, it is equally
true that Edsa was also about getting back the nation's wealth that the Aquino administration claimed was been stolen by the Marcoses. It was that slogan of the
return of the nation's wealth that fascinated the electorate.
Money was on the minds of Aquino's relatives while the people massed at Edsa. Money and property deals between the former strongman's relatives and Aquino's relatives
were being forged even as Filipinos used their bodies as human shields against possible attacks by Marcos' forces.
The first decree creating the Presidential Commission on Good Government issued by Corazon Aquino, who wielded absolute power, was focused on money: the billions the
Marcoses stole, the billions that would be returned to the people. The law empowered the PCGG to recover any and all Marcos assets through sequestration of all
properties suspected to be owned by the Marcoses and their cronies on the assumption that everything they owned was ill-gotten.
The government sold the sequestered assets and found that some of them were the legitimate properties of foreign companies but leased to the cronies. Yet the Filipino
people hardly benefited from the sequestration and the sale. The post-Edsa administrations did, through graft and corruption.
It was still money that was on the government's mind when Aquino dispatched two of her relatives as her special emissaries to forge a deal with the Marcoses in
Hawaii. When the deal was exposed in the media, it was discovered that the Aquino relatives were asking for a huge cut that would go into someone's private pocket.
It was the Aquino regime that focused on even more money and gold buried in Fort Santiago. For the gold treasure it believed to be buried underneath the fort, its
people destroyed the national shrine and a precious heritage.
Even the secret deals forged between the Ramos PCGG and the Marcoses were all about money that would again land in private pockets.
And weren't the human rights victims' case against the Marcoses all about getting money as compensation for their pain and suffering during the dark days of the
dictatorship? They didn't file a criminal case in the US courts, only a civil suit. And from the tone of the reported settlement, no apology from the Marcoses was
required.
In all the 12 and a half years of the two post-Edsa administrations, there was no let-up on charges that the Marcoses looted the national treasury. It was always
money that was on government's mind, and mostly what they can do for themselves with all that money.
It was the constant refrain the two administrations sang, a refrain that harked too much on the past and with hatred, which is one reason the country and its people
can hardly hope to move forward and mature as all successful democracies should. It is true that people should not be made to forget the past, but surely the past,
no matter how painful and dark, can be remembered without fanning the flames of hatred every time, especially when high government officials also indulged in
cronynism and widescale graft and corruption during their time.
Thirteen years after the Edsa revolt, the same individuals are asking the people to live the spirit of Edsa, yet they forget that Edsa's was the spirit of generosity,
which they killed by keeping the fires of hatred burning throughout their administrations.
Thirteen years after the revolt, 13 years during which they encouraged a culture of hate and division, and 13 years after they denied the Marcoses whatever rights
they had as Filipino citizens, they continue to demand that the Marcoses admit their guilt and apologize to the Filipino people. Surely they realize how impractical
that demand is, considering that they slapped criminal and civil charges against the Marcoses, which remain unresolved in court to this day.
An admission of guilt from the Marcoses would automatically cause their conviction by the courts of law. To apologize for their plunder of the nation's wealth will
constitute an admission of guilt.
Cardinal Sin and Corazon Aquino really expect the Marcoses to admit their guilt and apologize to the Filipino people? Do the Filipinos expect or demand that apology?
If Aquino truly believed that anyone who has committed abuses and other crimes against the Filipino people should apologize, why did she not demand an apology from
Fidel Ramos instead of anointing him as her successor? Ramos never apologized for his role during the martial law years, yet he was the chief of the police and the
Philippine Constabulary, which committed crimes against the Filipino people. It is on record that he, like the young Marcos, also said that he had nothing to apologize for
and Aquino accepted it, just like that.
But the Marcoses also share a part of the blame by raising the hackles of many Filipinos when they display their arrogance and brush off the past as though everything
that was done in their time of power and privilege was good; as though there was never a dictatorship; as though there was no pain or suffering caused by the
oppressive and dictatorial regime of Marcos.
They, like the sanctimonious post-Edsa administrations, are not without sin.
Philippine Daily Inquirer, February 27, 1999
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