‘But how many of them have the grit to measure up to the war heroism and democratic patriotism of the Hunters-ROTC guerrillas when the Han chauvinists invade their safe spaces?’
PURPORTED politico-economic reform via charter change is the customary utensil of the dynasts (ferried on the backs of the lumpen and the petty-bourgeois) who mutate a free government by usurpation. Boil and bubble, toil and trouble; their aberrant of Cha-Cha is a witches’ brew, which is countered by the hex of history.
Recall his words: “Knowing that while a people can be politically free, they can yet remain shackled under various forms of economic bondage, captive to either the control of others or to the terrible prisons of poverty and underdevelopment. Economic liberation for us means what I have repeatedly said: the transformation of a mendicant society into a productive society, self-sufficient, self-reliant, proud and dignified because each individual earns a livelihood and contributes to the nation’s vitality and strength. Our Constitution specifically recognizes this economic dimension to national liberation, in stating in various provisions the need for the promotion of gainful opportunities for every Filipino and the need for the nation to address itself to the tasks of development.” [Address of His Excellency Ferdinand E. Marcos, President of the Philippines, On Constitution Day, Released on January 17, 1984]
1. “This is a day both of commemoration and commencement–commemoration because we mark today Constitution Day in our country and commencement because this Parliament of our people convenes for the first time in the New Year that is now upon us…
Our concern for the welfare of the workers within the constraints of a less developed country is reflected in our labor policies which are considered highly advanced for a member of the developing world. Since the first oil crisis, we have raised legal minimum wages through 10 presidential decrees and one presidential wage increase of P8 in the base year of 1972, and incomes have been protected against inflation.” [Ferdinand E. Marcos, 18th State of the Nation Address, January 17, 1983]
2. “In industry, the structural adjustment program for the economy will be intensified with emphasis on export development, progressive energy, self-reliance, industry dispersal, and tourism promotion. But we must develop world-competitive and agro-based industries and intensify selective import substitution… The heart of this program connotes in essence a shift from import-dependent development strategy to indigenous and locally-based development. It accepts the challenge to the nation to look within for deliverance, to tap the energies of our own people for growth.” [Ferdinand E. Marcos, 19th State of the Nation Address, July 23, 1984]
3. “Kawit and Malolos are celebrated in our history as acts of national greatness. Why national greatness? Because, armed with nothing but raw courage and passionate intelligence and patriotism, our predecessors built the noble edifice of the First Asian Republic. (But)… Our forefathers built a democratic republic on an extremely narrow social and economic base. The task of our generation is to broaden this base continuously. We must spread opportunities for higher income for all. But we shall encourage investment to ensure progressive production — the true answer to our economic ills.” [Ferdinand Marcos, “Mandate for Greatness,” First Inaugural Address, Delivered on December 30, 1965 at the Quirino Grandstand, Manila]
Indeed we have our Constitution (and all public policies, national and local, including presidential and gubernatorial statements) as the Syntax of our Republic, and now it falls to the Millennials and the Gen Z to deal with the business arising from the previous administrations: “We have willingly accepted the challenge to carry the democratic message in our part of the world; we have played a prominent role in Maphilindo, the association of peoples of Malay origin; we have made progress on our claim to Sabah (North Borneo).” [Diosdado Macapagal, Third State of the Nation Address, January 27, 1964]
1. “The Constitution makes us equal partners in the patriotic task of serving our people…I must warn against complacency. Communist imperialism still threatens us from without and from within.” [Ramon Magsaysay, First State of the Nation Address, January 25, 1954]
2. “We have committed ourselves unequivocably to ASEAN and its ideal of open regionalism. Together with our immediate neighbors and partners, we are building the regional architecture for our vision of a peaceful, neutral, and nuclear-free Southeast Asia.” [Fidel Ramos, Third State of the Nation Address, Delivered on July 25, 1994 at the Batasang Pambansa Complex, Quezon City]
3. “To prove that our performance in 1994 was not just plain luck, nor just the high point of a ‘boom-and-bust’ cycle, nor just a case of a one-time ‘ningas cogon’ result. This year we must prove that our gains are sustainable, that our policies are effective for the long term, and that the growth we achieve redounds to the welfare of all our people… By land, by sea and by air, we must begin the modernization of transport, because it is the wheel of our development.” [New Year Report of His Excellency Fidel V. Ramos, President of the Philippines, Malacañang, Manila, January 4, 1995]
4. “We must continue to address the most urgent issues of our times—mass poverty, terrorism, environmental degradation, social injustice…the Philippines is caught between the claims of its feudal past and the imperatives of the global future. We must complete the revolution that our forebears began more than a century ago and take the mission to uplift the life of every Filipino to the global stage.” [Speech of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, President of the Philippines, During the Vin d’ Honneur for the Diplomatic Corps, Rizal Hall, Malacañang, January 9, 2004]
5. “I am happy to greet this mammoth multitude of the youth of the land including civic, business, and religious leaders. Your enthusiastic response to the country’s call to austerity fills me with the much-needed inspiration and spiritual strength to carry on the difficult task of government…What we need is to revitalize scientific and industrial research and apply the results to production. But above all, we need the unflinching will of our people to produce more of our essential needs and cast away the colonial mentality of preferring foreign products to ours which may be similar in quality. Let us consume what we produce and be proud of it. Let us make this, part of our way of life. True nationalism begins with economic nationalism. However, we cannot live in a vacuum of isolationism in our international life. We can fill what other people lack with what we have in abundance and get from them what we lack by mutually beneficial trade.” [Second Austerity Speech of Carlos P. Garcia, President of the Philippines, Independence Grandstand, January 18, 1958]
The snowflakes, zoomers and sexters have the luxuries of time and legacies to learn their good fortune of having been born and adulting in a period of relative peace and progress.
But how many of them have the grit to measure up to the war heroism and democratic patriotism of the Hunters-ROTC guerrillas when the Han chauvinists invade their safe spaces?
