Malacañang: Forget Edsa II By Michael Lim Ubac Philippine Daily Inquirer First Posted 00:08:00 01/20/2008
MANILA, Philippines -- Read Malacañang’s lips: Everyone should forget Edsa II.
Seven years ago today, then Vice President Macapagal-Arroyo was sworn in as President, taking the reins of power from her disgraced predecessor. It was a heady moment, with an ecstatic Ms Arroyo describing her assumption of the presidency as a “historic event.”
But there will be no dancing in the streets or partying in the Palace to mark the President’s rise to power on Jan. 20, 2001.
In keeping with Ms Arroyo’s wish to “heal the wounds of Edsa,” Malacañang has not ordered any commemorative activity marking the seventh anniversary of Edsa II.
Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita in effect said memories of that fateful day should be tossed into the dustbin of history,
“Remember, one legacy agenda [of the President] is healing the wounds of Edsa,” Ermita told the Inquirer. “And we thought not celebrating [it] will be one of the steps toward healing any hurt feelings brought about by Edsa II.”
Ermita pointed out that the “principal character,” ousted President and pardoned plunderer Joseph Estrada, had been “given his freedom.”
“So the least we talk about it, the better, okay?” the executive secretary said.
He disclosed that the commemoration of Edsa II was never discussed in recent Cabinet meetings, unlike the Edsa I revolt of 1986 that led to the dictator Ferdinand Marcos’ downfall, the yearly celebration of which is spearheaded by the People Power Commission.
Ermita found no wisdom in commemorating Ms Arroyo’s assumption of the presidency in 2001, considering that “not all allies are still with the President now.”
And it appears that the feeling is mutual.
Dismissing the Supreme Court’s upholding of the legality of Ms Arroyo’s assumption of the presidency, the 70-year-old Estrada described his eviction from Malacañang as the day “when democracy in the Philippines died.”
“The death of democracy must not be celebrated,” said Estrada, the first Philippine president to be impeached, and who will mark Edsa II as a free man for the first time.
He had spent the previous six anniversaries of Edsa II in detention while on trial for plunder.
Since Ms Arroyo gained a fresh six-year mandate in 2004, her administration has stopped commemorating Edsa II.
Indeed, Malacañang has not issued an official statement from the President, who will apparently treat this day as just another day.
She is scheduled to visit the sleepy towns of San Francisco and San Felipe in Zambales to inaugurate road and bridge projects.
On Saturday morning, she went to Batangas City and inaugurated the Southern Tagalog Arterial Road Tollway Project and the city’s international port and container terminal.
At 2 p.m., she was back at the Palace to personally receive an original copy of the decision of the Presidential Electoral Tribunal (PET) dismissing the electoral protest lodged by Sen. Loren Legarda against Vice President Noli de Castro.
Romulo Macalintal, Ms Arroyo’s election lawyer, asserted that when the PET ruled that the election documents were “genuine and validly used for the proclamation of De Castro, it goes without saying that the election returns and certificates of canvass used for the proclamation of President Arroyo were likewise genuine, authentic and duly executed.”
Macalintal also said the release of the decision was “timely” because it was made on the eve of Edsa II.
Still, Secretary Cerge Remonde, chief of the Presidential Management Staff, said the Arroyo administration had opted for a “silent commemoration” of Edsa II this year.
He did not explain how it would do this.
But Remonde confirmed that Malacañang had not lined up any activities to mark the day, although he added that the Palace had not forgotten the “lessons” of Edsa II.
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