During the term of Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, she and her minions tried to downplay People Power and bury it into oblivion. Despite their yearly efforts to ignore it, however, people power is far from dead and the spirit of EDSA will continue to live for as long as there are people who are willing to stand up against tyranny and oppression, and to fight injustice and corruption.
Arroyo, who was the accidental beneficiary of the second EDSA People Power Revolt, wanted us to forget EDSA because she feared being engulfed by its awesome power. She feared the very forces that catapulted her to power, a power she just as soon abused. She feared the very people that gave her their trust, albeit hesitantly, in EDSA 2 in January 2001. Her fear had grown so much, she couldn’t stand to see people gathering, especially at EDSA, and she soon turned to the same oppressive tactics and policies that the people repulsed at EDSA in 1986 and 2001.
While the Filipino people seemed to have abandoned the spirit of EDSA, because of their perception, rightly or wrongly, that their efforts and sacrifices in the two peaceful revolutions have not brought positive changes to their lives nor to the country’s political and economic well-being, the world obviously has not forgotten.
The people power revolutions that engulfed the Middle East and Northern Africa in late 2010 until early 2011, known as the Arab Spring, are testimony to the legacy that those four days of People Power Revolution at EDSA, starting Feb. 22 until Feb. 25, left to the world. These revolutions were a repeat of the uprisings that rocked and democratized communist Eastern Europe, starting with the fall of the East German government and the eventual dismantling of the Berlin Wall in late 1989, and the lifting of the mythical Iron Curtain, both longtime symbols of communism in the region.
The people power uprisings spread all the way to the once mighty Soviet Empire, with the former Soviet republics declaring their independence from Moscow.
The EDSA People Power-inspired revolts spread all across the Arab World in the Middle East and North Africa, toppling dictators in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen. Uprisings also rocked Bahrain, Algeria, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Morocco and Sudan, and Syria is still engulfed in an unending civil war, the immediate result of civilian protests.
The tyrants of the world are shaking in fear.
And recently, people power is manifesting itself again in recession-rocked European countries, such as Spain, Greece, Italy and Portugal.
These events lend even more significance to the celebration of the 27th anniversary of the EDSA People Power Revolution the past week. Although the two People Power revolts led to two failed governments, the first because the installed leader was obviously unprepared for the humongous task of rebuilding a severely damaged nation, and the second because the installed leader betrayed the people, the lesson that EDSA left must not be lost on the people – that the power of the people is supreme, and that the answer to tyranny and injustice is people power.
While nearly all people power uprisings led to the downfall of long-entrenched tyrants and dictators, or the downfall of inept and corrupt leaders, people power need not be limited to the toppling of tyrants and dictators. The people must not wait for another abusive president to relive the spirit of EDSA.
People power can also be harnessed to pressure the existing government to go after the corrupt and abusive officials of both the past and present administrations. People power can be rekindled at EDSA to stop the evil designs of national leaders to perpetuate themselves in power, to stop Congress from passing unfair legislations, to pressure a callous Ombudsman to resign, to pressure government to act against human rights abuses and injustice, and to air their legitimate grievances.
EDSA must live on to be a constant reminder to corrupt and abusive officials that if they do not mend their ways, they would pay the price at the altar of freedom and justice. EDSA must not only rise to topple tyrants, but must continually be on the go to prevent leaders from becoming tyrants, and to make sure that the nation’s leaders remain answerable to the people.
That is the spirit of EDSA, and it lives on.
(valabelgas@aol.com)