by: Mike Baños

September 21, 2006 (Anniversary of Proclamation 1081, September 21, 1972)

The world's media attention on September 11 was focused on the fifth anniversary of the terrorist attack on New York's Twin Towers, the first time in centuries foreign invaders successfully engineered a massive attack on the continental United States.

Hopefully, Filipinos would not forget this date as being equally infamous in Philippine history as the birth date of the late dictator Ferdinand E. Marcos who was born on this same date in Sarrat, Ilocos Norte.

On his 89^th birth anniversary, it behooves us Pinoys to look back at his legacy and reflect on how, with all the power at his disposal under martial law, one man held the future in the country in his hands, and how easily, as many still insist, he became "the best President the Philippines could have had." A former aide of Marcos said that "Nobody will ever know what a remarkable president he could have made. That's the saddest part".

As a colleague in the fourth estate once put it, "The Marcoses were the best of us, and they were the worst of us. That's why we say we hate them so much."

Marcos apologists claim Marcos was serious about Martial Law and had genuine concern for reforming the society as evidenced by his actions during the period, up until his cronies, whom he entirely trusted, had firmly entrenched themselves in the government. By then, they say he was too ill and too dependent on them to do something about it. The same has been said about his relationship with his wife Imelda, who became the government's main public figure in light of his illness, by then wielding perhaps more power than even Marcos himself.

Philippine presidents before the "Apo" are now widely perceived to all have trod the path of "traditional politics", a phrase which has gained a negative connotation as the practice of using one's position to enrich relative, friends and allies. With Martial Law, Marcos rewrote the book on "traditional politics", raising it to new heights of sophistication (or plumbing record depths of greed, depending on whom you ask) through his "politics of achievement".

He became the "ninong" of not just his cabal of cronies  but the entire government machinery as well from the judiciary, legislature and administrative branches of government down to the barangay captains and their kagawads and all to all branches of the military and police, using bribery, racketeering and embezzlement.

"Ill-gotten wealth" was another Filipinism which gained notoriety in the martial law lexicon. To this day, probers from the much maligned "Presidential Commission on Good Government (PCGG) couldn't even determination how much wealth the Marcoses have looted from the country and salted away in foreign banks.

Crony capitalism (to cite another word from the martial law lexicon which remains with us to this day) pervaded Philippine business with Marcos cronies holding several key industries under their control such as sugar (Roberto Benedicto), coconut (Danding Cojuanco),  and blue chip corporations like PLDT, PAL, Meralco, Fortune Tobacco, SMC, several banks and media print and broadcast institutions.

To this day, many of  the "Apo's" loyalists (still another from our 9/21 lexicon) insist "Ninong Ferdie" was a gem of a Filipino - a brilliant lawyer, a shrewd politician and keen legal analyst with a ruthless streak and a flair for leadership. They claim he was essentially good but was misguided by his inner circle (or cordon sanitaire, still another from our 9/21 lexicon) including his wife Imelda who once boasted in public that her family "own practically everything in the Philippines."

With his iron hold over the country for over 20 years, Marcos had the rare opportunity to lead the Philippines toward prosperity, with massive infrastructure he put in place as well as an economy on the rise. Unfortunately, he chose instead to build a personal empire that was well on its way to becoming a dynasty.

It is important to note that many laws written by Marcos are still in force and in effect. Out of thousands of proclamations, decrees and executive orders, only a few were repealed, revoked, modified or amended.

Among these is the infamous Presidential Decree No. 1177 or the "Budget Reform Decree of 1977" which provides for, among other things, automatic appropriations for the government's payment of "behest loans" (another from the 9/21 lexicon which refers to foreign loans disadvantageous to the Philippine government such as the one taken out on the US$ 28-Billion Bataan nuclear plant which produced not even a single watt of power but for which we continue to pay interest to this day).

House Minority Leader Francis Escudero also cites how PD1177 gives the sitting president, who now happens to be Gloria Arroyo, a practically "bottomless" pork barrel she can dispense at her discretion in case Congress fails to enact the budget and the country has to resort to a "holdover budget" from the previous year. That figure, according to Chaz, is 17% of last year's GAA of P900-Billion, or approximately P153-Billion.

Transparency International has listed Marcos as the second most corrupt head of government ever, overshadowed only by Indonesian strongman Suharto. But a recent survey indicates many Pinoys still pine for Marcos' autocratic, strong-arm governance, complaining that too much democracy in post-EDSA Philippines has spoiled the body politic, with divisive standoffs in Congress leading to legislative gridlock,  suffocating incarnations of  "People Power" , deadlocks in the Senate and the resurgence of traditional politicians and dynasties. Many remain nostalgic for the Marcos era, where the government was well-organized and laws were strictly followed by civilians, leading to a relatively disciplined populace.

But Senator Nene Pimentel, one of the staunchest opposers of martial law, warns:

"Unfortunately, some people in and out of government continue to manifest some bias for the reemployment of martial law methods ostensibly for the development of the country. It may, thus, be proper to recall that martial law was touted in 1972 by the then President Ferdinand E. Marcos as the panacea for the ills besetting the country. He said he had imposed martial law because he wanted to eradicate the massive poverty of the people ; to contain the rising tide of the communist insurgency, and eliminate the pervasive corruption in government.

History, however, unequivocally tells us that Marcos miserably failed to achieve any of his announced martial law goals. The poverty levels increased; the communist insurgency attracted more recruits; and corruption became a way of life not only in government circles but in the private sector as well.

Amartya Sen, the 1999 Nobel Prize winner in economics, debunks the idea that authoritarian rule facilitates the development of nations as advocated by the former prime minister of Singapore, Lee Kuan Yew. In fact, Dr. Sen says that there is little evidence that authoritarian politics actually helps economic growth. Indeed, the empirical evidence "very strongly suggests that economic growth is more a matter of friendlier economic climate than of a harsher political system."(Development as Freedom, pp.15-16)."

The merits and demerits of Marcos the President and his legacy of 20 years of martial law will remain a bone of contention many generations beyond ours, but it is evident that the EDSA Revolution that led to his downfall has left Philippine society polarized, perhaps beyond repair.

Many pine for the good old days of the New Society, its peace and stability, and relative prosperity compared to the chaos of the Cory years, and the degenerating quality of life under Tabako, Erap and now GMA. Ironically, many of the economic problems hounding the country today have their genesis in the behest loans the country took out under martial law.

Sen. Nene Pimentel warns : "God forbid that martial law in any shape or form will ever be imposed again in this our beloved land. As the current motto of the Marines, which is lifted from an Israeli marker at the entrance of Masada, the place where Jews had killed themselves centuries ago rather than surrender to the invaders, put it: numquam iterum, never again."

To put today's 89^th anniversary of the Apo's birthday and his martial law legacy in its proper context, Filipinos would do well to place their fate in the hands of the Almighty and recall the immortal lines of Rudyard Kipling's "Recessional":

The tumult and the shouting dies;
   The captains and the kings depart:
Still stands Thine ancient sacrifice,
   An humble and a contrite heart.
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget - lest we forget!