What are transition councils for?

http://www.philstar.com/opinion/2013/09/22/1236693/what-are-transition-councils

What are transition councils for?

FROM A DISTANCE By Carmen N. Pedrosa 

(The Philippine Star) |

Updated September 22, 2013 - 12:00am

With Noynoy Aquino fast developing into a lame duck president, the talk among responsible Filipinos is how to move on — what do we do to make sure the country does not deteriorate beyond repair.

We have been let down so grievously by those to whom we have entrusted the running of our country.

We need to tackle national problems strewn in the wake of the latest government crises – the Napoles expose of pork barrel scam and the fighting in Zamboanga that has cost dozens of lives and with no prospect of ending. Letting it just fester will be our doom.

More and more are thinking of seizing hold of the situation instead of letting matters just drift. There are various scenarios to consider — the most crucial of which is to create a transition government and get the most able, experienced and patriotic Filipinos with unsullied reputations whether in or out of government to keep the country’s institutions running properly.

It may be ironic but the first task of preserving our chosen democratic way of life is to create a revolutionary government acting as a transition council. The test of revolutionary government would be to write a new Constitution and overhaul the entire system of governance.  

We must keep repeating that to ourselves that any other solution will fall short of stopping pork barrel scams and public moneys being filched by politicians to the detriment of the country. Neither do we have the luxury of time.

Opinion ( Article MRec ), pagematch: 1, sectionmatch: 1

*      *      *

To those with reservations and hope that something can still be done to save the country from utter perdition should be reminded that at present all officials elected in 2010 and 2013 are illegally occupying their posts. The government acting through the Comelec is stonewalling all questions regarding this election so the duty falls on the citizenry to pick up the gauntlet.

These elections were failed elections and remain unresolved to this day.

How can an illegal government try the criminals of the Napoles pork barrel scams when it does not have the mandate from the people?

Moreover, the investigation is being made by people who took part in the crime either by actual commission or neglect in doing something about it. We have a government claiming to be against corruption and yet abets the very same corruption. We are deceived.

If we are to create a new society it must be founded on moral principles of government. The revelations of the pork barrel scams leave us no options unless we meet the challenge now of creating a new system that follows the democratic principle of government that is for the people by the people and of the people.

That task should have begun with the election failures of 2010 and 2013. We are not the first country that had had to confront the task of making the leap of change through revolution peacefully if possible and violently if necessary. Only then can we secure the future of our country.

 For this we will need to move fast or events will overtake us end up with the status quo, stuck in the oligarchic society we had tried to reform in the first EDSA that fooled so many reformers, some of whom gave up their lives and fortunes for the cause.

*      *      *

The military is mandated by the Constitution as protector of the state when it is threatened either internally or externally. But it can only act if there is a transition council under the principle that civic authority is supreme at all times. That can happen only if there is a civil transition council that the military can support. Without the transition council the military has no choice but support the existing government under the dictum of civilian supremacy.

Therefore reform-minded Filipinos must create a transition council, empowered to forge a new constitution, punish all government officials who were part of the scam and preside over new elections. All stolen moneys by politicians and officials alike should be returned to the national treasury under pain of being charged with crimes without bail. These moneys could instead be by the state for a new government set up by real ballots and a true counting.

*      *      *

It is unacceptable that the very same persons who committed the Napoles pork barrel crimes are allowed and continue to be in charge of investigating the crimes.

 Only a transition government can work out a juridical procedure to punish those who had shamelessly stolen the moneys intended for infrastructure and social services.

We must pursue this line while the issues are hot and burning and the people have awakened with a new energy to set the country right.  

If we don’t seize the moment then we may revert to business as usual with unscrupulous politicians feasting on public moneys with impunity.

*      *      *

The transition council follows the practice of “provisional government” that has been used in other parts of the world when a country is devoid of government. The Smartmatic PCOS elections combined with the Napoles pork barrel leaves us very little choice but confront the fact that we do not have government – only a seizure  by thugs elected by pre-programmed machines only to steal public moneys.

Thieves have broken down our electoral system, violated the Constitution and are helping themselves to public moneys. If that is not an indication that no one is charge, I wonder what else will.

*      *      *

There are provisional governments, transition councils, interim councils of every kind and hue in most countries after a revolution peaceful or otherwise. We had one after Cory Aquino’s EDSA but it ultimately failed  to carry out the reforms envisioned by the revolution. This time we must proceed more carefully as we move to what can be  considered a God-given opportunity to try again.

*      *      *

Disgruntled forces surface

Disgruntled forces surface, say ‘crucial decision’ made

Written by  Tribune Thursday, 12 September 2013 08:00

ROU SAYS NOYNOY REGIME ‘WEAK, CORRUPT, INSENSITIVE’ 

Signs of unrest have again manifested in the military ranks as a group which called itself the Reformist Officers United (ROU) issued a manifesto yesterday declaring a stand to “save the country from further ruin and continue the unfinished revolution of our forefathers, the true nationalists of the 1896 Philippine Revolution.”

The manifesto, called an “Article of Faith,” carried the signatures of representatives from all the military commands, the Philippine Army, the Philippine Air Force, the Philippine Navy, the Philippine Marines and the Presidential Security Guard, and civilian security agencies Philippine National Police, Coast Guard and the National Bureau of Investigation. The names in the manifesto, however, are all likely pseudonyms.
The ROU said it reached a “crucial decision,” which it did not state clearly, after many of its supposed members attended the recent rally at the Luneta Park or the Million People March on Aug. 26.


The decision was arrived at “after much contemplation of the political, social, economic and national security situations that turned from bad to worse, after we have vetted our organization, purged its ranks of opportunists and fake nationalists and after we have consulted some of our elders in the military, legal profession, farmers and those from the business, church, academe, labor and civil society groups.”

“Rest assured, together we will win this battle if possible with less bloodshed,” the ROU said in the manifesto.
“We are very much aware of the colonial and neo-colonial circumstances which have denied us the chance to discover our national self and to establish our identity and discover how much our dignity is really worth,” it stated. 
The group added that the government and many of the country’s leaders have been “weak, corrupt, venal, insensitive and self-serving.” 


As a result, foreign powers in the name of friendship and business partnership have interfered in our affairs with impunity, manipulating us, playing with our lives, our country and our destiny, the ROU added.


The group was clearly critical of the administration of President Aquino saying that his government “is no different from his mother’s regime, characterized by callous shamelessness propped up by endless popularity surveys.” 
It added that the Aquino administration stages spurious public shows of piety and compassion. 
“It goes through the motions of apologizing for numerous blunders in public yet committed the unforgivable sin of blasphemy to shield its depravity,” the group said.


It described the Aquino administration as being in the shameful tradition of the Makabebes, who betrayed the Philippine Revolution of 1896, and the even more notorious Makapilis who sent many Filipinos to their death (in World War II).


“Pnoy’s government has repeatedly frustrated the honest aspirations of our people by offering its fanciful and deceitful brand of democracy, economy and political lifestyle to unscrupulous foreigners and appealing directly for their intervention to save it from the wrath of long-suffering populace with legitimate grievances,” the ROU added.
The group added Aquino has been deceiving the armed forces into “fighting its battles of self-aggrandizement while undermining the military at every turn. It tells its armed service to fight terrorism without credible laws to protect them and the people.” 


“Many of our men have already died of loss of blood fighting a war they do not even understand,” the group added. 
It said occasionally, Aquino throws the military a bone to chew on, like guard dogs to be placated from hunger and reject. 


“More than 70,000 of our men in uniform are living as squatters in the urban centers as well as in the countryside,” it added.
The Aquino administration has reduced the once-proud military and police organization into a private security force, dedicated to perpetuate its status quo. 
The group added that a Gestapo-like counter intelligence organization is being maintained by the government “not to spy on the real enemies of the State but to spy endlessly on the office corps, rank-and-file, their families and other innocent targets.”


“From the first day, Pnoy, using useless advocacy of Matuwid na Daan, has actually steered by one direction alone, that of private gains and mindless arrogance,” the ROU added.
For more than three long, unhappy years (Aquino) has drifted with neither will nor ability to govern, muddling through all our national crises, setting a record of corruptions and plunder, incompetence and clumsiness, it said.
The solutions offered “have been short-sighted, meaningless palliatives and rhetorics that leave the people more frustrated than ever.” 


The ROU said the Aquino administration excelled in only two things: the enrichment of its clique and self-congratulations.
“What is more unconscionable is that (Aquino) even lionized Janet Lim-Napoles, who stole public funds and enriched herself and unscrupulous politicians. She cannot deny this because there are witnesses and highly incriminating pieces of evidence that will send them to jail the rest of their lives. This is not the right time to read a bill of particular. That will come later,” it added.


The group said that only a few days ago while the political crisis was evolving, (Aquino) apologized to the nation and appealed to the public to support his presidency and the rule of law. 
“His conscience has become so compartmentalized he does not realize that the very men and women he asked for help were the same men and women victimized by his government’s corruption, plunder, arrogance and incompetence,” it said.


Daily, the public “contend with (Aquino’s) mismanagement, extravagance, arrogance and sexual escapades, it claimed. 
“They suffer the high prices and the low wages. They suffer the scarcity of jobs. They suffer the absence of transportation, water shortage and high fuel prices. They suffer the breakdown of law and order, moral decay and endless salvaging,” it added.
The group also lamented that the Aquino regime has the gall to ask for help from the very people they continued to deprive of their rights and their dignity. 


“Pnoy even asked the men in uniform to die for his government and his brand of illiberal democracy. But will they, these people on whose tongues linger the acrid tastes of disillusion, betrayal and greed?,” it added
The ROU said it has “allies in the civilian sectors” and will offer the country, “not the tarnished version of EDSA 1986, cheapened and exploited beyond recognition, but the revolutionary spirit of 1896 and its noble dream, a dream filled with a fierce yearning for change: true independence, a sovereign nation, a just and wise government, genuine nationalism, respect for the rule of law, freedom in its best sense and reconciliation.” 


“In short, genuine democracy as the Filipino revolutionaries of 1896 installed but only fleetingly enjoyed before decades of subjugation, tyranny and pretense that saw our resources exploited and our values warped and perverted,” the group said.
It called on “friends and guests from foreign lands” who the group said it gives respects to their “sovereignty, culture, individuality and business interests.” 
“We implore you in the name of our country not to interfere anymore with our internal affairs,” it said.


It also appealed to media “to be fair and responsible in your reporting.”
“We will not hesitate to fight fire with fire those who will stand in our way and undermine our determination to protect the State and to create a just, wise, efficient and stable society throughout the land,” the group warned.
It said that its members will remain anonymous, for the meantime, “but in time we will get to know with one another as some of our forces are still busy gathering intelligence information, infiltrating centers of power of the Aquino Government and carefully assessing its loyal forces on the basis of their morale, command system, fighting capability, intelligence and materiel supplies.”


It said that since the 1986 EDSA Revolution, the Filipino masses “still huddled in their hovels, exploited, hungry and dispossessed. Our bureaucracy is corrupt and inefficient.” 
“There is systems failure everywhere. The entire country is deregulated in favor of the elite and their crook foreign partners. Prices of basic commodities keep on rising while workers’ wages remain the same,” it added. 
The group also said there is no peace and order. “The simplest public services cannot be delivered. Our military is demoralized and shot through with politics. Our judicial system does not work. The guilty go free; the innocent are framed.” 


The ROU said the country’s strength is vitiated by corruption, plunder and ignorance in high places. “When we protest, the government responds with arrogance and brutality. Our elections are farces, contests of force and money, or sleight-of-hand spewed by computers and automated machines,” it added.

http://www.tribune.net.ph/index.php/headlines/item/19082-disgruntled-forces-surface-say-crucial-decision-made

An Expression of Public Disgust and a Call for Action