The launching of the anti-Bongbong campaign in Cebu was timed with the 30th anniversary celebration of the first People Power Revolution that drove the Marcoses out of Malacañang and into a foreign land.
About 30 years after the event, there were things that haven’t changed, much of them in the way of governance as the country’s elite crept back into the halls of power and practically dominated them in the years that came afterwards.
Only difference came in the return of the Marcoses into those same halls of power, even with a ton load of cases against them which have yet to see resolution and provide compensation to their many victims.
That three-decade span of time can also change the mind set of a lot of Filipinos who were either too young or were not yet born during that history-altering event in our country.
One would think that Filipinos would have remembered the atrocities of martial law, but a New York Times article that recounted the sentiments of the younger generation of Filipinos about the so-called “golden years” of martial law rang the alarm bells of the Aquino administration so much so that outgoing President
Benigno Aquino III made mention of the Marcos regime rule in his last Edsa anniversary speech.
The president said the Edsa Revolution wasn’t so much about the political rivalry between the Marcoses and the Aquinos but about right against wrong.
For his part, the senator played to the crowd and said he was being singled out for his father’s wrongdoings while saying that he is against the enforcement of martial law.
Incidentally Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte, a tough-talking politician with whom Marcos tried but failed to team up with, also shot down fears of him declaring martial law when he becomes president, saying there are enough laws for him to use in his fight against criminality.
It is that specter of martial law that opponents of Senator Marcos are trying to raise to the public’s attention, but how do they convince a generation of voters unaware of those dark days about the danger of possibly revisiting them with a Marcos vice presidency that’s just a heartbeat away from the country’s top post?
Those who suffered much under that brutal period can answer with conviction the question of whether Senator Marcos should be spared the blame for his father’s actions.
And it is they who will lead the campaign to prevent another Marcos from returning to the Palace. And they will not be alone.