FERDINAND MARCOS (Ika-12 Bahagi)

NAIS ni Alexander Gesmundo muling buksan ng Supreme Court ang desisyon na nagpapataw ng P203 bilyon sa kaso sa real estate tax ng mga Marcos. Hindi ipinaliwanag ni Gesmundo kung bakit kailangan muling buksan ang asunto na unang idineklara na “final at executory” ang pagpataw ng P203 bilyon. Sinabi niya na walang pumipigil sa Korte Suprema na muling buksan ang naunang desisyon.

Opinyon lang ni Alexander Gesmundo ang kanyang tinuran. Hindi ito ang opinyon ng buong Korte Suprema na binubuo ng 15 hukom, sang-ayon sa Saligang Batas. Hindi malinaw kung ano ang opinyon ng 14 na mahistrado. Hindi namin alam kung ano ang pinanghahawakan ni Gesmundo sa kanyang nakakatindig balahibong pahayag. Samahan kaya siya ng mayorya ng mga hukom sa Korte Suprema?

Kung sakalaing makialam ang Korte Suprema at muling buksan ang tax case ng mga Marcos, hindi namin nakikita na mananatili ang napakalaking halaga na P203 bilyon. Maaaring lumiit ito sa halagang kayang-kaya na bayaran ng mga Marcos ang kanilang atraso sa buwis. Isang malaking kahangalan na muling buksan ang kaso at manatili ang halaga. Sasauluhin ito ng Korte Suprema. Maitataga iyan sa bato.

Isang pasanin ang desisyon na patawan ng P203 bilyon ang mga Marcos. Hindi sila nalalayo sa kawan ng mga pusang hindi maihi ang mga Marcos sa sandali na binabanggit ang desisyon. Hindi maalis ang hinala na walang balak ang mga Marcos na bayaran ang kanilang atraso. Hindi makapagmagaling si BBM. “Bayaran mo muna ang utang mo sa buwis bago ka dumakdak.” Ito ang balik sa kanya ng sambayanan.

***

HINDI pa tapos drug case ng anak ni Boying Remulla. Nai-raffle na ito sa Las Piñas RTC.

Napunta ito kay Branch 197 ni Acting Presiding Judge Ricardo Moldez II. Huwag sana siyang bumigay sa matinding pressure sa kanya.

***

MULING bumabalik ang aming naisulat tungkol sa diktadura ni Ferdinand Marcos. Halaw ang mga sumusunod sa aklat na aking tinatapos tungkol sa diktadura ni Marcos.

1971 PLAZA MIRANDA BOMBING

The magnitude of the violence of the August 21, 1971 Plaza Miranda bombing could be aptly described as beyond description. While it is true that Philippine politics is an anarchy of families as one political family vies with another family for political power, incidents of violence are normally isolated. Not a single violent incident in the past could match the attempt to decimate the entire LP senatorial slate. The authoritative Philippines Free Press, the magazine of record in the premarital law days, said: “[The Plaza Miranda bombing] was most villainous, outrageous, and shameful crime in the annals of local political violence… a night of national tragedy and infamy… a democracy Philippine style bared itself in all its terrifying ugliness.”

Senator Jovito Salonga, who was running for election after he topped the 1965 senatorial elections, was the most injured among the senatorial candidates. He lost an eye and an ear to pieces of shrapnel that pierced the left side of his body. His limbs were badly mangled. He was almost lifeless when brought to the hospital; even the attending doctors thought he would not survive the violent attack. But miracles do happen; he survived. Those days, senators were elected in nationwide elections just like today.

The late senatorial candidate Ramon Mitra Jr., who later became the speaker of the House of Representatives in the post-Marcos 8th Congress, told me in an interview how he developed diabetes after a shrapnel hit his pancreas, adversely affecting its production of natural insulin necessary for the sugar management in the body. Manila mayoral candidate Ramon Bagatsing Sr. lost a leg; the same fate befell on John Osmena. Sen. Sergio Osmena Jr., who lost to Marcos in the 1969 presidential elections, almost died after his body was tossed up in the air like pizza by the loud grenade explosion. He had his share of grenade wounds, which affected his health and led to his death ten years later. Senatorial bets Eva Estrada Kalaw, Genaro Magsaysay, Edgar Ilarde, Salipada Pendatun, and Melanio Singson suffered shrapnel wounds in the body and lower limbs.

Although the entire LP senatorial slate survived the carnage and won six of the eight senatorial slots (only Pendatun and Singson lost), they all had shrapnel wounds. In the political campaign that led to the November 1971 elections, the senatorial candidates led by LP president, Senator Gerry Roxas, spoke to the people with heavily bandaged bodies, crutches, and wheelchairs. It was a very emotional election. Ernesto Maceda won among the close lieutenants Marcos fielded. Juan Ponce Enrile and Blas Ople lost miserably. Sen. Benigno Aquino Jr,, who was LP secretary-general, escaped the violent attack after he attended a dinner and arrived late. Ninoy Aquino said he earlier received a call from an unidentified person, who warned of a possible attack. After his dinner, he went home to don a bulletproof vest. Aquino’s absence in the LP proclamation rally did not escape the attention of Marcos, who promptly sowed intrigues. Marcos threw innuendoes Aquino could be behind the bombing to get rid of rivals in the 1973 presidential polls. Appearing in a television interview, Aquino flatly denied the accusation, saying that if he wanted to get rid of his colleagues, he would instead poison them as they frequently had dinners and lunches with him.

Subsequent police investigations did not yield results to name suspects. But some quarters, including the political opposition and nosy US intelligence agents and Embassy officers, did not buy Marcos’s explanation that the communists were behind the carnage. The CPP had about 100 cadres during those days; they were scattered mostly in rural areas to stage a revolution along the Maoist dictum of “surround the city from the countryside.” In 1988, a group of disgruntled renegade party members led by Ruben Guevarra surfaced to claim that Jose Ma. Sison, CPP chair, ordered and planned the Plaza Miranda bombing to hasten the creation of a revolutionary situation and advance the party interest. They told a Senate committee public hearing that Sison thought of the bombing as a way to pit one group of political elites against another group.[36] They claimed Marcos would be blamed for the ensuing carnage. They claimed that the person who threw the grenade was subsequently killed in a violent party purge. But their claim did not attract interest because the insurrectionary tactic did not fit into the Maoist model of a peasant-led, rural-based revolution. Even Victor Corpus, the young army lieutenant, who defected to the NPA in 1972 only to return to the Armed Forces six years later, made the surprising claim at the height of the “God Save the Queen” plot in November, 1986. Not one could explain his motives to make the claim, although some observers believed it was his way to rehabilitate himself as he was reinstated as a reserve army officer.

Until now, the August 21, 1971 Plaza Miranda bombing, just like any other violent incident, has yet to find a closure. Hearsays continue to fly thick. But the Plaza Miranda bombing significantly influenced the flow of political developments in the country. The LP-dominated results of the 1971 senatorial elections deeply stunned Ferdinand Marcos, leading him to alter his earlier plan to field either wife Imelda or Juan Ponce Enrile as his candidate in the aborted 1973 presidential elections. The elections results convinced Marcos that no one among his trusted leaders could beat Ninoy Aquino or Gerry Roxas in 1973. Only he could beat the LP presidential candidate. But the 1935 Constitution was his biggest problem because it barred him from running for a second reelection. Marcos began looking for other options, which included the game-changing declaration of martial law in 1972. He had to touch the nerve of history to perpetuate his presidency beyond 1973. In short, the Plaza Miranda bombing was a major antecedent to martial rule. (Itutuloy)