Rebel

Nicanor Faeldon was cited in contempt for refusing to attend Senate hearings. Now the man is in open rebellion against what has warped into an institution for persecution.

In a press conference yesterday, the former Marine officer announced he would be at the Senate premises on Monday but only to submit to an order for his arrest. Even if physically brought to the session floor, he will refuse to participate in the proceedings.

By taking that stance, Faeldon becomes a predicament for the Senate. The senators might attempt to badger him, even bamboozle him. But this man has shown capacity to be still as a rock. He will be immovable and the Senate cannot detain him for life.

Faeldon does not fear jail. He has been there and mocked those who jailed him. He has the stuff to endure extreme diversity. He was, after all, trained to endure – and then to prevail.

The former Marine officer knows he has nothing more to lose. He has been humiliated, subjected to wild accusations clothed with parliamentary immunity and cruelly smeared.

The only thing he asks of his tormentors is to cease continuing the carnival at his expense. He wants them to file a case against him if there is any. The court will be an impartial arena free of political clowning. There, justice might look at him with favor.

Faeldon was once a rebel, a conspirator in a badly conceived mutiny driven more by futility than by strategy.  Today, he is a rebel once more, choosing to personify the ordinary citizens often crushed by the narcissism of those who wield power.

He is a better soldier today than he was when he joined that march on Oakwood many years ago. The march on Oakwood was a rant more than it was a military maneuver. It was an undertaking without a chance of victory. They dared the system and the system simply threw them in jail.

Today, Faeldon has chosen the path of passive resistance. Stoicism will be his weapon. Stony silence will replace rant. His refusal to participate in a ritual of ignominy will be his indictment of the system.

Passive resistance, as we saw in the case of Mahatma Gandhi, could be extremely dangerous to oppressors. Gandhi simply chose to withdraw to his inner fortress, keeping his peace where lesser men might have flung themselves into violent acts. His determined silence wearied the most powerful empire of the time, emasculating every instrument for intimidation that empire had in its arsenal.

Gandhi exasperated the British rulers of India. They could not intimidate a man who decided he had nothing to lose by not abiding by the will of those who seek to rule over him. By silence, not by demagoguery, Gandhi inspired his people. When all India passively resisted British rule, the empire was doomed. It was much easier to crush an armed rebellion, impossible to silence a man who was already silent.

The Senate has everything to lose and Faeldon none. Arrest was the last weapon the Senate could wield to intimidate Faeldon and the ex-Marine has decided jail was something he could embrace. Jail was a more honorable option than keeping the senators entertained.

By arresting Faeldon, the Senate expends the last bullet in its barrel. From Monday, onwards, Faeldon holds all the cards. He will have his own podium. He can seek relief from the Supreme Court or simply hold court while in detention. Having curtailed his freedom of movement, the Senate cannot go further and curtail his freedom of speech.

From then on, Faeldon will have the bigger megaphone with which to indict the corruption of institutional practice where panels of legislators morph into kangaroo courts.

In these kangaroo courts, thinly veiled as public hearings “in aid of legislation,” senators and congressmen are free to malign anyone under the cover of parliamentary immunity. Ordinary citizens made to appear before these hearings, for their part, are made to recite an oath and are constantly threatened with perjury if their responses displease their elected tormentors.

Live television coverage (at the Senate, cables running from the OB vans to the session hall are permanently in place) encouraged the public hearings to be used as soapboxes for grandstanding.  The temptation is such that our weakest willed politicians could not resist. One wit called these hearings as being conducted “in aid of reelection.”

The election of obvious sociopaths to legislative office did not help in maintaining the highest standards of decorum in both chambers. The hearings deteriorated into occasions for political assassination, for unbridled partisan politicking or simply for the pursuit of the narrowest personal interests.

In one of the most regrettable episodes, Senator Antonio Trillianes forced one of the finest officers our military ever had, Angelo Reyes, to commit suicide. In that hearing, the “resource person” was so thoroughly maligned and so completely stripped of personal honor that he felt he had no recourse but to argue back by taking his own life.

More recently, the House caused the prolonged detention of six employees of the Ilocos Norte government. They were basically held hostage to compel Gov. Imee Marcos to personally appear before the inquisition. In a way, the Abu Sayyaf are more honorable in their methods because they do not attempt to cloak hostage-taking with some flimsy parliamentary excuse.

Someone has to stand up finally to condemn the corruption of public hearings, the boorishness of legislators and the abuse that gets by under the protection of “parliamentary immunity.” Faeldon decided he would be it.