The Ambassador's threat

I am surprised at the lukewarm reaction (at least from those who can publish their opinions) to US Ambassador Kristie Kenney’s recent warning. They were not angry that she said “US would be concerned if the election were postponed.” Ironically, she made the statement to celebrate Philippine American Friendship Day. It is a blatant interference in our internal affairs. Some Filipinos even cheered the ambassador’s insensitivity. Charter change critics and oppositionists bent on the 2010 presidential election sighed “America is on our side.”

It is tragic that the comment was made in the spring of Obama’s presidency when one would have expected a more enlightened attitude towards a former colony like the Philippines, struggling to interpret and fulfill its own weal. It would have been welcome if she had made a statement commiserating with the difficulty of these efforts. It would have been better had the ambassador wished us well with these efforts as a fitting gesture to celebrate the day of friendship. She could have reaffirmed America’s respect for our sovereignty but that it would stand by to help us attain those goals. These would have been more consistent with Obama’s promised program of change in pursuit of America’s better history. Yes. But then Ambassador Kenney is a Bush appointee and perhaps does not see her public statements contradict Obama’s “audacity of hope” to reclaim America’s dream.

But what about Filipinos who do not discern that it was a verbal assault on their sovereignty? Formal colonialism may be gone but it lives on in the lack of patriotism and nationhood in Filipinos themselves. To me that is a greater concern than the American ambassador’s undiplomatic bravado. I will say it as simply as I can that too many of us cannot or will not distinguish between narrow political interests and the larger vision of a strong Filipino nation.

We can differ on what ought to happen in 2010 but I certainly hope that on whatever side we stand it should not be dictated by a threat from the American ambassador that the “US would be concerned if the election were postponed.”

That is for Filipinos to decide. What can be debated are the reasons if it were to be postponed. Those who believe the election would not serve a higher good for the nation should be given the latitude to pursue their vision of “real change through Charter amendments.” American intervention on what should happen in 2010 is out of place and a violation of our sovereignty.

Some Americans may think that election is an absolute value of democracy. But leaders in countries in our region have done better for their citizens with a sharper focus on what elections can do and what it cannot do. There are those who have put the cart before the horse and play blind to the harm of  the kind of presidential elections we have. It stunts our development as a strong and prosperous nation. The election of a new president under the same rules of a failed system will not bring the good governance we hanker for. What is true is that these wasteful elections spawn a multitude of problems. For that reason, others see things differently and have considered other options.

They regard constitutional reforms as necessary before another wasteful cart of an election. This is a national debate and therefore ought to be resolved by the country’s institutional processes as sanctioned by the Constitution and not by an American ambassador’s threat.

By the way, the Philippine president is not entirely helpless in the face of these threats. She has her own cards to play in case a confrontation is forced on the issue of the country’s sovereignty. She should put it to good use when that time comes.

 It is not a question of whether the US will intervene in 2010 elections, it has already intervened with the blatant force of the Kenney statement on Friendship Day.

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Some friends in the Charter change advocacy movement who read my column last week on the One Voice ad chided me for even bothering to comment on it. These are the rants of the very oligarchy threatened by Charter change. Our concern should be on how information on Charter change should get to the people in the language they understand. “It’s their stomachs that are rumbling and telling them what needs to be done. They are not misled by such ads,” says Dante Jimenez, founding chairman of VACC (Volunteers Against Crime and Corruption).

They are aware that they need to unite for their own good and do not wish to be pawns in the tribal wars of oligarchs. The louder the oligarch noises against Charter change the more they are convinced it is the right thing to do. Charter change advocates should not be distracted by the propaganda that the issue is term extension and President GMA.

Unless they work together on Charter change as Charter change it will never happen before or after 2010. They may differ in timing and mode but they ought to be together to strengthen their vision and pass it on to their compatriots. Unless the message on Charter change is clear and forceful, it will fall by the wayside. The politicians as oppositionists, big business and their foreign sponsors have been working hard to denigrate Charter change.

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At a recent meeting of different groups and individuals to work together, I was surprised to see Brig. Gen. Victor Corpus. I had not seen him since his campaign against powerful people bent on raising funds through drugs for their presidential ambition.

Corpus gave me a copy of his latest book – America’s Dim Mak Points.

According to the prologue “Dim Mak is a form of martial art that means meridian press.” Meridians are energy channels in the human body through which vital life forces flow. There are 800 cavities or points within this channels that can either cause death or unconsciousness. A weaker combatant can use dim mak in a fight with a more powerful enemy.

He extends this as metaphor for the war between China, the weaker combatant with the US. “Taken in a geopolitical context, China can be likened to the weaker fighter that uses deep understanding of her adversary’s anatomical vulnerabilities to bring a much stronger belligerent nation like the US to her knees with minimum effort,” he writes.

 The book will be launched on July 30 at 6 p.m. at the Power Books on Greenbelt 4.