In 1990, Cory sent Jose Yap, then a congressman, to talk with NDFP leaders based in Utrecht, the Netherlands, to explore the possibility of resuming the peace negotiations. However, Fidel V. Ramos, then defense secretary, and Gen. Renato de Villa, then Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) chief of staff, opposed and derailed these moves.
Ocampo said this showed that Cory’s government had been “held hostage” by the military, which had backed her up during Edsa 1 and through the numerous coup attempts by rebel soldiers.
The absence of agrarian reform under Cory’s administration, underscored by the Mendiola Massacre, was another thorny issue between her and the Left.
“The 1987 Constitution has provisions recognizing the need for agrarian reform, but the conservatives were also able to insert provisions recognizing the ‘right’ of landowners to develop their land in whatever manner they please,” Ocampo said. “The prime example of that was Hacienda Luisita, which was exempted from redistribution and subjected to the ‘stock distribution’ option.”
What happened next was, although Cory declared agrarian reform as the centerpiece of her administration, her advisers prevailed upon her to take a different direction, and there were forces in Congress that insisted upon their interests.
This, Ocampo said, explains why the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) had to be extended over and over without being completed.
Other issues on which the Left clashed with Cory were the dismantling of the US military bases, the repudiation of onerous debts, and the so-called “low-intensity conflict” which led to numerous human-rights violations especially in the countryside. In all these, Ocampo said, lobbying and pressure from the US factored in. “She lacked the political sophistication to resist that,” Ocampo said.
Still, there were some other positive aspects about Cory’s presidency, Ocampo said, such as the dismantling of the vestiges of authoritarian rule and the appointment of a few progressive personalities to her Cabinet.
She was not, however, able to void all decrees issued by the Marcos dictatorship – even as the initial stage of her presidency, the “Freedom Constitution” period, gave her almost absolute power to do whatever she pleased since there was no Congress at the time.
“We learned that many counseled her not to cancel all of these Marcos decrees, because they may be needed in the future to ‘defend’ the government,” Ocampo said. One of those who offered such a counsel was Joker Arroyo, now a senator who was Aquino’s first executive secretary and who, ironically, had fought the dictatorship and cultivated an image as a civil libertarian.
Cory, Ocampo said, “was not sophisticated” politically and “she trusted her advisers, which is why so many Marcos decrees were not voided.”
After 1992
Cory stepped down in 1992 after her term expired and she never ran again for president although she was qualified to do so under the Constitution. She remained active in politics, however, at first participating in campaigns to oppose charter-change moves under the Ramos and Estrada regimes. In these campaigns, Cory found herself on the same side with progressive forces.
She was also a key personality in the Edsa 2 uprising that toppled the Estrada regime. Progressive groups also played a significant part in this uprising. But last year, Cory dismayed many in the Left as well as her allies in the Edsa 2 uprising when she publicly apologized to Estrada.
The article also fails to mention that Joma Sison condemned the radical Left's non-participation at EDSA I.
I agree with Mr. Jorge. They even try to undermine the possibility of having a 'revolution' with matching picnics on the side.
I am a Moro and a Muslim. While Cory’s role in the overthrow of the Marcos dictatorship was important, she never left a legacy that would have a profound impact on the final and just resolution of the war in Mindanao and Sulu. True that she went to Jolo to meet with Nur Misuari of the MNLF. But that’s it. As a typical member of the Filipino elite perched atop an ivory tower, she felt no attachment to the oppressed Moro masses and no historical grasp of the root cause of the Bangsamoro liberation struggle. Thus, under her ‘democratic’ regime, we Moros were no better off just like when we were under previous Manila regimes which considered and treated our occupied Moro homeland as a colony of the Philippine nation-state
The article fails to mention that in the 1986 snap elections, the Left, instead of supporting Cory, called for a boycott. And, during the EDSA uprising, the Left chose not to participate and again called for a boycott. So when they sing praises now to the "icon of democracy", they are actually trying to drown out the fact that in the two most significant exercises where Cory showed she was the icon of democracy, the Left chose to sit it out.