The Successful Coup

There were two coups against the constitution that fateful Sunday of July 27 There was the failed one, the one that now appears to have been cooked—and abandoned, for now--by key politicians identified with the late Estrada administration Then there was the second one, the more sneaky coup, the one that formally began in the afternoon of that fateful Sunday. And this second successful coup unraveled with three words declared by the Macapagal-Arroyo administration: state of rebellion.

By Joel Garduce
Center for Anti-Imperialist Studies
Posted by Bulatlat.com

More than a week after junior military officers led by Navy Ltsg. Antonio Trillanes IV mounted an unusual protest action by holding fort at Oakwood in Makati for 19 hours, what has now actually emerged is that there were two coups against the constitution.

There was the failed one, the one that now appears to have been cooked—and abandoned, for now--by key politicians identified with the late Estrada administration directly exploiting the brewing discontent among the rank-and-file of the military and police.

Then there was the second one, the more sneaky coup, the one that formally began in the afternoon of that fateful Sunday. It likewise exploited the protest action by military elements but on a wilier level. This coup claimed to be on the side of the Constitution but actually suspended it. This coup claimed to be part of a success for democracy, but is actually demolishing it.

And this second successful coup unraveled with three words declared by the Macapagal-Arroyo administration: state of rebellion.

As all Filipinos know, and which the Macapagal-Arroyo regime vainly tries to downplay, there is nothing in the 1987 Constitution that provides for a state of rebellion. This is a plain legal invention outside constitutional bounds.

It’s quite ironic that Macapagal-Arroyo had to resort to extra-legal measures to address what is sees are extra-legal threats to its rule. No amount of government spin that this state of rebellion is aimed principally at coup plotters can offset the far larger danger that this unconstitutional tack of the administration inflicts on the Filipino people.

What this resort to a state of rebellion unmasks then is that the current clique in power—the most able partner of U.S. imperialism in the country today-- is clearly desperate to preserve its hold on the Philippine neocolonial state, and that its knee-jerk resort to this blatantly antidemocratic measure shows the Macapagal-Arroyo-Angelo Reyes clique’s readiness to junk all pretenses to democracy.

One key use this unconstitutional, tyrannical state of rebellion will likely be for the Macapagal-Arroyo-Reyes clique is the suppression of a full-blown, independent, credible investigation into the three main themes forwarded by Trillanes and company: (1) the deep-seated, flagrant corruption besetting the military establishment; (2) the ties that bind terrorism and this government, signified by Trillanes’ expose of government’s authorship of the recent Davao bombings; and (3) the Macapagal-Arroyo clique’s plan to impose martial law this month.

As it is, Macapagal-Arroyo has not done any serious steps along this investigation. Instead, what has been actually formed is a special committee to look into how the military protest emerged, and how this can be prevented in the future, similar to one set up by the Aquino government in the aftermath of the December 1989 coup d’etat. (In fact, one of this previous task force’s members, U.P. Prof. Carolina Hernandez, sits in the new committee formed by Macapagal-Arroyo.) Clearly, this committee will not look into the exposes of Trillanes’ group.

Which is quite odd, considering the gravity of all the above three concerns raised by the Magdalo group.

It didn’t help that Trillanes and company offered no extensive concrete evidence to the media in all the 19 hours they commanded public attention last Sunday to buttress these controversial assertions. But being themselves in the military, they are surely in a position to know and obtain many of the facts underlying these claims. (Could they be holding their punches? If so, why?)

Of the above three themes revealed by Trillanes, the matter of government’s ties to terrorism is particularly controversial and significant. It’s quite anomalous, in fact, that in the official comments of the Bush government (in the U.S.) and the Howard government (in Australia) on the June 27 military protest, not a word was ever uttered expressing concern that key elements of the Macapagal-Arroyo government—their most able partner in their so-called global war on terrorism—might have something to do with the terrorists and the recent local acts of terrorism. Doesn’t this nagging silence clash with these governments’ public ferocity against terrorists and all those that harbor them? Hmm…

We need not wait for Navy Ltsg. Trillanes to quit holding his tongue for information on these serious matters to be brought to public light. For in this particular expose of government’s ties to terrorism, there are already quite promising leads for an investigation along this line. We refer in particular to the following:

(1)           The current and historical ties of the Abu Sayyaf bandit terrorist group to yet-unnamed active and retired military officers as well as to the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). As early as 2000, in a speech where he called the Abu Sayyaf “a CIA monster,” Sen. Nene Pimentel had already urged an exhaustive inquiry into the links of the Abu Sayyaf to both the U.S. and Philippine military establishments. Until now, nothing of this sort has happened.

(2)           The ties of busted CIA explosives operative Michael Terrence Meiring to the Abu Sayyaf terrorists and the Philippine establishment. Meiring was caught in Davao City last May 16, 2002 with high-tech explosives in his possession. But he was extricated to the U.S. by agents of the U.S. FBI and National Security Council with the assistance of the local U.S. embassy headed by Ambassador Francis Ricciardone even before he could be investigated. Subsequent independent exposes (which were otherwise shut out in leading media outfits here and abroad) bared his employment to the CIA and his ties to both the Abu Sayyaf terrorists and top military and civilian officials.

(3)           The multifarious mysteries behind the prison escape of Rizal Day 2000 bomber Fathur al-Ghozi. Among others, it was revealed that a fellow escapee of al-Ghozi, Abdumukim Ong Edris, was a deep penetration agent of the government inside the Abu Sayyaf, prompting some police investigators to consider the possible angle that al-Ghozi’s escape was a special operation with key PNP officers in on the plan.

(4)           Lastly, the demonstrated cover-up being made by the Macapagal-Arroyo government on (1), (2) and (3). No military officer has been prosecuted until now on the June 2001 Lamitan fiasco, despite terse recommendations for court martial proceedings on a number of military officials by the Senate probe led by Sen. Ramon Magsaysay, Jr. The continued non-extradition of Meiring back to the Philippines preserved unharmed the terrorist network he left behind here. And nothing seems to be forthcoming from the inquiries into al-Ghozi’s escape, which might altogether be discarded by an anticipated recovery of the Indonesian terrorist, whether dead or alive.

These leads should be more than enough to point to a likely confirmation of Trillanes’ charge of government’s collusion with terrorists and its authorship of recent terrorist acts.

Now put your jaw back up. Government involvement with terrorism is not a novel phenomenon in the Philippines. Remember the assassination attempt on Defense Secretary Juan Ponce Enrile in the early 1970s, which was among the incidents pointed to by then President Marcos to justify declaring martial law? Let’s not forget Enrile’s quite public confession as EDSA 1 was unfolding in 1986 that that assassination attempt on his own life was indeed stage-managed by the Marcos power clique to justify martial law.

And the emergence of the Internet helped bare a much earlier manufactured terrorist provocation by government-aligned forces here in the Philippines. In a letter to Jim Garrison (the only U.S. district attorney to mount criminal proceedings in court related to the 1963 assassination of U.S. President John F. Kennedy) found at the website www.prouty.org which posts his writings, former U.S. covert action operative and whistleblower Air Force Col. L. Fletcher Prouty noted that his friend Edward Lansdale—the infamous U.S. colonel that personified the “Ugly American” here in the Philippines in the period immediately after World War II-- told him of having manufactured violent Huk provocations against poor civilians in rural Philippines in the 1950s.

It does appear to be a long-upheld tradition here in our country. And its likely reuse today dovetails with similarly familiar refrains in Philippine politics: namely, the looming danger of martial law.

But unlike the handful of advocates of this ugly tradition, you don’t have to get comfortable with these matters. Indeed, without a serious, no-holds-barred, independent and credible investigation of the current government’s ties to terrorism, every Filipino has every reason not to sleep well every night, aware that their government is likely finding much warmth in the company of terrorists. And every reason, thus, for every compatriot to rage against the dying of the light. Posted by Bulatlat.com

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