Batas Mauricio SOME thoughts on the Nov. 30, 2016 rallies, for or against former President Marcos and his burial at the Libingan ng mga Bayani: first, it was refreshing to see that those who are on the side of Marcos are now emboldened to hold their own rallies, even simultaneous with the rallies of the anti-Marcos forces. Unfortunately however, anti-Marcos media entities refused to publicize the pro-Marcos rallies. Second, the anti-Marcos rallies continued to be diminutive in number. I mean, even if we assume, for the sake of argument, that there were 10,000 people who joined the anti-Marcos rallies on Wednesday (10,000 is, of course, a bloated figure already), that is still minuscule if we take into account that, at present, there are now around 110 million Filipinos nationwide. Those who ranted against Marcos did not even comprise .01 percent of the whole population. What does this mean? It means the anti-Marcos forces, then as now, do not really have the support of the majority of the Filipino nation. They remain as they were in 1986--insignificant in number, although admittedly noisy and boisterous and ridiculously selfighteous. And come to think of it, the only things that these anti-Marcos forces have achieved, in all their movements, are this: bringing our country closer and closer to anarchy, lawlessness, chaos, disorder, rebellion, disobedience to duly-constituted authorities and lawfully-issued orders, and, because of all these, rampant criminality. Imagine, they were the ones who brought the issue of Marcos being buried at the Libingan with the Supreme Court. One would think because they invoked the jurisdiction and authority of the highest court of the land, they would obey and follow what the Supreme Court will say. Yet, notwithstanding the clear ruling of the tribunal in their own petition, which was based on the law and then concurred in by nine of the 15 justices, anti-Marcos forces not only refused to recognize that ruling but are, just like what they have been doing the past week, even enticing or encouraging Filipinos to similarly disrespect, disobey, and reject the court’s ruling. Clearly, anti-Marcos forces do not respect the law and the duly constituted authorities, just like what they did in 1986. They are only interested to uphold their own selfish interests, accepting only the ruling that favors them. This is the reason why many of our countrymen are now similarly rebellious and disobedient of the courts and of the authorities. Anti-Marcos forces have made Filipinos rebels!
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After all the huffing and the puffing by Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez Jr. and his trusted lieutenants in the House of Representatives, particularly Rep. Rey Umali and Rep. Rodolfo Farinas, where they threatened a warrant for the arrest of Sen. Leila de Lima on account of her advice that her former driver-lover Ronnie Dayan should disobey a House subpoena, it would seem nothing is going to come out of it after all. It would now be clear that the rants of Alvarez and his boys against de Lima have only been much ado about nothing. In the end, Alvarez had to take back his word that the lower chamber of Congress can order De Lima’s arrest if she will not appear to explain why she advised Dayan to hide and not show himself up at a legislative inquiry by the House. All that Alvarez, Umali, and Farinas managed to do on Tuesday was to give a copy of their subpoena for de Lima to an official of the Senate, and then announce, rather sheepishly, that in the event she will not appear before the House, they will simply file a complaint against her before the Senate Ethics Committee. Many Filipinos are now asking: what happened to Alvarez, Umali, and Farinas? Why did they appear to have chickened out in their threats to cause the arrest of de Lima if she would disregard their subpoena? Did someone whom they could not refuse tell them to go easy on the lady neophyte senator? Or, did they get cowed by the statements of some senators that de Lima and the other senators could not be touched by the House at all? Some lawyers are saying they missed a golden opportunity to test the issues of “inter-parliamentary courtesy” and the coercive powers of both chambers of Congress to compel attendance in their hearings, even by their own colleagues. Now, de Lima could not be faulted if she appears victorious, gloating over Alvarez, Umali, and Farinas, because her oftepeated statement--“I will not recognize the authority of the House of Representatives over me”--would seem to have been proven true. This is truly sad, because the impression from all these is that, arrests by Congress can be carried out only against small fries, like Dayan and Kerwin Espinosa. E-mail: batasmauricio@yahoo.com