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Sunday, February 26, 2012

A different EDSA story

By Ed Lingao Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism

Filipinos have short memories, unfinished businesses

THERE IS another version of the EDSA People Power story, but it is one that EDSA veterans aren’t liking.

In this new version, former President Ferdinand Marcos is portrayed as the real hero of EDSA for refusing to fire upon the assembled crowds in February 1986; EDSA was a gathering of military adventurists, veteran professional protesters and communists, and hakot crowds; and Corazon Aquino stayed tucked away in the safety of Cebu while unwitting civilians put their lives on the line.

Marcos is hailed as the one who built massive infrastructure projects and rebuilt the economy; he is also the one who turned back the communists at the gates of Malacanang by declaring Martial Law. In addition, Marcos is portrayed as a close friend of oppositionist Benigno ‘Ninoy’ Aquino Jr., whom he jailed during Martial Law. In fact, this version says, Marcos and Ninoy would even chat with each other using scrambler telephones. As such, Marcos could never have ordered Ninoy’s assassination.

As the nation marks the 26th anniversary of what the world has come to know as the People Power Revolution, young Filipinos who never experienced the events of February 1986 are left wondering again what all the ruckus is about. But what is most striking is the fact that this alternate version of the story is one that more and more young Filipinos are tuning into – and apparently identifying with and liking.

This new version of the People Power story is being told over the Internet through social media sites, in a nine and a half minute video that seems like a cross between the Angry Birds game and the movie ‘Gladiator,’ with heart-pounding music, bold primary colors, and moving graphics, yet with simple lines of text that are well attuned to what one viewer calls the “Powerpoint generation.”

Hidden truths?
Titled “Ninoy + People Power: Hidden Truths the Media is not Telling Us!”, the video began gaining popularity in YouTube by the middle of last year and has since become viral. It has appeared or has been reposted in numerous websites and YouTube channels, and pops up repeatedly in FaceBook.

The video’s creator, who calls himself Baron Buchokoy, maintains a YouTube channel called PinoyMonkeyPride. As of mid-February, the video that was posted in Buchokoy’s YouTube account in June 2011 already has more than 200,000 views. Buchokoy implies that the video has had more views, saying that the video in fact was just re-uploaded “since the powers that be hacked and removed it recently from YouTube.”

This is proof, Buchokoy says in his introduction to the YouTube video, that “someone or some group is trying to hide the truth.”

“Please spread the message,” he adds. “Marcos is the least suspect in the Ninoy assassination and that only 2% of the 1986 Philippine population attended EDSA People Power. Let’s end Filipino ignorance. It ends now.”

IN THE past, such assertions had merely been dismissed as rumblings of Marcos sympathizers keen on putting their own spin into the history books to rehabilitate a fallen icon.

“The points are not very new,” says Mon Casiple, executive director of the Institute for Political and Economic Reform (IPER). “These came out immediately after the assassination of Ninoy and right after EDSA 1.”

“All these arguments were made by Marcos-aligned groups,” Casiple says. “It is a mixture of truth, lies, omissions, and, of course, a little bit of popular handling.”

“That falsification or distortion of history may go some length, but it is like you can change the perception of Hitler and the Nazi regime,” comments Rene Saguisag, former spokesman of then President Corazon Aquino. “You saw the human rights violations and the plunder committed by the Marcoses during their merciless martial rule.”

Old version, new traction
But if the number of views and the lively and passionate comments on YouTube are to be any indication, this new “old” version appears to be gaining traction with the youth. Too, the video is told in the language and the pace of the Net and video generation, something that neither pro-EDSA nor pro-Marcos proponents were able to maximize before.

“It’s effective,” says 20-year-old Darlene Basingan, a PCIJ intern from De La Salle University in Cavite, after watching Buchokoy’s video. “Marcos was portrayed very negatively in the stories I had heard about EDSA. So I wondered if it could be true that everything about Cory was positive. Now I have been enlightened as to the truth after watching this video.”

She says Marcos “wasn’t all negative” during the uprising. “Hindi naman pala niya gusto atakihin ang mga tao (He didn’t want to attack the people).”

“This should be viewed by the youth,” says Basingan. “I suppose everything said here is true, based on facts, and not just someone’s imagination. If that is the case, this should be seen by other youth so they can have a bigger perspective of People Power.”

“This is the only time I learned about this,” says JB, a sophomore computer science major. “I had never seen or heard about these things in any documentary. Not everything we heard about EDSA was true.”

In Buchokoy’s YouTube account, a post by Mr Langam read, “I used to be fooled by our history teacher using a false book.”

“The only thing I can say is that this country needs a new Marcos, and history needs some revision,” said Maimiewow.

“I cried after watching this video… this country is dying,” said Dyna1226. “Like a patient with cancer stage4.”

Meanwhile, anelio21 said, “Dami na nating nagising na mga Filipino dahil sa video na ito. Maraming salamat sa gumawa nito (There are a lot of us who were awakened with this video. Thank you to the one who made this.).”

Yet while the comments were overwhelmingly in favor of the video and its message, not everyone has been a happy fan. Said genocide222: “Most people who are commenting here are probably too young to really know what happened so please just don’t comment. Cory had a country that were in ruins in every aspect and was destined to fail, Marcos on the other hand came in with an economy that was one of the best in Asia and he just built on that, and he did a good job on that. I just think he became obsessed with the idea that he is the savior? of the country and did not want to let go. That’s why he was threatened by Ninoy.”


Editorial
Another kind of different story

WE see another kind of revisionist history. It is in our view a worse revisionism. It is the one created by the minds of the lords of our politics and our mainstream media.

In the real Edsa 1 People Power Revolt, there were presences thathave been made to disappear in the narratives found in history books and in the speeches and in the media glorification of that event during anniversaries.

These presences are God, the Almighty Himself, and Our Lady, the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God the Son Jesus Christ.

The unveiling of Cardinal Jaime Sin’s monument yesterday in Intramuros did not make up for the glaring fact that President Aquino did not have it in his schedule to pay a tribute to Mother Mary.

The person or persons in charge of drawing up the Edsa 1 anniversary agenda apparently did not find it necessary to include any moment of thanksgiving or passing mention of the Shrine of Mary Queen of Peace. The shrine is just a couple of long blocks away from the secular Edsa Shrine. It was in Mother Mary’s hands that Cardinal Sin’s nuns, priests, seminarians and lay Catholic activists put their lives when they bravely faced tanks and armed soldiers.

This will to forget God and His Mother is of the same caliber as that which most Filipinos in high places have when they make decisions affecting the socio-economic destiny of our nation.

No wonder we are always in a mess.


CHED should burn the house to kill the (f)rats

COLLEGES and universities offer dozens of non-academic activities to an incoming freshman where he can give vent to and harness his interest (read, obsession) and talents: student council, dramatics, music, school choir and band, sports, military, techno, provincial Varsitarians, debating societies, even religion. Such activities are hoped to make him a better and useful member ofsociety.

Still, a few misguided students choose to join frats/sororities and for what else? Brotherhood? Camaraderie? Status? Political connections?— as if they can’t find and cultivate friends in any other organizations on campus. The brotherhood of silence, ofconspiracy, and of politics in the APO grenade bombing case (which blasted the leg of one victim) is still fresh in the mind ofthe public. Its conclusion has remained open-ended because the suspect happens to be a frat brother of our Vice-President.

A student who joins a fraternity is looking for something else outside the realm of education, socialization, and brotherhood. He is a dangerous social misfit. Let schools save these misled souls by “burning the house to kill the rats” on campus. CHED should go after and outlaw all fraternities with or without hazing policies. Those who choose to go underground should be rounded up by the police and school authorities, expelled, and banned from entering any other college. These Greek letter groups have neither place nor purpose in an institution of learning.

POMPEYO S. PEDROCHE

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