By MANNY LOSTE
www.nordis.net

After the Nacionalista Party now headed by presidential aspirant Sen. Manny Villar forged an alliance with the Marcoses’ Kilusang Bagong Lipunan (KBL) with Rep. Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos, Jr. as its senatorial bet, the Koalisyon ng Mamamayang Makabayan or MAKABAYAN, for short, which is fielding Representatives Satur Ocampo and Liza Maza as its senatorial bets, opted to launch their candidacy as independents instead of running under the NP-KBL umbrella.

The Makabayan bets pointed out that forging an NP-KBL alliance was a patent mistake as it would have revived the moribund KBL, by a party – the NP, which was actually demolished by the late dictator Marcos when he declared martial law.

Talk of a victim resuscitating his own victimizer. But such things happen when people lack a longer view of things.

Recognizing his mistake, Villar decided to scrap the newly-minted alliance opting instead to invite Bongbong Marcos as a guest senatorial candidate of the NP, while at the same time adopting Satur Ocampo and Liza Maza as senatorial bets under the same party.

In addition, he reiterated his commitment to do justice to the victims of martial law by pursuing the indemnification case for the victims of human rights violations under martial law and by pursuing the recovery of the Marcoses’ ill-gotten wealth.

With such a public commitment on basic human rights issues, the Makabayan candidates returned the gesture of Villar by publicly endorsing him and his vice-presidential bet, Loren Legarda – a first time in Philippine politics when the legal Left has endorsed a presidential and vice-presidential bet. 

While matters have apparently been worked out between Villar and the Makabayan bets, the same cannot be said between them and Bongbong Marcos.

In fact, Satur Ocampo has openly declared that they cannot suppport Bongbong’s candidacy for the senate even if they are lined-up in the same party. 

The reason is rather simple. Bongbong continues to take the line of his mother, Imelda Marcos, that the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos has done nothing wrong in imposing martial law and depriving us our democracy for 14 long years. This revisionist version of recent Philippine history might have prevailed, if there were no living victims of the late dictators’ reign.

Unfortunately for the Marcoses, many among the the rank and file of Makabayan are living witnesses to the abuses and excesses of Marcos and his cohorts. Chief among them is Satur Ocampo himself.

How could they possibly endorse a candidate – Bongbong, in this case – who continues to deny the pains and sufferings of his countrymen during the dark years of martial law.

But such is the nature of traditional politics in this country that given enough time and money, the villain can be transformed into a hero, and wrongs can be officially certified as rights.

Time has a way of making things hazy, but there are those among us who would not let “bygones be bygones” because if we do so, we will never learn as a people from our past mistakes. We will never move forward, but instead keep moving in circles like what is happening now.# nordis.net