Philippine Election: Post-Election Comment
Foolishness of 2007 Elections
The counting in COMELEC is not yet over. The machination attempts of senatorial candidates and partylist groups are still ongoing for the former to become a part of the "magic 12" and the latter to garner the 2% of the total number of partylist votes, while a large number of local candidates had been proclaimed already.
In spite of that, the foolishness of the election result that is tainted with the mystification of democracy and questionable credibility is already clear. The working masses have nothing to gain and hope for from the newly elected officials of the capitalist state, but more suffering and hardships.
The effects of the election to the entire line of the ruling class is the opposite: it is comfortable with its outcome. The ruling class is confident that the winning candidates (administration or opposition) will serve the goal for the continuation and preservation of the rotting capitalist system. In fact, the stock market rose up and the peso was further “strengthen” (which is the primary measuring stick of the bourgeoisie as to the stability or instability of political conditions in the country) a few days after the election.
Even Gloria herself called immediately for the people to respect the result of the elections and work together for “national unity and development” a few days after election.
“Clean Elections”
In the Philippines, just like in other countries where the worst form of the decomposing decadent capitalism can be seen, there is no such thing as “clean elections” even if we base it on the standards of bourgeois democracy. The 2007 election is no different from previous elections. It is even far worse.
There were more than 100 deaths and more than 100 wounded in the more than 200 recorded violent election incidents. These acts of violence were the handiwork of local warring candidates, who belong mostly to one or “allied” parties (Lakas-CMD of Ramos and De Venecia and KAMPI of Gloria Arroyo).
The armed conflict of political warlords, especially inside the Arroyo faction, is the concrete manifestation of the “every man for himself” mentality of the rotting system. And this will become worse in the future. This also shows the weakness of the state under Gloria Arroyo to prevent or contain the armed conflict between these different factions of the ruling class.
One more example of the “every man for himself” mentality is the success of the opposition senatorial bets in the local level, even when the local winning candidates belonged to the administration party. This means that the local candidates were just thinking of their success and did not bother anymore the call of their national party.
Cheating is still rampant: vote buying, ballot switching, ballot snatching, ballot burning, cheating by COMELEC itself and etc. Almost all of the candidates (including the Left), most especially the losers are hypocritically complaining that their opponents cheated them, as if they were not cheating themselves. The 12-0 win of the administration senatorial candidates in the province of Maguindanao is a clear manifestation of how the COMELEC itself becoming an instrument of widespread cheating in Philippine elections.
The declaration of failure of elections by COMELEC in 14 towns of Lanao del Sur is in preparation for widespread cheating in the holding of special elections in these places in favor of candidates who wanted to become a part of the “magic 12” and partylist groups interested in garnering 2% at the highest possible price per vote.
Even the international observes cannot hide the rampant cheating. So the COMELEC, the PNP and the state itself can only say: “It is not as bad as the previous elections.”
“ The Voice of the People”
The “winners” always say that they are the ones bringing the voice of the people, the people have “spoken” and they were “chosen” to lead (rule over) the former. Thanks to the participation of the Left in the bourgeois election, many of the workers and the poor believe in this kind of mystification.
On the other hand, the ruling class has succeeded in giving a semblance of credibility to the election, which is their primary purpose because of the scandal caused by the 2004 election. The victory of the “opposition” in the Senate and a few in the Left from the partylist groups has been assured, while the majority of congress and the local governments are certainly coming from the administration. In short, the ruling class has already shown that there is still democracy in the Philippines. The ruling class as a whole is happy with the result of the election.
The Left still added one more mystification in their own declaration that the supposed-to-be victory of candidates from GO, especially the good showing of Antonio Trillianes in the counting of the senatorial votes, the popular leader of the rebel junior officers of the AFP, as a “concrete expression” of the discontent of the masses toward the system. The ruling class is smiling while listening to this kind of statement from the Left because it will help in the preservation of the illusion of the workers and the poor who still believe in the Left that something can still be expected from the system for as long as there is an “opposition” within the capitalist state.
The Left Hold on to Reformism in the Analysis of Election
The Left agrees that cheating is rampant during the election where their candidates, especially their partylist, were also victims even if they were also cheating in order to win.
However, instead of correcting the problem and using revolutionary analysis from decades of experience in the dirty bourgeois elections, they became even more drown in foolishness.
In the analysis of the Left: the expected number of leftist candidates was not able to penetrate the capitalist state because there was no electoral reform and the consolidation of their mass base was not enough in order for them to have the capacity to campaign effectively and fight to death their right to protect their votes from fraud.
In general, the conclusion of the Left is this: to immediately fight and win all electoral reforms within the capitalist system. The logic behind this is to have a fair election, which means that there will be a bigger chance for their candidates to win. As such, they will end up lobbying and aligning themselves with politicians inside congress to legislate a law about this.
The goal of the Left and the Right of the bourgeoisie are the same because in general “fair election” is the goal of the ruling class to preserve the exploitation of the workers that is coated with the democratic illusion.
In short, the Left will continually fight to put themselves inside the capitalist state in order for them to become the “conscience” and the “voice” of the masses within the decomposing system that has no “conscience” and that has always repress the rights of the people.
The Seed of Revolutionary Consciousness
Even if in general the bourgeoisie was able to preserve the mystification of democracy and election among the workers and the poor, and the opportunist Left was able to declare that the outcome of the election is the expression of discontent among the people, they failed to hide the true manifestation of the discontentment of the toiling masses against the system.
According to NAMFREL itself, an authorized “citizen’s arm” of the government to watch over the election, 50% of registered voters did not vote. This is different from the previous election in 2004 where 85% of the registered voters voted in the election. It is certain that it is higher this time because according to the state the registered voters has risen considerably compared to the previous election. The lowest turnout was with the OFW’s absentee voting. In addition, the survey of ABS-CBN before the elections among the youth showed that 50% of them were not interested to vote.
The reason of those who did not vote: ALL CANDIDATES ARE THE SAME, AND THERE IS NOTHING THAT CAN BE EXPECTED FROM THEM NO MATTER WHO WILL WIN.
One more example: the vote garnered by Leftist partylist groups went down. Except for the Right’s effort to prevent the former from winning more congressional seats, it is also clear that the die-hard supporters of the Left failed to convince the workers and the poor to vote for their partylist groups and the workers themselves saw that the Left failed to accomplished anything inside the bourgeois parliament, with the exception of their effort to go hand-in-hand with the capitalist politicians.
This is a clear indication that more and more people are getting aware of how useless is the bourgeois election and the process of looking for alternatives outside the bourgeois electoral circus. This is also a manifestation of the increasingly waning illusion of the masses about Leftist organizations. The wide experience of the workers themselves is the major factor that enabled them to see the truth behind the mystification of elections.
The Task of Internationalist Communists
The seed of revolutionary consciousness in the Philippines will not grow and bear fruit if the revolutionary minority being a part of the class will not nurture it.
The possibility is growing that in the future many workers — workers that are questioning the future that the system can give — will listen to the analysis of the communist left. There is also a growing potential of the new generation of workers — the young workers and students — who did not experience the mystification of the Left organizations to become more interested to study and analyze the condition of society and the perspective towards a communist revolution.
In spite of that, the danger brought by desperation against the system might push the workers, especially the youth and the unemployed, to the camp of anarchism, workers atomization and worsening “every man for himself” mentality. In fact, in the past few years despite the worsening poverty and exploitation, only a few strikes happened in the factory level and most of them are only about “union busting” and CBA deadlock. The Filipino workers have already lost their confidence in their own strength to fight the repression of the state because the union themselves are the ones preventing them from initiating generalize strikes to avoid committing an illegal act.
In addition, because of the growing exposure of the opportunism of the Left, more and more of the young generation are enamored to the different kinds of anarchism, instead of them having a serious reflection by studying their condition and looking for an alternative. The disdain for work and the rejection of the revolutionary nature of the working class and the communist perspective could possibly gain influence in the Philippines, especially among the unemployed youth. This is the worse kind of anarchism — individual freedom and the building of small model communities in the middle of the wide ocean of capitalism.
Therefore, the task of the communist left in the Philippines is to reach out to the growing number of workers that are looking for answers about the hopelessness of the system and their future with the analysis based on the framework of international class struggle of the proletariat.
However, before the communist left in the Philippines can take on the challenge, they need to promptly work on their primary responsibility today — the theoretical clarification of their own experience and the total rejection of the influence of the Leftist ideologies: Maoism, Stalinism, Trotskyism, Anarchism and “Leninism”.
Workers of the World, Unite!
Fight for International Proletarian Revolution!
Internasyonalismo
21 May 2007
The facts and Issues presented is indeed without biased on both the different poles (the administration and the opposition). It presented fact that would surely stir ones consciousness regarding the issues in politics. One could reflect that, indeed, moral issues regarding politics in Philippines or even in other countries are far from changing…
Comment by yvette — September 20, 2007 @ 8:41 pm