Imperialism and thePhilippines election

Vanguard June 2010 p. 9
Bill F. and Sue N.

When the Gloria Arroyo government became a liability for its violence and corruption, the US-backed ruling class in the Philippines shifted support to other less exposed oligarchies.

Predictably, the new President-elect Begnino “Noy Noy” Aquino Jnr. and his administration have pledged to carry on the same pro-imperialist policies that have oppressed and impoverished Filipino workers and peasants for decades.

Imperialism has devastated both the manufacturing base and the agricultural economy of the Philippines. Manufacturing has been reduced to component assembly in the multinational sweatshops of the Special Economic Zones, where workers pay is well below the official minimum wage and the “no union, no strike” policy is enforced by company goons, national police or even army units on site.

The Philippines is now a net importer of rice, the staple food for many millions of people. Corrupt ‘land reform’ policies have had the effect of forcing many small owners off their land to make way for export crops, such as sugar cane and plantation timber, along with multinational mining operations. Even though the Philippines is a country rich in minerals and other natural resources, none of this wealth ever flows through to benefit the people. The poor flock to the cities to find insecure part-time work and live in squalid shanties, eking out their lives as day to day casual workers. Others leave the country altogether to endure a hard and lonely life as cruelly exploited domestic workers, carers or unskilled workers across Asia and the Middle East. A large part of the Philippines GDP comes from the remittances of the estimated 8-9 million overseas Filipino workers.

The tight hold of US imperialism over the Philippines ensures the country remains devastatingly poor, as an underdeveloped, semi-feudal and semi-colonial economy. Against this background and the overshadowing crisis of global imperialism, the election campaign became a contest as to who could serve the interests of imperialism the best.

Election games
All possible measures were taken to ensure the election of people compliant to the interests of foreign imperialism, particularly the economic and political interests of US imperialism, which dominates the country through its financial monopolies and direct investments, coupled with long-standing unequal trade treaties and ever-present military forces. The government carries a large deficit, while debt-servicing now accounts for half the budget!

A small cluster of wealthy Filipino families and their allies use intimidation, bribery and nepotism to form and break alliances in their tussle for power and influence over government. The election winners get to amass huge amounts of wealth rorted from the public purse, to be wined and dined and dance in the spotlight. These feudal games are then sensationalised by the monopoly media to distract the people from the real cause of their misery.

Consequently, the media carried almost nothing about policies, but there was a constant stream of scandals and exposures designed to reduce all political discussion to personalities. This happened with all contested positions – President, Vice-President, House of Representatives, Senate, Provincial Governors, Mayors and Councillors, just adding to the confusion and chaos, as if the length of the ballot paper wasn’t enough!

The election commission COMELEC, disallowed some of the Party-list opposition groups from even contesting the election. Groups such as Migrante, the voice of overseas Filipino workers, were not permitted to stand. The Party-list system allows marginalised or minority groups to have a small number of seats, determined by a percentage of the vote. On this occasion, a significant number of bogus Party-list groups allied to the ruling class factions contested the positions, confusing the electorate and splitting votes that may have gone to more progressive candidates.

COMELEC and the Arroyo government had already made it difficult for voters to register on the electoral roll. On election day, many who turned up were unable to find their names and were sent away. Many voting lists were incomplete or out of date. Some were posted at the wrong precinct or even the wrong town! The confusion meant that many voters were disenfranchised.

To add to the chaos, Arroyo and COMELEC had determined that this election would be conducted using an automated election system to count the ballot paper votes and transmit the results to the main Manila tally room. At huge expense, thousands of machines were hastily delivered across the country and entrusted to school teachers with barely two days training on how to use them.

On the day of the election, many machines broke down and thousands of ballot papers were put aside waiting for a technician or replacement machine, which hardly ever eventuated. Some of these ballots may have been fed into other machines, but nobody really knows whether they were counted at all! There is also a great suspicion that pre-programmed flash-cards were substituted for the actual voting count in several key areas. Many voters, sick of the confusion and waiting for hours in cramped school corridors and ‘holding areas’ just gave up and went home.

All this was observed and reported by a number of international election monitoring teams across the country. They collected evidence of vote-buying, of violence and intimidation by poll-watchers (scrutineers), of the illegal presence of armed police and military in the polling areas and many other irregularities.

Struggle continues
All protests and complaints have been swept aside by the authorities. US imperialism has the result it wanted, not only getting a compliant new President, but reducing the number of progressive voices in the House and Senate as well.

In spite of all the manoeuvres and difficulties, a number of progressive Party-list candidates were elected and will continue to speak up in support of the struggles of the working people and marginalised sections.

Regardless of the election result, the mass work of revolutionary forces of the Communist Party of the Philippines goes on uninterrupted in all sectors and levels in the factories, workshops, schools, dockyards, urban and rural communities, hospitals, universities, towns and villages all across the Philippines. Broad alliances of the united front are expanding. In the countryside, the New People’s Army defends the people from the abuse and violence of the state and strengthens the people’s movement. The revolutionary ideology of serving the people and political education of the masses flows through all areas of work.

Many fighters have fallen along the long and tortuous road of the Philippines revolution. Many more courageous revolutionaries have risen to take their place, to serve the people and the revolution forward. Sooner or later, the Filipino people will sweep away US imperialism, along with all the local tyrants.