Thinking 2010...

“ The Filipino, it seems, has lost his soul, his dignity, and his courage.

We have come upon a phase of our history when ideals are only a veneer for greed and power, (in public and private affairs) when devotion to duty and dedication to a public trust are to be weighted at all times against private advantages and personal gain, and when loyalties can be traded.

Our government is in the iron grip of venality, its treasury is barren, its resources are wasted, its civil service is slothful and indifferent, its armed forces demoralized and its councils sterile. We are in crisis. You know that the government treasury is empty. Only by severe self-denial will there be hope for recovery within the next year.

To rally the people, I vow to fulfill the nation’s “mandate for greatness.”

This nation can be great again. This I have said over and over. It is my articles of faith, and Divine Providence has willed that you and I can now translate this faith into deeds."

-- Speech of President Ferdinand MARCOS during his first term as President

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If he can sound so right in the beginning how can he go so wrong in the end? How can an entire nation make the mistake of voting a Marcos into the presidency? How can we prevent that from happening again?

For the 2010 Presidential elections can I propose that before we scrutinize the Platform of Government of each candidate, we first look at and dig into each candidate's CHARACTER.

Let's first ask who is the man or woman behind the mask? Once we are happy with the answers then let's talk plans.

I think this is the best way to start narrowing our choices because if we want to learn from the lesson of Marcos the man wouldn't have passed the litmus test of character if he was subjected to it today.

If Marcos was a candidate in this day and age, where nothing is secret and everyone has access to news and information at the touch of a button, his candidacy would not have survived the question of the premeditated murder of Julio Nalundan. This skeleton in his closet would have surfaced long before he would have filed for candidacy and prevented him from even running for office.

Ferdinand Marcos in his 20s, while finishing his law degree, was convicted of murder and received the death penalty for the killing of Julio Nalundan, a political rival of his father. Marcos was incarcerated while the case was appealed in the Supreme Court. In jail he wrote an 800 page defense that won him his freedom. The Supreme Court Justice, then Jose P. Laurel, reportedly was so impressed of his defense that he acquitted Marcos of all charges except contempt of court.

The man was that brilliant. He got away with murder and, as history will tell us, everything else.

This all began in the dark ages of the 1940s when mass communication mediums like TV and radio were still in their infancy. When rulings of Supreme Court Justices were not yet subject to the questioning of a free and responsible press and the judgment of a concerned nation.

But try that today, an accusation of murder won't get you anywhere near the Malacanang Palace - let alone reside in it for 20 years. You kill a man you go to jail not become the president of a Republic no matter how brilliant you are.

If Marcos delivered that 800 page defense to the court of the people via satellite on national TV, today, he'd be booed out of the country much, much earlier than the fates would have intended.

Imagine how different our collective lives would have been if Marcos was not allowed to get away with murder? If the people then were given the opportunity at that information and allowed them a glimpse of the character of the man. We could have been spared a 20 year long dictatorship that sapped the spirit of an entire nation and made its people subject to the terror and trauma of a dictatorship.

A Marcos candidacy with such a tainted past would not have survived the burning lights of an inquiring media and the watchful eyes of a questioning nation.

History has a lot of lessons to teach us. Particularly the experiences that leave a bitter mark in our collective lives. Let us recognize those mistakes, reflect on how we made them, learn and swear never to put ourselves in the same situation again. Let us make a habit of revisiting our past so that we can make better decisions about our future.

The lesson of Marcos to me is this - in choosing our leaders the first thing to ask is CHARACTER. Who is that person standing in front of me promising me a better future? What does his past say about his capacity to lead? What kind of person is this?

One way to answer these questions is to look back in each candidates life and sift through the political talk and find the stories that help define the character of each candidate.

For the 2010 Presidential elections let's be more curious. We need to look inside the closet of each candidate and be willing to unearth the skeletons hidden underneath.

As in the lesson of Marcos finding the skeletons means the very life of the entire nation.