MANILA - The conviction on Wednesday of
former Philippine president Joseph Estrada may
offer the current administration of Gloria
Macapagal-Arroyo a respite from its many political
problems, but the court decision against the
former elected leader could cast yet another
shadow over her unpopular regime's legitimacy.
The guilty verdict, which sentenced
Estrada to life imprisonment on plunder charges
and required that he forfeit US$15.5 million and a
mansion, had been widely expected, including by Estrada's
own
legal camp. It comes at a time when Arroyo is
still hounded by allegations that she stole the
presidency not once but twice, first in the wake
of Estrada's impeachment and
popular-protest-driven downfall, and then under
allegations of massive cheating during her 2004
election campaign against the late actor Fernando
Poe Jr.
Although the Supreme Court
eventually ruled that Estrada had in effect
abandoned the presidency at the height of the
so-called People Power 2 protests, he continued to
enjoy positive public sentiment and sympathy. Even
while the case wound through the Philippine
judiciary, according to polls, Estrada's net
popularity rating remained positive.
Meanwhile, Arroyo's popularity has
continued to slide, and she has never fully
recovered from the telephone-wiretap scandal that
caught her discussing poll results with an
election official before they were officially
announced.
Estrada's still-strong residual
support, which runs particularly deep among the
poor masses, was shown in a recent survey of the
Social Weather Stations polling agency, which
found his "trust" rating runs at 64% and that
almost half of those surveyed in Metro Manila and
neighboring provinces felt that he should be
pardoned if found guilty. In contrast, only 18%
indicated they had "much trust" for Arroyo, while
62% said they had "little trust".
Estrada,
a former swashbuckling action-film star who
started his political career as a town mayor, won
the 1998 presidential election by a landslide. His
populist style went down well with the country's
poor masses, which make up the bulk of Filipino
voters. Two years into his term, however, Estrada
was already beset with corruption allegations.
His reputed drinking buddy,
then-provincial governor Luis "Chavit" Singson - a
self-confessed "jueteng lord" (an illegal
numbers game), exposed that he had personally
delivered protection money amounting to P545
million ($11.7 million) to Estrada. He also
alleged that Estrada pocketed P70 million out of
Singson's province's share of tobacco excise tax
revenues.
Singson's expose led the House
of Representatives to investigate, and in November
2000 Estrada was formally impeached. In January
2001, Estrada became the second Philippine
president to be ousted by a so-called "people
power" movement, the first being the 1986 ouster
of the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos.
Then-vice president Gloria Macapagal
Arroyo was sworn in as Estrada's successor, the
plunder case against Estrada was pursued through
the courts, and the former leader was put under
house arrest. Aside from Singson's allegations,
Estrada was also tried for stock manipulation and
maintaining a bank account under a fictitious
name, Jose Velarde.
Estrada denied the
four allegations and claimed that the charges were
politically motivated. He also claimed in his own
defense that Singson's testimony was tainted
because he felt threatened by the government's
plans to legalize jueteng.
Political verdict The 211-page
verdict is widely perceived to be fraught with
political considerations, but the anti-graft court
nonetheless earned the public's respect throughout
the six years of proceedings. That's true even
though a not-guilty verdict would have had serious
political repercussions for Arroyo's already
unstable government.
Although Estrada's
organized mass support base has shown signs of
inertia, with Estrada-aligned groups such as the
Union for the Masses and for Democracy and Justice
and the People's Movement Against Poverty losing
miserably in the recent party-list race, their
capacity to mobilize people for massive protests
and rallies is still believed to be strong.
Various other interest groups, including
rights organizations, political groups and the
legal community, have all roundly welcomed the
verdict.
"It showed that it can be done
... that we can prosecute, complete the trial and
reach its logical conclusion," said lawyer Marlon
Manuel, project director of the Transparency and
Accountability Network, a coalition of law
practitioners and civil-society groups. "It should
serve as a lesson or a warning to others."
Law professor Edwin Lacierda described the
ruling as "a pure victory for the Philippine
justice system ... for the first time a big fish
was caught".
Human-rights lawyer Carlos
Medina said the verdict showed that the "court is
not intimidated easily by whoever is accused.
Estrada may be a former president, but he is still
powerful." Medina is also a convener of the
election-watchdog group Legal Network for Truthful
Elections.
Opposition Senators Francis
Pangilinan and Aquilino Pimentel have asked the
public to respect the ruling, despite lingering
doubts about the court's independence.
But
the conviction of a former president is a
double-edged sword that some analysts believe
could soon be turned on Arroyo. Shortly after the
ruling was handed down, Arroyo's critics lost no
time in reminding the public that her
administration faces its own share of graft-ridden
scandals for which it should be held accountable.
Pangilinan said, "This conviction casts a
very long and dark shadow on the Arroyo
administration," noting that her government has
yet to come clean on extrajudicial killings, a
massive fertilizer scam, and other alleged
anomalies. Pimentel said that with Estrada's
conviction, the next to be held accountable should
be Arroyo.
The political winds are
increasingly blowing against Arroyo, who is
scheduled to step down from the presidency in
2010. Initial projections show that the next
president could come from the ranks of the
opposition, judging by the recent senatorial race,
where opposition candidates took nine of 12
available seats.
Moreover, Estrada, even
from behind bars, is expected to remain a
political kingmaker, through his command of
influence over an estimated 30% of the voting
population. Arroyo, on the other hand, is
increasingly being viewed as a lame-duck
president, despite having almost three years left
in her elected term.
Estrada's conviction
may have bought Arroyo political time and space.
Yet an opposition candidate could chose to run, at
least partially, on the pledge if elected to
consider granting Estrada a pardon. Increasingly,
a changing of the political guard seems inevitable
at the next presidential polls, and though down
and out today, Estrada may yet have his
vindication.
Aries Rufo is a
political reporter for Manila-based Newsbreak.
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