TIRED, BUT WISER?
On March 3, Arroyo lifted the state of national emergency. But unless she resigns voluntarily or goes along with counter-elite plots to preserve the current political order, another people-power-type uprising continues to dangle over her head. It is still what most of the groups seeking her ouster are leveraging to force a political transition. Whether the outcome of another popular uprising will be special elections, a transitional council, or a transitional revolutionary government remains unclear, though.

In the meantime, the two critical elements for past successful uprisings are still apparently missing: the support of the military and hundreds of thousands of people on the streets. In the military, cracks are showing. The government may have foiled recent coup movements by some military factions, but it has not put an end to the restiveness inside the barracks.

Interestingly, the fissures in society are increasingly being reflected in the chain of command. A nationalist and, some say, progressive, bloc composed mostly of junior officers, is reported to be emerging. But as outside the barracks, the military is divided between those who are committed to defending the existing political order and those who want to reconstruct it. The question is, who will strike first and who will remain standing?

So far, the only political force that has been able to fill the streets on a sustained basis, though on a limited scale, is the organized Left. Some analysts attribute the general public’s refusal to join them to a so-called “people power fatigue,” and view this as implicit approval of Arroyo and the existing political system.

The other explanation, however, is that the people are not tired, just wiser: having seen how the previous uprisings only led to the replacement of one elite faction with another, and witnessing no real change in their economic well-being, they may be loath to support another merry-go-round at the top. If this is true, then they are just waiting for the right reason and the right moment to make history again. Get ready for more surprises.

Herbert Docena is with Focus on the Global South, a research and advocacy organization. A version of this piece originally appeared on Asia Times Online on March 3, 2005.