What was on trial was the political system

I disagree with a report that said what was on trial is the AFP system. I would cast my net wider because the corruption in the AFP system is a fallout from a political system that depends on military support to remove a sitting president or keep them in power. Without the military on the side of the president or a least one that stays neutral, civil authority could not keep in position for very long.

It is civil authority, as spelled out in our presidential system, that corrupts the military. It is endemic in the system and has affected other countries where civilian authority depends on the military gun. This was a lesson learned by Latin American countries with presidential systems that ultimately became military dictatorships.

Still, I do not think Senator Jinggoy Estrada and Senator Trillanes should be let off that lightly for General Angelo Reyes’ death. We may not know what made Reyes commit suicide but we do know what Senators Jinggoy and Trillanes set out to do in the Senate investigation - it was their revenge to get even with the late Sec. Angelo Reyes for withdrawing his support from the Erap government and Trillanes for ignoring what my colleague, Alex Magno calls a silly coup.

Those of us who saw how inept Erap was as president turned to his Chief of Staff Gen. Angelo Reyes for help and reminded him the 1987 Constitution states that civilian authority may be supreme but “the military is the protector of the state.” He had to decide on what that obligation under the 1987 Constitution imposed on him under the circumstances. During the Oust Erap days, I was told that Angelo Reyes agonized with his decision.

For a man who takes his job seriously, and who sought perfection in all that he did, his decisions and what guides him to make them must have remained in his mind long after the event. He must have wrestled with the ideas in his mind, whether these were right or wrong was not the point.

Given this intellectual turmoil in an honorable man, the puny senators who humiliated him with words that he had no “honor” stabbed at his heart long before a bullet did. They humiliated him. They provoked him. He was pushed in a defenseless corner where the only defense, indeed the only way he could get back at them for their insolence was in his hands - he would end his life and no one could stop him from doing that.

He was in control of his life and he would use it to teach these puny men a lesson they will never forget. If the intent were to destroy his equanimity and self-respect, bring him to his knees, he would not let them succeed.

This was not a question of seeking better legislation but a witch-hunt to preclude defense or explanation. It was simply a venue for public insult and a slap in the face masked as a Senate investigation, with his hands tied. Worse he was deceived to come to the Senate investigation as a resource person when all along the plan was to use it as a platform to insult him.

It is reasonable for some senators to say that the investigation must continue. But to what end if it were to be conducted by men like these senators whose motives are questionable and whose acts do not belong to civilized behavior. I am afraid the Senate does not have the authority to decide guilt or innocence. That belongs to the courts of law therefore the investigation must continue where it can be correctly handled.

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Suicide is a sickness and is one of the puzzles in medicine. I know of at least three instances where guilt or wrongdoing had nothing to do with depression. In medical circles, there is a common view that a chemical imbalance takes place within the brain that triggers the wish to kill oneself in whatever circumstances whether happy or unhappy. Those who make peremptory conclusions that it was guilt that pushed him to kill himself are off the mark.

The case of the late Secretary Jaime Ongpin comes to mind. It was also suspected that at the time of his apparent suicide he was suffering from extreme depression that could have led to helplessness and frustration.

Another is the scion of a rich banking family who was described by friends as a very stable person with no reason to take his own life. The other is a young girl, beautiful and in the prime of her youth. She had a breakup with a boyfriend and was so distraught her family sought psychiatric care and was prescribed a medicine for her depression. She took an overdose. The doctor who prescribed the medicine died soon after.

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The best narration of how a normally healthy person turns suicidal is by Leo Tolstoy in his book “Anna Karenina”. It is about a painful internal battle that we can only guess about. Anna had left husband and child for a lover but in the end as time went by, she would suffer from doubts whether the lover felt the same intense feelings she had for him. Here are the words in the novel at the last hours of her life as told by Tolstoy:

 “In the evening she heard the sound of his carriage stopping, his ring, his footsteps and conversation with the maid: he believed what he was told, did not want to find out any more, and went to his room. Therefore it is all over.

“And death presented itself to her clearly and vividly as the only way to restore the love for her in his heart, to punish him and to be victorious in the struggle that the evil spirit lodged in her heart was waging with him.”

That could have been what went on in Gen. Angelo Reyes’ mind. Ending his life was his last revenge.

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A newspaper reported Gen. Reyes said “sorry” during the last few minutes of his life. I wonder where the reporter got that when he was nowhere near the general in his dying moments. His children, who were actually there denied the story. Yet it was so casually thrown into the report to impute guilt. What he said to them was “be strong, be very strong” and that gives a completely different meaning to his death. His death was retaliation for what was an obvious revenge in the guise of a Senate investigation.