Marcos vs. Osmeña

We saw and heard last Tuesday afternoon, thru television coverage, the verdict handed down by the Senate sitting as an impeachment tribunal trying the case of Supreme Court Chief Justice Renato C. Corona. Twenty senators pronounced him guilty and three opined for his acquittal. By that democratic process that case is, or should, hopefully, be, now settled.

While listening to the nominal voting being done, I could not help but notice two distinguished members of the impeachment court who trace their blood lines to two former presidents of the country. By a quirk of imperceptible coincidence, they both carry the names of their forebears. It was not entirely inconceivable that, along their impeachment discourse, both the genes and the moral suasions of their predecessors managed, probably involuntarily, to surface. Oh yes, I refer to Sen. Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr., and Sen. Sergio Osmeña III, equally eloquent in their espousal of contrasting positions.

The baritone voice of Sen. Marcos Jr., (he would want his supporters to address him simply as Bongbong) is, as I recall it, not unlike that of his father, Apo Ferdie. When the young senator was explaining why he voted to acquit Chief Justice Corona, his voice reverberated in the senate halls just like his namesake, while also a senator. For reasons known to him only, his facial expression though did not reflect the passion of his sound.

Just the same, as he proceeded with the justification of his stand, he reminded me of the day his father, the late Pres. Ferdinand Edralin Marcos, proclaimed martial law. I was only 21 years old then but, like most Filipinos, I was already familiar with his resonant timber. To exemplify, when the senior Marcos ordered, among other things, that the streets be cleared of people by 6 o’clock in the evening, he instilled so much fear upon every freedom-loving citizen of the country that everyone wanted to rush home before that time. We could not mumble a word of defiance to the unfamiliar curfew imposition. But, you guessed it. The seeming authority behind his baritone voice reigned supreme that the people, save those who managed to either go to the hills or in exile, could only meekly obey.

The young Marcos pronounced that the non-disclosure by the Chief Justice of his money was not an impeachable offense. His peculiar masculine vocal projection impacted a degree of authority to his claim that to be impeachable, the hiding of the chief justice’s money had to be “woeful and intentional”. Oh, if only the senator acknowledged the fact that the beleaguered magistrate repeatedly hid his assets from being written in the legally imposed statement, his voice could have squeaked. Really, how could the legislator miss the fact that the respondent, from year to year, in a span of a decade, kept to himself what honesty, transparency and legal fealty mandated otherwise.

I could imagine, on the other hand, that Senator Osmeña III, replicated his grandfather’s temperate voice and sincere appreciation of fact. (By the way, before observant guys jump at me, let me clarify that this assertion of mine is merely an assumption from what I heard from those who had the privilege of getting near Pres. Osmeña. The truth is that I have not personally heard Don Sergio, the president, speak). The Cebuano lawmaker, Serge to his close friends and allies, in meting his guilty verdict upon the Chief Justice, did not use the Marcos type of bombastic resonance. Instead, he tried to connect with the citizens, by assaying in candid and down-to-earth terms, those observable aspects of the evidence that sheared the mantle of the magistrate’s flawed defense. And Sen. Osmeña III, by doing so without resorting to elocution, convinced his audience, not excluding me, of his just and judicious position.

That in one contentious issue, two scions of two former presidents espouse two different and opposing views may just be an unplanned happenstance. Be that as it may, let me posit the view that the exposition of Sen. Marcos Jr., so casts a negative impact on me that I intend to mark him when the 2016 electoral exercise comes in much the same way that if Sen. Osmena III vies for any elective office, I will view him with positive consideration.