Remembering historic incidents

There are two very important events in human history that people the world over celebrate. Yesterday was the 25th anniversary of the infamous Tiananmen Square protest of 1989 a.k.a. the Democracy Movement of 1989 where a mass demonstration of students filled up the huge Tiananmen Square. Students already sick and tired of communism’s erroneous ways had a goddess of democracy erected in the square. The protests began in April and it ended abruptly on June 4 when the Chinese military used force to remove the student demonstrators from Tiananmen Square.

What began as a peaceful student led demonstration became the infamous Tiananmen massacre where scores of students were believed to have died and thousands more were arrested and imprisoned. It was the Chinese people’s short-lived attempt to become a democracy. But the politburo controlling the communist government and the military won the day for China. The rest as we know is history.

A month later, the All China Journalists Association invited us to China (it was my first time to go to China with my media friends from Manila, Conrad Banal, Noel Velasco, Nona Ocampo) and we could still see the granite steps of the center of Tiananmen Square chipped off by the tanks. So the big question is, will democracy make a comeback in China? Only time will tell, but the Tiananmen Square still brings hope that this would come.

Tomorrow, June 6 is also a great day in history as it is the 70th anniversary of D-Day or the Allied Landings in Normandy a.k.a. Operation Overload, dubbed as the largest seaborne invasion in history. Some 24,000 US, British, Canadian Airborne troops cross the English Channel early dawn while the Allied infantry complete with tanks and armor began their landings on the 50-mile wide Normandy beach split into sectors called Sword, Juno, Omaha, Gold and Utah. Some 4,000 plus men on the Allied side died on this day while the Germans also had a similar number of casualties.

These two historic incidents resulted in dramatic changes in their respective countries. In China democracy was trampled down in Tiananmen Square, but it made the Chinese Politburo realize that communism’s ways would not usher any economic development. Hence China literally turned capitalist in their economic policies, but retained communism in its politics.

Meanwhile the political landscape in Europe changed thanks to the Normandy Invasion. The European Union (EU) could never have happened if the Nazis won the war. Thankfully, the Allies put Germany in its proper place and Europe experienced 70 years of peace, except for the short Balkan Wars and the current problems in Ukraine, which is another powder keg.

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Still on history, this coming Sunday, June 8 is the first anniversary of the consecration of the Philippines into the Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary. For conservative or orthodox Catholics this was a great event in Philippine history. How time flies indeed. But what a year it was! It was when I had a one-on-one talk with Archbishop Jose Palma and we talked about history in the 1930s when the Bishop of Leira, Portugal decided that he could not wait for the Pope to consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, so he decided to consecrate Portugal instead.

This consecration resulted in dramatic changes in Portugal. First its threat of communism dissipated, then there was a renewal of the Catholic faith in Portugal. Then Portugal was spared the bloody civil war happening next door in Spain and finally, Portugal was spared from the ravages of World War II. All this because their Church leaders cared for their country.

We should thank our Church leaders through the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) who agreed to conduct the consecration of the Philippines into the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Look what happened in just two months after this consecration by all the Bishops… the pork scam blew into the political scene. Suddenly, we have a Janet Lim Napoles and Ben-Hur Luy pointing their fingers at Senators and Congressmen for helping themselves into the people’s tax money through the use of fake NGOs and pocketing huge sums of money for their private bank accounts.

Mind you, on August 1997 the pork scam was headlined in our national dailies, but it fizzled out. Then during the presidency of Gloria Macapagal Arroyo she was hounded by scams to the point that they had a slogan called “moderate your greed.” Now our nation is vomiting corruption.

But at this time we know that the greed of the political elite has grown by leaps and bounds, while the Filipino people despite a strong economy continues to stay poor. Today our nation teeters on the brink of a political abyss and I must say that my fellow STAR columnist Carmen “Chit” Pedrosa is right when she said that our nation needs a National Transformation Council (NTC) to replace the political elite and we need it right now na!

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