Premature obituary

KAMPI NOW dead. Even Lakas is dying.

So was quoted Angeles City Mayor Edgardo Pamintuan as saying in a story here yesterday.

Can’t argue with EdPam. He knows whereof he speaks, being – as the story noted – a stalwart of the administration of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, founder of the Kabalikat ng Malayang Pilipino in 1996 and its prime reviver and beneficiary in the 2004 national elections.

Indeed, with GMA a veritable pariah in the current administration of President Aquino, only the trapped rats have not abandoned her sunk Kampi ship.

Still, I guess the good city mayor may have made an advanced, and therefore premature, obituary for Kampi and Lakas there.

The fate of Kampi underscores the failings, aye the aberrations, of the party system as practiced in the Philippines.

Rather than grounded on ideologies or philosophies, policies or programs, the Filipino party system is popularity- and personality-based. Hence parties rise or fall with their human embodiment.

Thus, with the Great Ferdinand, the Kilusang Bagong Lipunan.

With Marcos’ New Society supplanting the old socio-economic and political order, the KBL devoured the Nacionalista Party and the Liberal Party, effectively ending the American-patterned two-party system and birthed the invincible, formidable monolith that in 1978 managed to elect the octogenarian Pablo Floro over the charismatic and then prisoner-of-conscience Ninoy Aquino.

EDSA Uno shattered all of Marcos, his beloved KBL reduced, nay, restored to its sacramental reference of kasal, binyag, libing – the life cycle of the nominal Catholic – not totally devoid of political bearing though with weddings, baptisms and wakes serving as fertile grounds for electioneering.

On the wings of the widow in yellow rode Doy Laurel’s United Nationalist Democratic Organization and the Laban ni Ninoy, morphing into the Laban ng Demokratikong Pilipino.

In Cory Aquino’s radiance wilted Laurel and his UNIDO, leaving LDP as dominant party, with renascent power broker presidential brother Peping Cojuangco at its helm, and Ninoy buddy Ramon Mitra, voted House Speaker.

With Cory’s acquiescence came the great schism of the LDP – Mitra winning as party presidential bet in the convention, but defeated rival Fidel V. Ramos, forming a ragtag aggrupation called Lakas-Tao, winning the 1992 elections.

Lak-Tao underwent a series of evolution in the Lakas-NUCD (for the National Union of Christian Democrats of Sen. Raul Manglapus) then Lakas-CMD (Christian-Muslim Democrats) till finally coalescing to Lakas-CMD-Kampi, the appendage being GMA’s Kabalikat ng Mamamayang Pilipino.

Lakas-CMD-Kampi assumed, for the 2004 presidential elections, the moniker Koalisyon ng Katapatan at Karanasan para sa Kinabukasan (Coalition of Truth and Experience for Tomorrow), shortened to K-4, that provided the stage for GMA’s elevation to the presidency through the ballot, more (in)appropriately – many folk contend – through “Hello, Garci.”    

The 2010 presidential elections saw the renaissance of the grand old parties – the NP with Manny Villar and the LP with Noynoy Aquino, the comeback of the Pwersa ng Masang Pilipino of ousted President Erap Estrada, the birthing of new parties Bagumbayan spearheaded by Sen. Dick Gordon, Ang Kapatiran of Olongapo City Councilor Juan Carlos de los Reyes, and Bangon Pilipinas of evangelist Eddie Villanueva. And of course, the trouncing of then-rulingLakas-CMD-Kampi.

LP emerging victorious shoved to the sidelines NP and PMP and altogether doomed to early extinction the other wannabes.

Yes, parties rise and fall with the fortunes of their human faces.

Thus, Aksyon Demokratiko of Raul Roco, People’s Reform Party of Miriam Defensor Santiago, Promdi of Lito Osmena.

Not all political parties however can just be summarily pronounced OPD – officially pronounced dead, just because the figurehead falls.

Look at the Nationalist People’s Coalition – losing with Danding Cojuangco in 1992, and falling short of getting Malacanang with FPJ in 2004.  

Those failings notwithstanding, the NPC remains a much-sought-after coalition partner of every ruling party.

Look at the PDP-Laban – losing with Nene Pimentel in 1992 – flexing its muscles anew in Vice President Jojo Binay, no matter the fall-out in the United Nationalist Opposition wrought by Sen. Koko Pimentel’s obstinacy vis-à-vis Miguel Zubiri in the same coalition.

Look at the KBL – Bongbong Marcos in the Senate, Madame Imelda Marcos in the House, Imee Marcos in Ilocos Norte. 

As in the Origin of the Human Species, it is not the strongest that always survives, but that who can best adapt to the environment, blend with the situation. So it is with political parties, being, after all, originated by humans.

Hence, for the issue at hand, we may as well appropriate Mark Twain: The reports of the death of Kampi and Lakas are greatly exaggerated. If not all too premature.  

       

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