MMMiii!

My family isn’t really very poor. Although, around the time he was elected into office in 1998, my family was experiencing a bit of a really rough time. My father came from a somewhat well-to-do family. My mother was practically a princess in her youth. And they both supported Erap. Actually, they still do. If Erap runs for presidency, they’re going to vote for him.

I knew they were Erap supporters, but I only realized how strong yesterday.

I told my mother that I won $200 dollars, and that I’m going to get about $300 from my PayPal soon. Then she said that’s not really a lot these days. And I do agree. That’s only about P12000. Not even enough to get the cellphone I want.

Our conversation progressed to how Arroyo sucked so bad and how Marcos was an even better president than her. During Marcos’ time, when prices went up, it was also mandatory for the basic salary to go up, or something like that (according to my mother). Now, the dollar exchange goes down, food prices and gasoline keeps going up, and the salary remains the same. My salary as a call center agent will not really be enough to live on with the way things are right now. I’ll be living on instant noodles, probably.

My mother never really supported Edsa II. She would have gone to Edsa III if she was really up to it. She said, Erap may be corrupt, and even if he does buy luxurious things like a rest house to give to his women, are the poor still being supported? Life wasn’t really as bad when Erap was seated into office. The country really started crumbling during the time or Ramos. And Erap was just there to clean up the mess Ramos made. Why should Erap take the consequences?

I don’t necessarily agree with everything. After all, I don’t know a lot about these things. But I realized that common people would more likely feel these things, from their perspective. Especially if they know what it is to be well-off. There’s always that what-if-Erap remained president? What if the last presidential election was really a clean one and Arroyo didn’t win? Would the country be suffering like what we’re experiencing right now? Right now, the poor are just becoming poorer, the rich are becoming richer, and the middle class can’t even stay in the middle. They become poor as well.

To be honest, I had wanted to see Erap finishing his term. He does have the experience as a politician before becoming president. But whenever people talk about him, it’s like what they only remember of him is he was an actor and that he was corrupt and that he was ousted.

I read through the Wiki article on Erap, and his positions as mayor, senator, and vice-president were just like a side-note. Nothing spectacular. Probably so, it wasn’t as spectacular as his role in films, but at least he should’ve been given more credit for being in politics. He wasn’t just a lame actor who was the hero of the poor when he became the president.

Whenever Erap is mentioned, it’s always the negative things that come to mind. The Erap-tion jokes which plays with the thought of Erap being stupid. The corruption and plunder that he has committed. The ouster.

I guess the saying is true. People will only remember your mistakes, and never the good things. That’s why we should always be careful not to make mistakes.

I’m not much of an Erap supporter like my parents. But I do wish he could have been given more justice.

Edsa, Rallies, People Power… these are all useless now. Arroyo won’t be simply overthrown with these.

What we need is real unity and genuine love for our country. Not loyalty to some person, but to the country.

If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!