Since yesterday morning, the leadership of the Iglesia ni Cristo (INC) has massed its followers at the EDSA People Power Monument. Known as a power broker and influence-peddler that leverages its strength for political and economic favors, the INC’s aim is to show force to pressure the Marcos government to withdraw its plan to file a plunder case against INC stalwart Senator Rodante Marcoleta.
The case against Marcoleta comes a few weeks after another plunder case was filed against Senator Jinggoy Estrada, who has since been ordered detained and suspended as senator. These clearly form part of Malacañang’s scheme to secure a Senate majority, to ensure the conviction of Vice President Sara Duterte in the upcoming impeachment trial and prevent her from running in the 2028 elections.
The INC rally is being held against the backdrop of the Marcos regime’s continuing failure to hold accountable, prosecute and punish all government officials involved in corruption, particularly in the flood-control scandal. It has instead engaged in systematic cover-up to hide its culpability and exculpate Marcos allies. While pressing with its plan to charge its political rivals with corruption cases, it plans to let former public works secretary Manuel Bonoan serve as state witness against its political rivals, absolve Marcos in exchange for evading criminal responsibility.
The bigger political context, of course, is the intensifying conflicts between the reactionary factions of the ruling classes, the Marcos and the Duterte camp. Both sides have set their sights on the 2028 elections, and are riding on the people’s clamor to hold accountable all corrupt officials to pursue their self-serving political goals, in order to paint themselves as promoters of transparency and clean government, while desperately trying to conceal their corruption.
The outcome of the INC rally today will certainly depend on its negotiations with Malacañang. It may continue in the following days or be abruptly called off. Meanwhile, it is being accomodated by the police and government officials, much unlike how protests by mass-based organizations are violently suppressed.
Whatever political and economic favors and compromises the INC and Marcos will secure for themselves, the aspirations and interests of the people who were bussed in the rally in the name of transparency and against corruption, will certainly remain ignored and unmet.
Participants in the INC rally joined out of loyalty and obligation. Many of them, however, are also drawn to calls “lahat ng sangkot, dapat managot” and “ikulong na yan, mga kurakot.” They also see the political hypocrisy behind the INC leadership’s push to get one of their own–the corrupt Marcoleta–off the hook.
Majority of them are working people and small-income earners who suffer from high prices and low wages, together with the rest of the toiling maseses of the Filipino people. They are fully aware of the deteriorating social and economic conditions, under the current system perpetuated by the reactionary ruling classes that, despite rivalries, are united in oppressing the people.
The National Democratic Front calls on all democratic classes and sectors of the Filipino people, to unite and organize themselves against corruption of the highest officials of government, the biggest bureaucrat capitalists, foremost of whom are the King and Queen of Corruption, Ferdinand Marcos Jr and Sara Duterte themselves. Let us be relentless and untiring in our demand that all be made to account and suffer the consequences of stealing public money and for inflicting grave suffering on the majority of the people.
The NDFP calls on all sectors of Philippine society to see beyond the conflicting political interests of the ruling classes and their rival factions. These ruling political dynasties divide, mislead and misrepresents the people. The broad masses of the people must stand independently of narrow political and economic interests of the ruling elite.
Beyond the struggle against bureaucrat capitalism, we further call on the broad masses of the people to advance the overall revolutionary struggle to put an end to the rotten system. This semicolonial and semifeudal system engenders corruption, economic oppression, US imperialist domination and fascist repression.
Continue to build and expand the underground organizations as part of the solid base of people’s strength. Most importantly, let us join and support the revolutionary armed struggle being waged by the New People’s Army, as it wages the long struggle to establish a new system based on national freedom and genuine democracy.###
