EDSA unadulterated (1)
An episode in
1986, which was among what was termed then as part of a “confluence of events” that led to the People Power revolt at EDSA, was when computer tabulators, officially composed of 30 women and five men manning the Commission on Election’s (Comelec) quick count terminals, walked out of the Philippine International Convention Center (PICC) Plenary Hall in protest of what they said was the cheating they were being made party to, referring to the tabulation results of the 1986 Philippine Presidential Snap Elections.
Retired State Auditor V Arturo Besano, then a resident auditor of the Comelec, said the event may have not been as spontaneous as it was made to appear.
The snap election of 7 February 1986 was held after President Ferdinand Marcos readily accepted the dare made in November 1985 of an American journalist when interviewed during the American Broadcasting Company’s political affairs program This Week with David Brinkley.
No less than Brinkley himself was surprised to the snappy yes response of Marcos to his dare.
The President then wanted to show that he still enjoyed the mandate of the Filipino people.
On 3 December 1985, the Batasan Pambansa passed a law setting the date of the snap election on 7 February the next year. The presidential proclamation was followed by the campaign period that lasted 45 days, from 19 December 1985 to 5 February 1986.
On 16 January 1986, President Marcos wrote US President Ronald Reagan, “I wish to assure you Mr. President, that all constitutional, legal and operational measures have been taken to insure free, honest, fair and democratic elections.”
Events that followed made it very obvious that the Church, the elites and the oligarchs were coalescing against Marcos.
Most of the middle class then, however, clearly understood and appreciated the overall blueprint of the Marcos government, as evidenced by public works and highways across vast areas of the land, and health, social, financial, economic, educational, scientific, agricultural, defense and security infrastructure throughout the country.
Marcos selected Arturo Tolentino as his running mate. On the other side of the line, the opposition united behind Benigno Aquino’s widow, Corazon, and her running mate, Salvador Laurel.
The snap presidential election drew world attention. But the most ironic was the hostile attitude of American legislators who came to the Philippines as observers. Then Labor Minister Blas Ople charged in February 1986 that Undersecretary of State Michael Armacost, Assistant Secretary of State Paul Wolfowitz, Representative Stephen Solarz and Senator Richard Lugar were destabilizing the Philippines.
Two days after the snap election, and with the tabulation still ongoing, 35 computer programmers/technicians who were hired for the 1986 Comelec National Tabulation Project walked out of the PICC Plenary Hall, which served as their workplace for the Comelec Quick Count, when they alleged that their superiors started to tinker with the results. According to them, they walked out for the basic professional reason, to quote: “We did not want to be used ourselves in any way that violates fundamental professional ethics.”
There were several foreign observers: US Congressman
Solarz was there.
Senator John Kerry, one of the observers from the US, said:
“These people are angry enough that they’ve walked.
They are terribly scared.”
Besana narrated that “Senator Kerry looked tallest among the foreign observers. He was young then.” Now, he is a member of the Cabinet of current US President Joe Biden. (To be continued)
“They walked out for the basic professional reason, to quote: ‘We did not want to be used ourselves in any way that violates fundamental professional ethics.’
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Events that followed made it very obvious that the Church, the elites and the oligarchs were coalescing against Marcos.