100ARAW.com

By John Carl Gozun

Neric Acosta, Sharuff Ibrahim Albani, Alex Tinsay, and Arnold Clavio on Unang Hirit.

Last April 20, in GMA-7’s Unang Hirit, my attention was caught by Liberal Party’s (LP) senatoriable, Neric Acosta with his provocation of People Power lest the party’s standard bearer, Noynoy Aquino, doesn’t emerge victorious in the coming elections.

I, together with other UP Diliman students, had the chance to witness the show live, with host Arnold Clavio. The staff invited questions from us audience, and one of my comrade’s questions was luckily picked for Acosta to answer.

“Kung magkaroon po ng failure of election ngayon darating na eleksyon 2010, anong karampatang action po ang gagawin natin kaugnay po dito?”Ericson Julio asked.

“Unang-una po, to be very direct about it, Ericson, people power. Kasi po ang demokrasya ay hindi pagmamay-ari ng Comelec, ng Supreme Court, ng militar, ng GMA, o ng Malacañang. Ang nagmamay-ari po ng demokrasya, nasa kamay po ng taumbayan. Kung if-failure nila ito, lahat tayo manindigan, karapatan ng taumbayan, ng sambayanan ang demokrasya. Humanda po tayo ah, labas po tayo lahat sa lansangan,” the former Bukidnon Representative answered.

The question was later on followed up by Clavio.

“So kung matatalo ni Noynoy, People Power?”

“Hindi matatalo si Noynoy kung walang dayaan po. Alam nating panalong panalo na sa taumbayan. Ngayon lang kung titignan po natin, sa pag-iikot po namin sa buong bayan, bibilangin lang, lumabas na ang lahat ng tao, boboto lang, walang disenfranchisement, naniniwala po tayo na ang taumbayan na po ang nagsabi na gusto natin ng pagbabago,” Neri replied.

I am not a political blogger nor am I an advocate, but my scepticism was ringing the alarm about such frantic behavior. I can’t help but be a leftist about the spurring advocacy of the hailed yellow army to mobilize amassed supporters to a “new people power” centered on volunteerism as called by Noynoy in a rally in Tarlac. Based on what Neric said above, it is easy to conclude that the party is somehow being over-desperate to sit Noynoy and Mar on the thrones. The best analogy to their probable bitterness is the loss of a basketball team of no good sport attitude. They dismiss the thought of successful elections with Noynoy not winning.

On another note, while it is true that he tops in the recent surveys, it is wrong to assume that he has bagged the hearts of voters to the finish line. Results of surveys are mutually exclusive of that of elections. If failure happens, and if he doesn’t win, it is very idiotic to come up with the assumption that he is cheated just because it was observed in selected advantageous campaign locations that everyone was in yellow and waving a Laban sign.

Let’s just see how many people they can drive to flock EDSA again.