Moderating that Ramos Factor

By Rolo B. Cena

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Dumaguete Star Informer

06 November 2016

Juxtaposed with other presidents, Pres. Rodrigo Duterte is surely the most colorful.  In contrast and if I may further opine, former president Fidel V. Ramos is the exact opposite.

In 1992, shortly after the Commission on Elections declared Ramos president, he was charged by his opponent then feisty Senator Miriam Defensor Santiago of election fraud, an election protest that was resolved for about six years, shortly before the former’s term ended.  Sen. Santiago, who to date ran for president three times already, was opined by most political analysts and scholars and regarded by many Filipinos as the best President this country never had.

While several morning dailies, local papers, radio and terrestrial giants feasted and placed colors in his resignation as special envoy to China, it would be absurd to put too much hullabaloos in that predictable action from former president Ramos.  For one, it was just decent for him to quit rather than strike his own spikes against his boss.  Two, his approach is different from Duterte’s.  Three, if he talked about misdemeanors, he too has a lot in his registry.

Allegedly, one of the most notorious projects Ramos undertook was Centennial Expo Pilipino in Clark Air Base in Angeles City, Pampanga.  While the project was perceived to be one of his most distinguished contributions to the country, however, charges of massive corruption tarnished the overall results of the projects.  According to reports released by the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ), the Centennial Expo not only revealed the overspending and ineptitude of the (Ramos) administration, but also served as the convenient instrument to effect election fund-raising for his political party at the expense of the tax-paying Filipino people.  The Center also added that while it was intended to be the center of the Country’s Centennial Celebration of freedom from Spain, the Expo earned criticisms for being the White Elephant that disadvantaged the government at the cost of P9.0 Billion or 1.7% of the national budget.  Ramos then had to lobby at the Senate to exonerate his cohorts from the charges.

Tagged as the “grandmother of all scams” by Sen. Ernesto Maceda in his Senate speech in 1996, Ramos entered a deal in 1995 with Amari Coastal Bay Resources and Filinvest Development in the sale and acquisition of 158 hectares of reclaimed land on Manila Bay. The deal displaced over 3,000 fishing and coastal families in Manila Bay just to give way to what activists described as “an immoral, illegal and grossly unconstitutional state venture." The Ramos administration was accused of selling out the government's interests by favoring these developers over higher bidders in various lucrative real estate development schemes. According to Public Estate Authority (PEA), data revealed that the property was sold to Amari for P1.9 billion or P 1,200 pesos per square meter although the value of properties in adjacent areas were pegged at P90,000 per square meter.  Reports said that in 1998, the Senate found a paper trail purportedly representing commissions paid to certain PEA officials amounting to P1.7 billion and benefited party mates, which Ramos denied. This prompted former Solicitor General Francisco Chavez to file a petition nullifying the deal because the government lost billions of pesos in the sale.  Nevertheless, Ramos sealed the deal.

Will Ramos’ resignation as special envoy to China really hurt Duterte’s Administration?

Towards this end, I still maintain my reservation.  During his final years in office, Ramos tried to amend the Country’s 1987 Constitution.  Widespread protests led by Corazon Aquino and the Catholic Church aborted his plan.  An article from The New York Times (September 22, 1997) revealed that during the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee hearing, a member of his Team testified that during the Centennial Expo preparations, Ramos desperately tried to produce monies and exasperatingly calculated all ways to prevent Estrada from winning the May 1998 elections.  Estrada won and truly, in 2001, he was ousted from Malacanang through the concerted effort of Ramos and his cohorts, granting then Pres. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo the politically unpopular rights to take control of the government.

Why wasn’t Ramos Charged?

It was a sleight of hands of some powerful political actors.  In 2004, Pres. Gloria Arroyo won over popular local actor Fernando Poe, Jr. the presidency.  She was charged with election rigging by Poe whose election protest was resolved shortly after his death.  Affected by widespread protests and calls for her resignation, Arroyo allegedly planned to resign but remained in office after Ramos, who believed in her continued economic progress, good governance, and stability, successfully convinced her. Ramos was vocal in repeatedly stating that the scandal is “nowhere as grave as the stagnant Philippine economy in the final years of the Marcos regime and the allegedly massive corruption of the Estrada administration”. On the advice of Ramos, Arroyo cleared all issues regarding her alleged involvement in the wiretapped conversation with an election official known as “Hello Garci” that made her “mental lapse” dictum cum alibi popular.

Are we truly losing him? As a statesman we may be losing his wisdom and diplomatic connections; as a politician whose interest seemed to be only aligned to his personal vision and mission and not to the Chief Executive, we are not.

Arguably though, while the entire country believed that we gained him when he and Enrile defected from Marcos via the 1986 People Power, we however lost him to his gluttony of fame and power when he allegedly manipulated election results over Santiago, betrayed Cory Aquino over Charter Change, betrayed Estrada through People Power 2 and betrayed Gloria Arroyo in the guise of support to cover his ass towards this end.

He should be careful for what he wished for:  What comes around goes around; what goes around comes around.