The IIRC Review
It is the first prerogative of Justice to restore dignity to the human person and this is most especially true in cases of murder.
We do not live in an ideal world. In this world, sickness, deterioration, and war, relentlessly drive against the striving of Man to build and advance the cause of human civilization. And this is true both in the temporal and the spiritual sense.
The hostage-taking incident last August 23 claimed the lives of eight Hong Kong tourists the youngest of whom is Jessie Leung Song-yi. She was only 14.
It's tragedy stems from the fact that we can never bring them back. From their families, friends, to their nation and their generations, to ours, their promise has now been forever withheld from the totality of all human community - at this time.
The just equality of all human beings under God is a chief concern of spiritual Justice. And this equality is built upon two foundations: Human Dignity (who we are) and Human Promise or potential for good (what we are). From this equality we all must begin and unto this equality we all must return. A society that is just will intrinsically recognize and uphold a just equality and her temporal Justice will stand in defense of this good. She will be thus guided.
It must now also be noted that the effects of the tragedy, centered on the deaths that resulted from the murder of the eight Hong Kong tourists, is now poised to claim the lives of other people but not in the same sense. We must be careful not to further damage what good there is that must be for our own sake's preserved. It is from this underlying consideration that I believe the IIRC review findings drew its principal mitigating logic.
Because what proceeds from the first prerogative of Justice is the preservation of the human promise. Notably not as a diminution of its first task but as a co-equal task.
It is a fact of this tragedy that the perpetrator of this crime has himself become a victim of his own evil intention.
It is also a fact of this tragedy that institutional weaknesses played a significant role in the undesired outcome of the rescue effort.
It is also a fact of this tragedy that anger and other unrelated motives still threaten the climate of objectivity in the bar of public opinion.
Evil must not be re-payed with evil. It must be repelled from the life of our common community. It must be deliberately excluded from our public peace.
And to do this, what good there is must be recognized, preserved and if necessary restored by the court of Justice, temporal and spiritual. And in this nation, this is the function of the juridical processes established across all the three independent branches of the Republic government - the executive, legislative and judiciary.
Therefore, that we all agree in quorum is crucial. Because it is very important for this Country of ours, my fellow Filipino compatriots, to move forward.
Personally speaking, and in defense of Mayor Lim, it must also be taken into consideration that the Mayor is an ex-cop and his service meritorious. He has accomplished a lot for the City of Manila as a member of the MPD. He has accomplished a lot more as Mayor.
That his sensitivity to the outfit and to the uniform might have reactively influenced his strategy can not be ruled out because the hostage-taker himself was an ex-cop albeit dishonorably discharged. If this is true, this weakness that in retrospect appear to be so might have appeared to many before the fact to be a strength.
Again, it must be pointed out that the effect of the person of Mayor Lim on the undesired outcome of the operation was only exacerbated by institutional failings that have been the cumulative effect of years of national decline.
The best way to reverse this is to move forward on all fronts. And I believe this is what the present Aquino administration is trying to get us all to do - and by example.
As regards to this tragedy in particular, I believe the best way to move forward is to learn from it and to become better prepared to defend the common good specifically in the effective rescue of hostages and to do this on behalf of all those innocents whose promise we are now left without.
We shall honor their deaths by restoring the dignity of their lives.
Because to remember them well, we should work to become better for their loss and not worse and work to preserve the memory of their promise for our own good sake in remembrance of their lives.
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People Power and Proclamation 50
I am carrying this post over from All to my All -
REVOLUTION, how must we understand it, O my nation?
LET US FIRST SEEK to know what revolution is not: Certain.
Time itself being so much fraught with uncertainty, like a chasm the depth of which no one knows, revolution yawns beneath the feet of those who seek to be defined by it.
It is like a throw of dice, entered only when the need is such that one must by destiny heed the call of random chance. And this need must be such great a need as to be placed upon its time by purposes that must transcend it, lest the will of the fight soon falter and fail, the faith of the people must burn that brightly, to set itself completely against the test.
This is why the People Power revolution of 1986 was such a great wonder.
It is a miracle of grace; our timeless pulling together for God and Country, and the measure of the quality of our people.
So let us remember People Power not as a falling apart but as a gathering together, in our hearts, in our lives, and in our times together as a one whole Filipino nation.
Let us not forget, my honorable compatriots, that to willingly surrender to chance is to court the Devil that we may from People Power learn to remember always the measure of our resolve to advance the cause of our one Republic, and to tempt never the Providence of the one Divine under Whose singular Standard of Truth the oppressed is liberated.
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I support Proclamation 50. I support this Amnesty because I am of a firm belief that we stand to become better unified as a Country through it.
I have always thought that the Magdalo group had in its heart the betterment of the nation specifically, the Filipino soldiery and the nobility of the Philippine profession of arms.
But not unlike our current Secretary of National Defense, Voltaire Gazmin, I am more personally inclined to err on the side of loyalty and disagree only with their method. I do not and never will support instability in all its forms including military adventurism.
In view of this, I believe we can all commonly draw our lessons from EDSA 1986, shed away the past, and become better as a nation for our coming together this time.
Mabuhay ang Pilipinas! God bless us all.
We must begin today
what no other generation can.
We must quicken to truths
that no lie can ever deny.
We must open doors
that lead to new horizons.
And we must shut the gates
so that no one may be left behind.