The Philippines Getting Their Acts Together

By Jill Smolowe

The countdown to disaster had already begun. On Monday, Salvador ("Doy") Laurel, 57, marched into the office of the Philippine Commission on Elections (COMELEC) and filed as a candidate in the Feb. 7 presidential election. On Wednesday, Corazon ("Cory") Aquino, 52, did the same thing. With the ink on Aquino's registration papers barely dry and with only hours remaining before the midnight filing deadline, there was only the dimmest hope that the two opposition leaders would patch up their differences and revive plans that had collapsed three days earlier to run on a single ticket. The possibility loomed that the opposition vote would be split in the snap election--and President Ferdinand Marcos, 68, would be assured of victory.

By early Wednesday afternoon, Aquino and Laurel had each met separately with Jaime Cardinal Sin, the influential Archbishop of Manila, who has been a frequent critic of the Marcos regime. Sin encouraged both to subordinate their personal ambitions to the greater interests of the country. Later Aquino and Laurel met at the house of Maur Lichauco, the sister of Aquino's husband, slain Opposition Leader Benigno ("Ninoy") Aquino. In just 20 minutes, the two candidates agreed to revive their deal for a unified slate. At 10:30 p.m., Aquino and Laurel returned to COMELEC and re-registered. By agreement--and to Aquino's obvious delight--the new papers listed her as the presidential candidate and Laurel as her running mate. For Laurel, there was the satisfaction that the ticket would be fielded under the banner of the party he had spent years building, the United Nationalist Democratic Organization (UNIDO).

The rescue came not a moment too soon. Earlier that day, the 8,462 delegates attending the nominating convention of the ruling New Society Movement (K.B.L.) had assembled at the Manila Hotel to submit the party's nominations for the presidency. As expected, Marcos' was the only name offered. Formalities concluded, the President entered the hall, borne triumphantly on the shoulders of loyal aides. With a touch of nostalgia, or perhaps superstition, he wore the same striped short-sleeved shirt jacket that he had worn to the 1965 K.B.L. nominating convention at which the stage was set for his first successful presidential bid. After the cheers of "Marcos still!" had quieted, the President stepped to the microphone and launched into a sonorous denunciation of the opposition. He accused his political foes of slander, corruption, godlessness and collusion with "leftist killers."

Then Marcos did something he had not done for more than a decade: he designated a Vice President, a post he had abolished after he declared martial law, evidently for fear that any understudy might someday try to hasten his departure. To the surprise of many, he picked as his running mate Arturo ("Turing") Tolentino, 75, a party maverick who was sacked as Foreign Minister nine months ago for espousing views "incompatible" with the President's.

With those rival displays of unity, the Philippine campaign season was under way. On the K.B.L. side, Marcos demonstrated beyond any doubt that he is firmly in charge of his party and, in his choice of Tolentino, that he has not lost his talent for surprises. On the opposition side, the new ticket was the most powerful in recent memory. Aquino, while politically inexperienced, has a reputation for moral integrity that is certain to attract voters fed up with the corruption, economic mismanagement and military ineptitude that have marked the later Marcos years. She will also benefit from her connection with the martyred Ninoy Aquino. Former Senator Laurel brings to the ticket, in addition to his own savvy as a veteran politician, the well-oiled political machinery of UNIDO, the country's third-strongest political force, after Marcos' K.B.L. and the illegal Communist-led National Democratic Front, whose military arm is the New People's Army.

While there are no reliable polls to gauge voter preferences, Laurel predicted last week that the opposition would capture 80% of the vote in a "fairly clean election" and 70% in a "fairly dirty" one. The estimate seems wildly optimistic. True, the anti-Marcos forces enjoy a pronounced edge in metropolitan Manila, home of 4 million of the country's 25 million registered voters and the region where the opposition captured 16 of 21 assembly seats contested in last year's parliamentary elections. But in most of the country's 73 provinces, the K.B.L. still commands strong voter loyalty.

Moreover, the united opposition slate may actually cost Aquino votes among her more radical supporters, many of whom regard the vice-presidential candidate as a latecomer to the anti-Marcos cause. Laurel, who is married and has eight children, was a Senator before the 1972 declaration of martial law; unlike other leading opposition figures, he suffered neither imprisonment nor serious loss of fortune under the emergency. In 1978 he won a seat in the interim National Assembly as a K.B.L. candidate, and he did not become an active member of the opposition until 1982. Although Laurel made a name for himself during the 1970s by founding the country's first legal aid society, leftist opposition members are largely unimpressed by his record as an advocate of the poor. Instead, they see the Yale-educated lawyer as a slick machine politician who will cozy up to U.S. interests and bring about little change in the lives of ordinary Filipinos. Late last week there were signs that dissatisfied opposition factions might boycott the elections.

Marcos' opponents can ill afford to have any potential supporters stay home. Despite the President's sinking popularity since the Aquino assassination in August 1983, Marcos remains a formidable foe. He has two decades of uninterrupted rule under his belt and an almost unbroken record of imposing his will on the 54 million people of the 7,000-island archipelago. He has tight control of the country's electoral apparatus and could easily rig the elections, as he has been charged with doing in the past. Even if he allows an honest contest, the incumbency gives him an enormous campaign advantage with the power to dispense favors and reward supporters. While the Aquino forces hope to raise $28 million for the campaign, K.B.L. insiders expect Marcos to spend at least $150 million during the next two months.

If that money fails to persuade enough voters to remain loyal to his cause, Marcos now has another powerful weapon in his arsenal: his running mate, Tolentino. A 37-year veteran of Philippine politics and one of the country's leading experts on constitutional law, Tolentino is a popular vote getter who could boost the K.B.L. turnout in the critical metropolitan Manila area, his home district. In the 1984 parliamentary elections, he was the only K.B.L. candidate to win a seat in the city of Manila. An outspoken critic of the Marcos regime, Tolentino has called for the President's resignation several times in recent years. He also took part in the unsuccessful 1984 Assembly battle for the abolition of Amendment 6, a constitutional provision adopted after martial law was lifted that allows the President to issue decrees and use emergency powers.

Tolentino's willingness to serve as Marcos' vice-presidential candidate caught many Filipinos off guard. Last month when Marcos endorsed Cabinet Bill No. 7, calling the Feb. 7 election, Tolentino was among the first to label the contest unconstitutional because Marcos refuses to resign before the vote is held. Last week the feisty Tolentino, whose quick wit and muscular physique belie his age, found a new position. "If the Supreme Court rules the bill unconstitutional, then there will be no election," he said. "If it doesn't, there will be (an election), and we have to support the Supreme Court to defend the constitution." As for his well-known dissatisfaction with Marcos- style rule, Tolentino now says calmly, "The moment I become his Vice President, I can be close to him and advise him more effectively."

That is assuming, of course, that Marcos will maintain Tolentino on the K.B.L. ticket. Given the peculiar twists and turns of Philippine politics, it is quite possible that the ruling-party slate will change before, or even on, Feb. 7. Under Section 77 of the Omnibus Election Code, which was adopted three weeks ago, any candidate for President or Vice President can withdraw or be disqualified at any time until noon of election day, and any votes cast up to that point will be tallied for the person from the same party who has been named to fill the vacancy. Skeptical Filipinos, Laurel among them, have warned that Marcos might use that clause at the last minute to make First Lady Imelda his running mate or even the K.B.L.'s presidential candidate. For now, Mrs. Marcos seems determined to dispel such rumors. "I had to go to the major leaders who wanted me on the ticket and tell them no," she told TIME last week. "I really don't like any public office because I am much too sensitive." Opposition leaders tried last week to play down the tactical brilliance of Marcos' selection of a running mate. "It's a sign that (the Marcos factions) are desperately trying to deodorize their image," said Assemblyman Joselito Atienza. "But like any other deodorant, it will fade away." Still, some opposition sources conceded that the Tolentino nomination was a factor in persuading Aquino and Laurel to mend their differences quickly.

The question of the election's constitutionality, however, remains unsettled. Marcos' opponents, in hopes of delaying the vote and gaining more time to campaign for their candidates, have filed a total of ten petitions with the Supreme Court challenging the legality of the snap election. The court scheduled a hearing for this week on the matter, but a ruling may not come for weeks. Opposition members, including Aquino, have warned that if Marcos senses impending defeat at the polls, he might signal the justices, all of them handpicked by him, to call off the election. With a respected constitutional expert like Tolentino on Marcos' team, the ploy might gain greater credibility.

The opposition campaign could also be disrupted by a law that requires any presidential candidate to have been a legal resident of the Philippines for the past ten years. Although Aquino has maintained a residence in Queson City and has paid Philippine taxes during the past decade, she and her husband lived in exile in Boston from 1980 to 1983. Few believe that the President would challenge Aquino's candidacy on such a sensitive point. On the other hand, a politician as resourceful as Marcos might try almost anything if the going gets rough.

With reporting by Sandra Burton and Nelly Sindayen/ Manila