“Austere Laurels”

by: JOHNY MERCADO

Like many citizens, the wife and I pored through the inauguration program for this Republic’s 15th president. There’s no shortage of “backgrounders”.

Inquirer ran a montage of quotes by presidents from “inaugurals past,” plus serial editorials on outgoing President Gloria Mac apagal Arroy o’s “true legacy”. Emails on the transition hav e cascaded.

“Most of the time we fail our leaders,” wrote UP graduate Angioline Loredo, now a New York-based executive. “It is not enough to say: ‘Please, Noynoy, don’t let us down.’ It is equally important to say: ‘Noynoy, we will not let you down.’ That’s my two cents.”

Wednes day ’s peac eful transfer of power radically differs from Proclamation 1081 that clamped on martial rule. Street brawls presaged ouster of the boozed Estrada regime. “By any standard, (this) is a momentous achievement in political stability,” UP professor Randy David notes.

Since People Power, the president-elect fetches the incumbent from Malacañang, Inauguration spokesman Manuel L. Quezon III points out. Both proceed to Quirino Grandstand, aboard Car No.1 “This may turn out to be the longest ride in their liv es,” Inquirer said Aquino has v owed to pin Arroy o for corruption. She will be “gracious until the final moments of her administration,” Palace spokesmen insist.

She had “no choice but to make a virtue of necessity,” commented W. Scott Thompson of Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and Oliver Geronilla. She “decamped” be caus e a ll her e fforts to retain power–from keelhauling the constitution to coopting the military–floundered. “All doors were closed. Except the “Exit.”

The stiff trip recalls the chilly January 20,1953 drive from the White House to the U.S. Capitol by President Harry Truman and p re si de nt-e le ct Dwi gh t Eisenhowe r. A b itter campa ign marred relations between them.

“Can I stand sitting next to that guy?” Eisenhower wondered aloud. When the Eise nhower s pic ke d up t he President at the White House, they refused to have coffee with the Tr umans. Ins te ad, they waited in the vehicle.

A seething Truman (gently prodded by his wife) came out. “ It was a sh ocking mome nt,” CBS correspondent Eric Sevareid reca lls. “ Th e curre nt and futu re Presidents’ journey to the Capitol was chilly.”

Even their memoirs differ.

But there is unanimity on one point. “Who ordered my son John back from service in Kore a?” Eis enhower as ked. “I did,” Truma n re plie d. “The President thought it was right for y our son t o wit nes s t he swearing-in of his father to the Presidency.”

The Luneta program calls for the “ graceful exit” at 10:55 a.m of Arroyo after last military honors. She shakes hands with the President- elect, then drives away, in a private car. Arroyo drives to a “ quieter public role” as congresswoman for Pampanga.

Is that poss ible? Before leaving, she booby-trapped everything for her successor. She shoved midnight a ppointe es into every post within r each: courts, government c orporations to agencies, not sparing even the Red Cross. She gutted the Ombudsman, civil service, etc. Will they serve as her praetorian guards to beat back likely plunder charges? On Wednesday, at least, there’ll be none of Oliver Cromwell’s brusque dismissal of the Rump Parliament: “You have stayed in this place too long. And there is no health in you. In the name of God, go.”

At noon, As sociat e Supreme Court Justice Conchita Carpio-Morales adminis tered the oath to Aquino. The first woman magistrate to do so. It was just “a minute long” oath, a Court spokesman shrugged. Excuse us. Behind the rites festers Arroyo’s drive to shred the constitutional ban on midnight appointments. She rammed through a Cinderella ex emption for the chief justice. Down the road, this issue will mutate in unforeseen fo rms.

After Luneta, the mint-new President ascended the grand s ta ir ca se lea ding t o the Ma la ca nang’s Cere monial Hall. Juan Luna’s painting, the “Blood Compact ador ns t he top of the staircase. President Aquino enters his new office, swept clean of his predecessor’s belongings. He inducts the new cabinet— and confronts stark reality. As his mother did before him, Aquino inherits “worsening poverty, pervasive corrup tion, decades long insurgency, empty sta te coffe rs, amon g othe r things,” UP School of Economics Raul Fabella said. “Hope has often been dashed in this past.

There is no guarantee it will end differently this time.”

We agree. No such guarantee, in any cas e, is possible. Nor do ordinary Filipinos expect such warranty. But are there some hopeful differences now?

For me r se na to r Ren e Saguisag articulated one. Given the track recor d,.Aqu ino wo n’t loot, as his predecessors did with abandon. If this comes to pass, that would be one up for the new admi nistrati on, he wrote in his weekly column.

Second, more citizens realize that there are no “messiahs”. After Pe ople Power, we left Cor azon Aquino to battle off the piranhas by herself. Citizen involvement is essential as a “new window of opportunity” opens for all.

Leaders “ may not claim the ‘divinity that doth hedge a king’, the historian Horacio dela Costa cautioned at Pr esident Manuel Roxas’ funeral. “He is held accountable always for the authority he holds in trust. And when his mandate is revoked, he must be willing to return, as a private citizen, to the ranks from which he came.

“Let him not expect any reward but the consciousness of having serv ed his people and his God. For often, he will get no reward but this. Austere are the laurels of the republic.”