the degree of democracy in the philippines during arroyo administration

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De La Salle University-Manila2401 Taft Avenue, 1004 Manila, Philippines

The Case of Arroyo: Military Support, Political Debt and theWeakening of Democracy

A Senior Research Paper on

Political Science

Submitted by:Keren Beatrice R. Dinaque

Maria Nikka N. Espiritu

Submitted to:Mr. Rizalino Malabed

SRP Adviser

Date: April 11, 2011



Acknowledgement

The researchers would like to thank the following:

Dr. Nikki B. Carsi-CruzProfessor Rizalino Malabed

Professor Gladstone CuarterosProfessor Francisco Domingo

Senator Antonio “Sonny” TrillanesProfessor Rommel Banlaoi

Ms. Rowena Banlaoi Atty. Krizna Gomez

Atty. Ray Paolo SantiagoMr. Roberto Paloma

Kuya ArielMs. Sunshine Serrano

Ms. DJ AciertoMs. Epifania Garay

Ms. Ana Elzy OfreneoHon. Loretta Rosales

The whole faculty of Political Science Department-DLSU, staff of Ateneo Human Rights Center,Commission on Appointments, Task Force Detainees of the Philippines, Karapatan: Alliance for

the Advancement of People’s Rights, Commission on Human Rights and Office of Senator Antonio Trillanes.

Our parents, friends, And God

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INTRODUCTION

The military is commonly perceived as an institution whose role is to maintain national

security. But in reality, it has three roles in the society. One is the classical role (Alagappa,

1989) wherein the military performs its duties by protecting the country from external and

internal threats. Then there’s the developmental role (Alagappa, 1989; Matibag, 1997; De

Castro, 2005) which seeks to provide aid to citizens during times of calamities and in improving

the country’s infrastructures. Lastly, the military now assumes a political role which recognizes

the influence of military in politics (Alagappa, 2001). This is where military intervention falls.

Military intervention can be defined as the direct or indirect involvement of military personnel in

the government. There are several ways into which military can intervene in government. Brillo

(2007) identified the degrees to which the military can intervene. First is through military

influence, then military participation and lastly military control. Influence is the most accepted

method of military intervention in democratic society. Any action of the military depends upon

constitutional provisions. Military participation on the other hand involves the military in political

activities by using them as implementers during elections. Other method of participation is when

the military hints (threats) on its political interest through coup d’ etats, mutinies and support.

Control on the other hand is when the military completely replaces the civilian leaders (please

see Appendix A for the diagram).

There are numerous debates regarding the effects of military intervention on democracy.

Some authors like Banlaoi (2003), Preece (2000) and Perez (1996) assert that military

intervention hampers democracy because it suppresses the liberty of citizens and challenges

civilian authority. On the other hand, Matibag (1997) said that military intervention can actually

promote democracy by ensuring the honesty and cleanliness of local and national elections

given that the military remains neutral at all times. He also suggests that the military be allowed

3



to enter the political arena through elections because they can help in overseeing the

government. From this point of view, the arguments made by anti-military intervention authors

seemed to focus on coup d’ etat alone. This urged the writers to look at the other type of military

influence, which is military support for the president that was clearly present during Arroyo’s

administration. Given the notion that the military should remain neutral at all times (Espedilla,

1994), this study seeks to find out how military support for the Arroyo administration weakened

Philippine democracy.

Historically, military participation was exhibited in the Philippines in two ways: military

support for political leaders and coup d’ etat. During former President Arroyo’s administration,

both of these instances were present, as the military leaders publicly swore to support the

Arroyo administration (Taipei Times, 2008). Coup d’ etats, though unsuccessful, were also

present during the administration. These were evidently seen in the Oakwood mutiny and

Manila Peninsula rebellion. Because of the high contrast between the two types of military

participation during Arroyo’s time, the researchers can say that not only was the presence of the

military intervention strongly felt but also on the fact that not all types of military intervention are

given enough attention. This paper will concentrate on the military participation through

providing support for the president. The reviewed literature on the relationship between military

intervention and democracy centered on coup d’ etat as the main method used by the military to

intervene. Coup d’ etats are clearly against the administration. Military support on the other

hand is for the Arroyo administration. Since the military should remain as a neutral entity

(Espedilla, 1994), the researchers would like to find out how military support for the Arroyo

administration weaken Philippine democracy. Exploring coup d’ etat in the view of democracy is

quite laid out on the open that the military officers were able to project general fear to the

civilians during their attempt, but what if the intervention is internal? For an administration? How

does that weaken democracy?

4



Arroyo’s administration had the most military appointments compared to previous

administrations. She and the military seemed to have good relations as military leaders publicly

swore loyalty to the Arroyo administration. The Singapore Institute of International Affairs (SIIA)

presents an explanation as to why the military remained loyal all throughout Arroyo’s

administration. According to them it is mainly because a number of military official “owe their

jobs to the President” (2005). In her first four years in office she already had appointed a total of

eight military generals. This is considered to be the most number of military appointments.

Former President Cory Aquino only had four military chiefs in six years; former President Fidel

Ramos had three in six years, and President Joseph Estrada had two in three years (SIIA,

2005). Arroyo appointed generals to top position even though they only had two months to go

before retirement. This scenario somehow caters to the extension of these military officers in

service (Romero, 2009). This type of setting was very much present during Arroyo’s

administration. The Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ) explains that this

happens because of the “weak & destabilizing institutions” that are present in the government

(2003). And so in order to protect the administration, the president would continue to appoint

military officers. “Regimes will choose this path rather than risk an armed confrontation with

their politicized soldiers” (PCIJ, 2003). Such is the case of the Arroyo administration.

Now to explain the linkage between the support and democracy in Arroyo’s time, the

researchers hypothesized in the following manner.

Figure 1Conceptual Framework

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Military support is defined as a subtle yet destructive method of military intervention

that creates a strong political dynamic between the military and the president to pursue each

other’s interests. It is also considered as the catalyst for the creation of political debt. A Weak

Democracy on the other hand is the general decline of democracy in the Philippines due to

Arroyo’s control over the military and the support they gave to the administration. Political Debt

is the resulting debt incurred by the Arroyo administration to the military after they openly

declared their support for the administration. This refers to the whole dynamics: military officials

were appointed and in return, Arroyo uses them as political machinery for carrying out injustice

acts. Military Appointments are the assignment of generals to the top AFP position which is

Chief of Staff and the appointment of retired generals to civilian positions in government.

Extrajudicial Killings are the human rights violations committed by the some military men

which were targeted towards the members or accused members of leftist movements.

The theoretical framework for this hypothesis follows the concept of Military

Professionalism in civil-military relations as demonstrated in Samuel Huntington’s book

“Soldier and the State” (1985). In this book, Huntington elaborated the difference between the

military and the civilian government. As the military is characterized by conservative ideals, the

civilian government is characterized by liberal ideas. These “worlds” however have their own set

of rules to follow that clash with each other as conservative military would tend to be illiberal.

Huntington noted that civilian dominance over the military must be maintained against the

Military Supportfor the

ArroyoAdministration

POLITICAL DEBT

WeakDemocracy

Military Extrajudicial Appointments Killings

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military threats to liberal democracy. His suggestion to this necessity is to have the military

practice its “professionalism”. He explains his hypothesis that the military is the authority when it

comes to providing security and the civilian authority’s role is to give goals or directions and

have the military achieve it on their own way or “professionally”. But all these are under the

circumstances that the military focus its activities and decision-making on the scope of their

“profession” or to remain “politically neutral” and not intervene in the civilian government.

Furthermore, to maintain civilian dominance would entail “objective civilian control” wherein the

directions and orders given to the military are detailed and direct making no room for the military

to do anything but to perform and carry out the technical aspects of it (Huntington, 1985).

In this case, the military support, however unpopular it is, like any other military

intervention weakened democracy because of their non-professionalism and defiance of political

neutrality. Figure 1 illustrates the variables of the study; the independent variable is the military

support, while the dependent variable is a weakened democracy. The researchers hypothesized

that:

H1 – Military support weakens democracy therefore military support for the Arroyo administration

weakened Philippine Democracy during Arroyo’s tenure.

H2 – Military support created “political debt” for the Arroyo administration, which weakened

Philippine democracy. Military appointments were used by Arroyo to repay the political debt.

Because of the appointments, Arroyo was able to use the military into silencing the leftists

resulting to extrajudicial killings.

H3 – Political Debt weakens democracy by enabling the military to suppress or control the

opposition through extrajudicial killings.

This study only includes Philippine military personnel and professionals who were

involved or were at least aware of the incidents which showed military support for the Arroyo

administration. Observations will only be limited to the period of Arroyo’s administration and the

armed forces of the Philippines. This study will only observe the effects of military support for

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the Arroyo administration to Philippine democracy. Observations will only be conducted in Metro

Manila where the central government is located since the researchers will be concentrating on

the presidential seat alone. The Arroyo case was also chosen because of its recentness and the

clear support which the military had for the regime. Another reason is that the Arroyo

administration made the most military appointments in Arroyo’s 10 years in office. Other military

roles and methods of military intervention will not be included in the study.

For this study, the researchers used two methods for data gathering: key informant

interviews and archival analysis. Each key informant provided insightful perspectives in the

hypothesis. An interview guide was used to conduct interviews.

The interviewees were: (1). Professor Rommel Banlaoi, a professor of Political science

who is also known for his works on national security, military affairs and military intervention, (2).

Senator Antonio “Sonny” Trillanes IV, a retired military officer that led the Oakwood Mutiny who

now serves as a Senator of the Philippines, (3). Mr. Roberto Paloma of Commission on

Appointments, (4). Ms. Sunshine Serrano of Research, Documentation and Information

Committee of Task Force Detainees of the Philippines, and (5). Ms. DJ Acierto of Karapatan,

Alliance for the Advancement of People’s Rights. The government agencies explored for the

archival research were Commission on Appointments Commission on Human Rights. While the

Non-Government Organizations were Task Force Detainees of the Philippines, Karapatan,

Alliance for the Advancement of People’s Rights and Ateneo Human Rights Center. The

Freedom House website was also explored for their Country reports.

The reports from the Freedom House (2002-2010) and other supporting details were

presented as proofs of a weakened democracy in the Philippines during Arroyo’s regime. The

data gathered is analyzed through content analysis. The two data gathering methods represent

the view of experts and intellects and the actual existing records. This setup is also valuable for

the consistency of the conclusions. The archival data to be gathered will be cases of military

appointment and extrajudicial killings that are within the timeframe of Arroyo’s administration.

8



Content analysis will be employed on the data gathered using the general themes of: Military

Support, Arroyo’s control of the military (or the interplay in the “political debt”) and an aspect of a

weak or weaker democracy. A matrix was constructed to illustrate the prevalence or non-

prevalence of these themes in the documents and transcripts. Then a series of arguments will

explain the mark on each cell of the table compiling them into the characteristics each theme.

These examinations will represent the manifestation of political debt. Now to make these

findings relevant to this paper’s hypothesis and the findings of Freedom House, the researchers

will formulate a matrix to correlate the general themes and the indicators used by Freedom

House reports.

The following section will discuss the data and analysis then summarize the findings

before the conclusions.

ARROYO and MILITARY: The Dynamics

The three main themes of this study are 1. Military Support; 2. Political Debt and 3.

Weaker Democracy. The presence of these themes were examined on the key informant

interviews and the results are shown below.

Table 1Themes of the Study

Interviewees

Senator Trillanes

Prof. Banlaoi Mr. Paloma HumanRights

(Serranoand

Acierto)

1. Military Support for Arroyo

+ + + +2. Political Debt + + -l l-3. Weaker Democracy - + + +

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The positive signs show that the view of the interviewee on the theme is parallel to this

paper’s theory. The negative signs on the other hand show that the view is opposing the theory

with regards to that theme. The half pluses on the other hand show that the view of the

interviewee is only partial with regards to the theme. All these accounts represented the

different views of the actors on the theory: military, government (Commission on Appointments

or CA), academe and Human Rights (HR) organizations. As not all extrajudicial killings are

accurately recorded, two NGO representatives are interviewed to compare their findings.

MILITARY SUPPORT

Military intervention is commonly associated with coup d’ etats and mutinies but it can

also be exhibited through a method that’s more subtle yet destructive: military support. It is

described as such because it’s not as highlighted unlike the previously stated types of

intervention and it can be destructive to the civilian society because the military can be easily

manipulated by the president. During Arroyo’s administration the support of the military was

highly evident. The military support for Arroyo started in 2001 when then AFP Chief of Staff

Angelo Reyes withdrew his support from former President Joseph Estrada and facilitated his

removal which paved the way for Arroyo’s rise to power. This was also shown on Figure 2 as

military support for Arroyo exists in all the perspectives examined in the key informant

interviews.

But having this kind of description, military support was existent even before Arroyo’s

period. Sunshine Serrano (2011) of Task Force Detainees of the Philippines (TFDP) said that

military support as a kind of intervention was very blatant and evident during Arroyo’s regime.

Professor Rommel Banlaoi (2011) also contributed on its historical existence because the

Filipino military institution is socialized into participating in politics that started way back from the

formation of the republic. It wasn’t a taboo in the government unlike Western ideals. In Brillo’s

examination of the 2001 military support, he also came to a result that a military and civilian

government relation endured within Marcos to Estrada’s regime. His concrete examples are

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Marcos’ “partnership” with the military for the dictatorial regime, putting the military at par with

the government, the initiating acts of the military in the 1986 people power revolution and the

famous support withdrawal from the Estrada administration (2007, pp. 8-9). All these evidences

of “military influence” (2007, p. 3), as how Brillo categorizes the types of military interventions,

along with the interviewee’s views only show that military support is as historically evident as

coup d’ etat and mutiny. The only difference is that it’s not given much attention despite its

impact on the civilian government. It must also be noticed how there is no successful coup

attempts in the history of Philippine republic. And because of this, military support is much more

important to study and analyze especially because it’s recent.

Now that the importance of military support is established, it is also an imperative to see

how the military support lasts, if it ever lasts, how it’s used or if it evolves into something else.

Arroyo utilized ways to maintain the military’s support or loyalty.

POLITICAL DEBT

Maintaining military support made the Arroyo administration indebted to the military. This

debt is existent in the dynamics of military appointments and extrajudicial killings. Banlaoi

(2011) described the military as being “politically beholden” to the Arroyo administration. The

military officials were beholden in a sense that they “owe their job to the president” (SSIA,

2005). As shown in table 1, political debt is existent in the views of Trillanes and Banlaoi (2011).

Trillanes (2011) viewed these appointments as Arroyo’s usage of the military for her conditions.

However Paloma (2011) only focused on the appointments and that the HR NGOs elaborated

more on the extrajudicial killings. Paloma (2011) explained that Arroyo had the highest number

of chiefs of staff appointments as compared to other presidents. And aside from this, Trillanes

mentioned in his interview that Arroyo took care of her generals as the various retirees were

appointed to different civilian positions. Angelo Reyes was appointed as secretary of

Department of National Defense, Department of Interior and Local Government, Department of

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Environment and Natural Resources and Department of Energy (CA, 2011). Alexander Yano,

Roy Cimatu and Generoso Senga were all retired AFP chief of staff who were assigned to

diplomatic posts. Dionisio Santiago on the other hand became head of the Philippine Drug

Enforcement Agency after his retirement. According to Tordecilla of PCIJ, Arroyo appointed a

total of 11 generals as AFP chief of staff. Furthermore he argued that these appointments

served as rewards for their support as PGMA’s allies (Tordecillia, 2011).

Table 2Military Appointments

*mandatory military retirement age: 56

Name of

MilitaryAppointee

Military

Position/Rank

Appointed Position

Under Arroyo’sRegime

Date of

Appointment/Date post was

assumed

Age during the

filing of appointment

Date of

Retiremen

LtGenHermogenesC. Esperon

LieutenantGeneral

- AFP Chief of Staff - Cabinet Secretary- Office of thePresidential adviser onthe peace process

July 21, 2006 53 February 92008

General Victor Ybrado

LieutenantGeneral

AFP Chief of Staff June 2009 55 March 10,2010

Delfin M.Bangit

LieutenantGeneral

AFP Chief of Staff February, 2010 June, 2010

GeneralDiomedioVillanueva

AFP Chief of Staff

AFP Chief of Staff December 20,2001

55 May 18,2002

DionisioSantiago

AFP Chief of Staff

- AFP Chief of Staff - Philippine DrugEnforcement Agency

December 18,2002Nomination

56 April 7,2003

LtGen Roy A.Cimatu

- LieutenatGeneral

- AFP Chief of Staff


- Ambassador toMiddle East

- preparedappointment-July 3, 2002- 2006

54

58

July 4,2002

Narciso Abaya AFP Chief of

Staff


-CEO of BasisConversion andDevelopment Authority

August 21, 2002 56 October

2004

BenjaminDefensor

AFP Chief of Staff

- AFP Chief of Staff -Co-chairman of theboard of AFPRetirement Separationand Benefit System

October 16,2002

- November28, 2002

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- Chairman of theBoard of AFP Savingsand Loan AssociationIncorporated and AFPGovernment InsuranceCorporation

Retired LtGenGenerosoSenga

- LieutenantGeneral- AFP Chief

- AFP Chief of Staff - General Manager of National BroadcastingNetwork

20052006

- July 2006

RetiredGeneral

Alexander B.Yano


- Ambassador toBrunei Darussalam- AFP Chief of Staff

-June 11, 2008 55 May 1,2009

Efren Abu LieutenantGeneral

AFP Chief of Staff October 19,2004

55 August 15,2005

Angelo Reyes AFP Chief of Staff

Secretary of DND,DILG, DENR and DOE

Source: Commission of Appointments, 2011 & GMA News Research, 2006

From this table, we can see that there’s a trend of appointing military officers that are

nearing retirement. Most of them are around 50s, close to the mandatory retirement age of 56. It

can also be seen that after retirement, these generals were given civilian positions. Even though

they are supposed to be retiring, they are kept near Arroyo instead. Another observation is that

these military officials are all, in Tordecillia’s words, “allies” of Arroyo. And these observations

are besides the fact that Arroyo had more chief of staff appointments compared to previous

presidents (SSIA, 2005). These observations indicate Arroyo’s interest as a leader. But the

question is, what kind of interest is it?

Mr. Roberto Paloma (2011), the interviewee from CA even noted that Angelo Reyes’

summary of appointments is comprised by a four page table stating the number of filed

appointments. According to him, that record alone could tell how much Arroyo wanted to keep

Reyes “around” and how this would maintain his support to her. Tordecillia explained that this is

“political pandering” to protect the administration from issues of legitimacy (2011), a way to

maintain the support from the military. Banlaoi (2011) also emphasized the importance of

13



maintaining this support by providing “perks and porks” or technically speaking, giving important

roles to military men in the government and society.

When Arroyo had “politically beholden” the military she was able to gain full control of

them. Not only in the sense of being the commander –in-chief but also because she was able to

use them to protect the administration from so-called leftist organizations. This exchange of

appointments and protection shows the relationship between the military and Arroyo. This type

of setting transpired even before the Arroyo administration. During Marcos’ time, he also made

some form of appointments to the military as he granted indispensable powers for them in

exchange of the “protection” and the silencing of the opposition. Marcos used the military for his

personal interests (Quilop, 2001 p. 93). Coincidentally, this is the period wherein the military in

the Philippines started to embrace its political nature. It was even said that the military was used

for cheating in the 2004 elections (Hedman, 2001). In Senator Antonio Trillanes’ view, military

support manifested when Arroyo used the AFP for cheating in the 2004 elections. He reiterates

that the military along with other government agencies are tools for Arroyo’s corruption and

accumulation of power. At the same time Paloma also points out the blatant “fact” that Arroyo

was able to cheat elections through the military (2011).

This interest was mainly geared towards the protection of the Arroyo administration. DJ

Acierto (2011) of Karapatan puts emphasis on the fact that Arroyo posed the need to

“neutralize” the opposition or the so-called leftist organizations that were present during her

time. Neutralization involved silencing the opposition which meant torturing and killing these

activists.

Oplan Bantay Laya was created in 2002 as a tool for fighting the insurgency. Its main

objective was to eliminate fronts of the New People’s Army. Unfortunately this plan did not

differentiate armed from unarmed civilians. The “Order of the Battle” came out in 2008 and it

was part of the Oplan Bantay Laya movement which introduced the people living in the hamlets

to the organizations who were considered to be enemies of the state. Members of these

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organizations were considered to be enemies of the state. The Order of Battle contained

names, pictures, and other personal information of people working for the leftist organizations. A

lot of the people included in this list have already been killed in Mindanao (Serrano, 2011). The

military then started pointing fingers to leftist organizations as parts or fronts of the guerrilla

movements. Aside from this Gen. Jovito Palparan became widely known as the “berdugo” of the

military. It was said that wherever Palparan went or is assigned to, the number of extrajudicial

killings in that area increases (Melo report, 2006, p.20). Death squad operations were also part

of the Bantay Laya program and this was said to have resulted to a significant increase in the

number of extrajudicial killings of human rights defenders and activists in the country. Despite

concrete evidence pointing the military as perpetrators of these killings, none of them were

brought to justice.

The figure shown below are the statistics gathered from the records of two human rights

organizations: Karapatan and the Task Force Detainees of the Philippines.

Figure 2Number of Victims of Extra Judicial Killings under Arroyo Government

0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010

KARAPATAN

TFDP

15



are experiencing according to Trillanes, this is how the country did during Arroyo’s regime. In

table 1, all interviewees gave the view of having a weaker or “failed” democracy during Arroyo’s

regime. Trillanes (2011) however claimed that there is no democracy in the first place. Banlaoi

(2011) subtly describes this notion in the Philippines as a façade of a democracy.

Figure 4Freedom House Country Report: Philippines; 2002-2010

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

Freedom House

Score

2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010

Year

Political

Rights Score

Civil Rights

Score

Source: Freedom House. Country Report: Philippines, 2002-2010.

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The figure above shows the Freedom House country report of the Philippines from 2002-

2010. 2001 wasn’t included in the data as this is the start of the term of Arroyo. This study is

looking on the consequences of the support during Arroyo’s regime. Including 2001 would also

mean the impeachment of Joseph Estrada which would fall outside the scope of this study.

According to Freedom House’s measuring indicators, those who score under 1.0-2.5 are

categorized as free, those who fall under 3.0-5.0 are partly free while those who fall under 5.5-

7.0 are not free (see Appendix D). This categorization can be attained through the combination

of the two scores: Political Rights Score and Civil Rights Score. These scores are measured on

the indicators used by Freedom House (see Figure 6). Most of which can be answered by a yes

or no. The higher the score is, the less political or civil rights are felt.

In the graph above it can be seen that as Arroyo’s regime progresses, the less civil and

political rights are felt. 2006 is the year where the country started to change scores steadily

increasing as the years progress. In the country reports, Philippines changed from free to partly

free by 2006 also. It was said in the summaries that electoral corruptions and fraud is the

reason for the change of ratings. Also by 2007, Freedom House reported that the increase in

the number of extrajudicial killings contributed to the “downward arrow” in the ratings. And

during 2009, Muslim-military violence resulted to more killings at around 600,000 people. All

these factors contributed to the declining ratings of the Philippines in the Freedom House

indicators. Now in the current 2010 rankings, Philippines scored 3.5-partly free in the ratings.

Because of these incidences, people were afraid to speak out for fear of the killings. We cannot

infer if these ratings are better than other countries, but it can be established that democracy

weakened as Arroyo’s regime ends through the measures of political and civil rights.

LINKING MILITARY SUPPORT AND PHILIPPINE DEMOCRACY

Based on the arguments above, political debt can be summarized as the exchange of

interests between Arroyo and the military. In order for the military to actually advance their

18



position in the institution, they needed to support Arroyo. And since it is in Arroyo’s interest to

have the military on her side, she made several military appointments. Through military

appointments, Arroyo was able to gain the military and used them for her personal interests.

One instance of such display of exchange is when certain military men helped Arroyo to win the

2004 elections. Military appointments on AFP Chief of Staff during this period are characterized

by (1) military officials are nearing retirement, (2) there are appointment of retirees on civilian

positions, and (3) appointees are mostly allies. While extrajudicial killings are characterized by

(1) ambushes are directed towards political activists and members of leftist organizations, (2)

these are proven to have been committed by state actors and the police, and (3) while killings

are concentrated in Mindanao during Estrada’s administration, it was dispersed all throughout

the Philippines during Arroyo’s time.

The researchers used the indicators created by Freedom House which is mainly

composed by two elements political rights and civil rights. Using the characteristics mentioned

above, each indicator is marked with a positive or a negative sign. A positive sign indicates that

there is a connection found between the indicator and the characteristics. A negative sign would

indicate that there’s no connection found and therefore political debt doesn’t affect that indicator.

Each corresponding mark is explained.

Table 3Political Debt and Philippine Democracy (may comments si sir sa mga ilang cell)

POLITICAL RIGHTS POLITICAL DEBT

ELECTORAL PROCESS

Is the head of government or other chief

national authority elected through freeand fair elections?

+

As stated earlier, military personnel were usedto cheat for the Arroyo administration duringthe 2004 elections.

Are the national legislativerepresentatives elected through free andfair elections?

- It might be that “military intention” also existat local levels-di lang kasama sa researchquestion niyo

Are the electoral laws and frameworkfair?

-

19



POLITICAL PLURALISM ANDPARTICIPATION

Do the people have the right to organize

in different political parties or other competitive political groupings of their choice, and is the system open to therise and fall of these competing partiesor groupings?

+Some leftist organizations were considered to

be part of the NPA which led to the membersof these organizations as enemies of the state.

Is there a significant opposition voteand a realistic possibility for theopposition to increase its support or gain power through elections?

+The manipulation of the 2004 elections by the

Arroyo administration had a negative effect onthe chance of the opposition (FPJ) to win theelections.

Are the people's political choices freefrom domination by the military, foreign

powers, totalitarian parties, religioushierarchies, economic oligarchies, or any other powerful group?

+People are led to believe that leftist

organizations are enemies of the state.

Do cultural, ethnic, religious, or other minority groups have full political rightsand electoral opportunities?

-

FUNCTIONING OF GOVERNMENT

Do the freely elected head of government and national legislativerepresentatives determine the policiesof the government?

- well political appointees like your generalsmake policies but are not elected

Is the government free from pervasive

corruption?

+

Military appointments were used to reward thesupporters of the Arroyo administration.

Is the government accountable to theelectorate between elections, and doesit operate with openness andtransparency?

+None of the state actors who were guilty of committing extrajudicial killings and electionfraud were held accountable.

CIVIL LIBERTIES POLITICAL DEBT

FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION AND BELIEF

Are there free and independent mediaand other forms of cultural expression?(Note: In cases where the media arestate controlled but offer pluralisticpoints of view, the survey gives thesystem credit.)

- what about the increase in the number of killings among journalists

Are religious institutions andcommunities free to practice their faithand express themselves in public and

+Everyone, armed or unarmed, can be accusedas enemies of the state even without

20



private? evidence.

Is there academic freedom, and is theeducational system free of extensivepolitical indoctrination?

-

Is there open and free privatediscussion?

-

ASSOCIATIONAL AND ORGANIZATIONALRIGHTS

Is there freedom of assembly,demonstration, and open publicdiscussion?

+Prominent political activists become targets for extrajudicial killings.

Is there freedom for nongovernmentalorganizations? (Note: This includescivic organizations, interest groups,foundations, etc.)

+Several leftist organizations were accused asfronts of the NPA.

Are there free trade unions and peasantorganizations or equivalents, and is

there effective collective bargaining?Are there free professional and other private organizations?

+Peasant organizations were attacked by the

military under the allegations that they are onlya front for the NPA.

RULE OF LAW

Is there an independent judiciary? -Does the rule of law prevail in civil andcriminal matters?

+Despite the guilt of the state actors specificallythe military in the commitment of extrajudicialcrimes, no one was actually apprehended.

Is there protection from political terror,unjustified imprisonment, exile, or torture, whether by groups that support

or oppose the system? Is there freedomfrom war and insurgencies?

+No one was practically safe during the Arroyoadministration because even civilians were

accused of supporting the insurgents.

Do laws, policies, and practicesguarantee equal treatment of varioussegments of the population?

+Progressive movements and leftistorganizations are treated violently by themilitary and members are persecuted withoutvalid reason and through illegal means.

PERSONAL AUTONOMY AND INDIVIDUALRIGHTS

Do citizens enjoy freedom of travel or choice of residence, employment, or

institution of higher education?

-

Do citizens have the right to ownproperty and establish privatebusinesses? Is private business activityunduly influenced by governmentofficials, the security forces, politicalparties/organizations, or organizedcrime?

-

21



Are there personal social freedoms,including gender equality, choice of marriage partners, and size of family?

-

Is there equality of opportunity and theabsence of economic exploitation?

-

From the table above it can be seen that 13 out of the 25 indicators are affected by the

characteristics of political debt.

In the section of political rights, 6 out of the 10 indicators are affected by political debt.

This implies the negative impact that political debt has on the freedom of the people to exercise

their political rights. On the electoral process alone, it was already shown that elections were

affected by the concept of political debt as the results of the 2004 elections were manipulated by

the administrations, destroying the essence of having free and fair elections. On the other hand

political participation of the people is heavily affected by political debt as three out of four

indicators point out. The suppression of the opposition was highly significant as the civil leftist

organizations were seen as threats to the society and were considered as insurgents

themselves. The violent treatment of the opposition affected the political freedom of the people.

On the functioning of government, political debt disrupts the accountability and transparency of

government as the government is not held responsible for the atrocities committed by the

military, considering the fact that the president is their commander in chief (Banlaoi, 2011). This

lack of accountability implies tolerance of these killings. (Serrano, 2011)

The media and the academe are not affected by political debt. However, public

expression is somehow limited due to the threat of being a victim of military violence.

Associational and organizational rights were heavily affected by political debt as all the three

indicators in this section show. These rights are suppressed due to the threats projected by

extrajudicial killings. The independence of the judiciary is not compromised by the presence of

political debt; however the rule of law is not as strong as it should be in a democratic country.

The increased numbers of extrajudicial killings indicate that civilians are not protected by the

law, and that the law does not deter the military from committing such violence. Personal

22



autonomy, on the other hand is not at all affected by the presence of political debt as shown in

the four indicators above.

Political rights and civil rights are the two core elements of democracy as measured by

Freedom House. Political debt had a negative impact on these two elements; therefore we can

say that political debt also had an impact on Philippine democracy during Arroyo’s

administration. The more indicators are affected, the heavier the impact on democracy. In this

case, more than 50% of the indicators were found to be affected by the presence of political

debt. This shows that almost 50% of the breakdown of democracy (electoral process, political

participation, functioning of the government, freedom of expression and belief, associtional and

organizational rights and rule of law). This 50% implies the effect of political debt on groups and

communities as well as institutions (government, NGO etc). It excludes however those

individuals who are not affiliated with any leftist group or without any accusation for affiliation. In

summary, this result implies that political debt has an impact on democracy particularly on its

collective aspect but not entirely as the other 50% needs to be filled in by other factors.

Explanation on why political rights is the only one affected by political debt. Freedom

House graph (figure 4): civil rights did not increase. Matrix (table 3): 6/10=political rights (60%),

7/15=civil rights (less than 50%).

CONCLUSION

In summary, the study found out that Philippines had a weaker democracy during

Arroyo’s regime and that political debt plays a relatively huge part on it with military support

serving as a catalyst.

This paper reiterates first that military support is an important type of military intervention

in the Philippines as it is rampant on the recent administrations and that its political implications

are impactful.

23



Secondly, political debt exists through the exchange of interests between Arroyo and the

military as catalyzed by the 2001 military support. This dynamic comprises military

appointments and extrajudicial killings. Appointments were characterized by retiring military

officials, close “allies” of the Arroyo administration as demonstrated on the support and the

appointment on civilian positions. Extrajudicial killings were characterized by ambushes of

political activists and members of leftist organizations, committed by state actors such as the

military and the police and that compared to Estrada, incidences in Arroyo’s administration are

dispersed all throughout the nation. In exchange for the appointments as a payment for the

support, Arroyo used the military to pursue her interests such as the silencing of the opposition

through extrajudicial killings.

Thirdly, democracy is affected by the concept of political debt through its focus and

impact on groups and communities, specifically those who are affiliated and accused as leftists.

Political debt also affects democracy in such a way that it attacks institutions such as rule of law

and that democratic processes are not practiced efficiently.

Fourth is that as military support catalyzes political debt dynamics, these acts of

exchanges do not affect democracy wholly but that a certain aspect of it was greatly disrupted.

Now that the conclusions are laid out, the researchers assessed the hypothesis to be

slightly incorrect. On the first hypothesis, military support was able to weaken democracy

through the causal mechanism ‘political debt’. The second hypothesis was proven by the

examination of political debt. Also suppression of the opposition may be one of the forefront

factors of political debt into weakening democracy but military appointments also has a direct

impact on democracy. Lastly, democracy was certainly weakened but not solely through political

debt.

In answer to that limitation, democracy during Arroyo’s regime may have weakened

through the angle of corruption. Arroyo’s budget allocation may have represented her interests

and the aspect of ‘money’ to the dynamics of political debt. If her interest is to get the military’s

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support, she could have increased military appropriations. In this case, other data and events

like the “Hello garci tapes” and the recent issues on military accounts could have been

considered. Since the findings have the participation of the police on the dynamics, it would also

be more specific to look at political debt on the police’s perspective. Their culture is quite close

to the military’s conservative attitudes but they deal a whole lot more of civilians. This angle can

contribute especially on extrajudicial killings. Another factor is the cultural reintegration of the

Filipino practice “debt of gratitude” on politics as this may present a possible ideological

perspective. With that as the case, we leave these angles on the 2001 event to future studies in

the hopes that the phenomenon of military support will be further explored.

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Appendix AMilitary Roles and Interventions

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Appendix BKey Informant Interview Questionnaire

The Case of Arroyo: Military Support, Political Debt and the Weakening of Democracy

Date:______________

MILITARY

CLASSICAL ROLE POLTICAL ROLE DEVELOPMENTALROLE

MILITARYINTERVENTION

MILITARY INFLUENCE

MILITARY PARTICIPATION

MILITARY CONTROL

MILITARY SUPPORT

COUP D’ ETAT

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Interviewer:____________________ Interview Venue:___________________ Key Informant Name:___________________ Position:______________________ Name of Organization (if relevant):__________________

1. How did the military exhibit its support for the Arroyo administration?2. What is the effect of this to Philippine democracy?3. What is your take on the concept of a “political debt”?4. Did the Arroyo administration have a “political debt” to the military? How so?5. If yes, how did Arroyo pay this debt?6. How was Arroyo able to maintain military support? 7. On the issue of military appointments, how did this affect civilian supremacy over the

military? And how is this connected to Arroyo’s political debt?8. On the allegations of human rights violations committed by the military, how can you

relate this to Arroyo’s political debt?9. What are the implications of this to Philippine democracy?

10. Did the military support for Arroyo’s administration weaken democracy? Why or whynot?

Appendix CFreedom House Key to Scores, PR and CL Ratings Status

Political Rights (PR)

Civil Liberties (CL)

Total scores

PR Rating

Total scores

CL Rating

36-40 1 53-60 1

30-35 2 44-52 2

24-29 3 35-43 3

18-23 4 26-34 4

12-17 5 17-25 5

6-11 6 8-16 6

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0-5 * 7 0-7 7

Combined Average of thePR and CL Ratings

Country Status

1.0 to 2.5 Free

3.0 to 5.0 Partly Free

5.5 to 7.0 Not Free

* It is possible for a country's total political rights score to be less than zero (between -1 and -4)if it receives mostly or all zeros for each of the 10 political rights questions and it receives asufficiently negative score for political rights discretionary question B. In such a case, a countrywould still receive a final political rights rating of 7.

the degree of democracy in the philippines during arroyo administration

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