Tide has turned, new chapter opening for PH, says historian

MANILA - The timing of the burial of late strongman Ferdinand Marcos at the Libingan ng Mga Bayani proves in the end that the Marcos family is the “last family standing,” a historian said on Friday.

Historian Manolo Quezon III said burying the late dictator before a weekend while President Rodrigo Duterte is out of the country, allows the incident to “essentially blow over.”

“And in the end, they would have proven, I’m talking about the Marcoses and those who support them, that they are the last family standing,” Manolo said.

Marcos was buried at the heroes’ cemetery on Friday noon in a hurried and discreet ceremony, 30 years after he was ousted.

Quezon added that the burial is “sheer completion of the 30-year project of the Marcoses to rehabilitate themselves and restore and thereby vindicate themselves” from the atrocities of the martial law period.

“This will settle definitely, at least until the next two elections, that the tide has turned and that 30 years of Philippine history and the way we have governed ourselves as a newly restored democracy has come to an end and therefore a new chapter, a very different chapter is opening up,” he said.

Quezon also noted the “tactical” use of government institutions leading to the burial of Marcos.

He said the Supreme Court faced a “checkmate” situation wherein whether it decided in favor or against the Marcos burial at the LNMB, it would still look “very silly” and “very impotent.”

ASCENSION OF THE SON

The burial of Marcos at the LNMB, according to Quezon, was never a “battle between two families” but a “quest to reverse history.”

“It was a battle of one family. It was the quest of the Marcoses to reverse history and to show that history has not come to an end, in other words, burying the father is now paving the way for the ascension of the son,” he said.

The late strongman’s son Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. who lost in the vice presidential race to Liberal Party bet Leni Robredo, has asked the Department of Justice to file criminal charges against Commission on Elections (COMELEC) and Smartmatic personnel over their unauthorized change in the system of the Transparency Server during the transmission of votes during the May polls.

President Rodrigo Duterte, during his state visit to China, introduced the young Marcos as the country’s new vice president, if he wins his electoral protest.

Duterte has also called for “forgiveness” following the late dictator’s burial.