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The Estrada government will again face the guillotine as the President is set to deliver his State of the Nation Address (SONA) in 17 days and this time, the blade will surely hit its target, the government’s head will surely roll. No matter how good his hired professional speechwriters would be, it would be impossible for them to disguise the glaring truth of our defiled Nation. He will be lying through his teeth when his report contains plentiful roses and only a handful of thorns. His speech cannot vindicate him from his biggest blunder yet, the economic crisis that we are encountering today and the continuing war in the South, no matter how his writers will play with the new set of facts and figures.

The past two years of Estrada’s term gave witnessed to his declining popularity. Issues of attempts to alter the charter, cronyism, media suppression and the like contributed to this decline. Most important of all, it is that shattered illusion of the President being "pro-poor, pro-masses" that has nailed the coffin.

The President won the presidency with the line "Erap para sa Mahirap". It was a combination of his movie star image and the slogan that captured the people. It was the perfect formula that seated him to power. Now, it is the same formula that will take him down.

For two years, the President has duped the people. It is his insincerity to his campaign line that gave his fraudulence away as the slogan remains to be just a slogan without the actions necessary to substantiate it. The government is now left with a "leader" that has no credibility to lead. The Estrada government has allowed the resurrection of cronyism and the worsening of patronage politics that inevitably leads to corruption.

If we look back at previous regimes, the Aquino government in its second year fueled its popularity through the enactment of CARP. With the decisive resolution to the energy crisis and the impressive economic recovery to the Asian crisis, the Philippines in Ramos' term was dubbed as the emerging tiger cub of Asia. Unfortunately, the cub was bedridden to near death following the financial crisis that afflicted the whole Asian region.

Now, with Estrada’s declining popularity, there is a clear assumption that he will not finish his term in office. But with the war in Mindanao, the government found a vehicle to boost its dwindling popularity. His "all-out war" policy has diverted the attention of the people from anomalies in the government and its other nefarious activities to the issue in Mindanao. It found a scapegoat that could be blamed for the slump in the economy.

Estrada has been very vocal in claiming that the country has recovered from the regional crisis, but the facts reveal otherwise. We are now facing yet another Herculean task – the resolution of our economic problems that were brought about not only by the Asian crisis, but by the Estrada government itself.

In Southeast Asia, the Philippines is at the tail of economic progress. While neighboring countries have already achieved a 10% economic growth, the Philippines crawls to achieve its 3% mark. The government has lowered its GDP target from 3.5-3.8% but even with this the experts remain to be cynical.

The Philippines is the last to be considered as a good investing area by foreign investors. Hence, newly invested capital has plunged to 6.3% in the first quarter of 2000. The rate of companies that has closed down is at 30%. The peso has weakened terribly compared to the dollar registering 21-month low. Our peso now stands at P 44.03 to a dollar.

Imports this month has fallen to 2.7% while the unemployment rate reached an all-time high of 13.9%-- the biggest in the past nine years. If these are a semblance of progress for the government, what then are the symptoms of an economic crisis? Whatever angle we look at it, it definitely forebodes of an escalating economic crisis.

These conditions only give us the legitimacy to struggle for reforms. The objective condition forces us to aspire to reform the system completely.

Along with the economic crisis, we also face the issue on education, which has long been sidetracked. The education budget is lagging behind despite the mandate for it to have the lion’s share. As the Commission on Higher Education [CHEd] has resigned to their ignorance and has complacently admitted that they are useless in solving the issue on tuition increases.

Meanwhile, a new Commission is taking center stage, the Presidential Commission on Educational Reforms [PCER]. This Commission, tasked to recommend measures to the Executive body, for it to save up on its budget, recently issued nine recommendations that justified the student sector’s fresh struggle.

One of the nine recommendations includes the introduction of the proposed scheme for re-orienting the premises for financing higher education which includes the scheme for increasing revenues by raising tuition fees. They claim that increasing tuition rates is acceptable as it can be subjected to future adjustments or amendments if the schemes will deem unfit.

Reading between the lines, it means educational institutions will just have to learn from the experience of the implementation; meaning we can implement it and if something goes awfully wrong then we can all just charge it to experience.

The students cannot afford this kind of set up as this puts us in the losing end of the bargain. If the Commission cannot study it thoroughly with the consideration of its effect to students and parents, then they should not recommend it. We all know that flaws in the policies in education are very hard to undo.

Also included in the recommendation is the finalization of the rationalization plan for public higher education that proposes the establishment of guidelines for the creation, conversion, expansion, privatization, merging, or phase out of State Universities and Colleges (SUCs), poising to commercialize education.

The institutionalization in each SUC, a recommended scheme of cost recovery and maximum utilization of assets to augment their operating and capital outlay budgets was also included in it. It urges the SUCs to adopt the same principles of the UP socialized tuition fee scheme, "where students coming from financially-capable families shall pay the larger share of the cost or tuition structure."

This means the government will oblige financially capable students to shoulder the school expenses of indigents rather than the government subsidizing them. Schools will be self-sufficient at the expense of the students. Analyzing what has been practiced in UP, we can safely say that the Socialized Tuition Fee Adjustment Program or the STFAP, to which the recommended program is patterned, has bred problems rather than solutions. From the bracketing to the transparencies of the procedure, STFAP has remained to be big issue that UP students continue to struggle against.

In the utilization of assets, the UP administration has once tried entering to such measures through the Commonwealth Property Development Plan, which created such raucous negative reactions from the entire UP community that it was ceased. It was the main issue why students poured out the streets in the 1997 SONA and demanded that this designed deal be shelved.

Also part of the recommendation is the preparation and implementation of business or development plans relative to the use of idle lands and properties. This implies that they will put up their assets for lease to private institutions. While it is common knowledge that the primary concern of the private sector is to gain profit, this recommendation subjects our SUCs to further exploitation.

Finally, they recommended an additional budget cut for SUCs. They see it fit that SUCs become self-sufficient. Their efforts to find ways to subsidize their operations may lead them to privatization and commercialization.

The Commission have recommendations that they think will help the common masses but instead they justified what the private sector’s commodification of education. Worse, they intend to follow suit. Nevertheless, the Commission does not lead to a more productive output of improving the quality of our education nor making education accessible rather it gave recommendations to lessen Government’s expenditures in education.

The Moro people of Mindanao have long been independent, as any and all attempts by foreigners to colonize Mindanao were in vain. Hence, they do not consider themselves part of any nation and neither do they recognize Filipino citizenship. They are their own people, with a different culture, set of traditions, economic policies and governing rules. These are the justification for the legitimacy of their struggle for self-determination.

History will attest to the veracity of their claim that Mindanao was never been a part of the Philippine Archipelago. Spanish invasion in our country failed to include Mindanao. But due to false claims made by the then Spanish rulers, the Philippines, including Mindanao, was sold to America.

In the 19^th century the Colonization Act was signed, allowing Christians from Luzon and Visayas to settle in Mindanao. The vast land of Mindanao was opened free for occupancy as the entire island was declared a public domain. This started the cross-cultural integration of Christians and Muslims in Mindanao, a strategy that lead to the integration of Mindanao to the Philippines. But this was not enough to negate the Christian sentiments sown by Spanish rulers against the Moro people. In addition, ancestral domains of the native Moros were technically grabbed from them, fanning the flames of the existing discord.

The Moros were left no choice but to fight for all that was taken away from them. For them they have a separate identity that legitimizes them to have their own state, giving them the right to struggle for their self-determination. Hence the commencement of the long waged armed conflict in Mindanao.

We should have no sentiments over the possible loss of Mindanao should the Moros win their struggle, for Mindanao, since the start, was never really ours. The legitimacy of their struggle gave them that right to self- determination, even though they choose on using war or armed struggle as the primary form of their battle. Their struggle is no different to struggles of national liberationists in World History who decisively won their independence through war. The history of the Quebecs in Canada, the Kosovos in Yugoslavia and the East Timoreans in Indonesia are concrete examples of these National Liberation Movements.

We have to realized that from the time we recognize the legitimacy of the Moro struggle is the time we recognize that their armed struggle is a mere extension of their political struggle for independence. They are the ones who know what is best for them. We have no right to interfere for this is their will as a Moro people not Filipinos. If we do it then, it will resort to a vicious cycle of wars until the Moros get what is their own from the start, it is the only thing they deserve, no more no less. This is not an issue of minority versus majority. Let us not belittle the Moro struggle this way. This is an issue of historical injustice rooting out from the past struggles of the Moros, when they were still the majority. If they were the minority in Mindanao now, it is the complication of historical accidents that took place amidst their quest for self-determination in which in decades now has not been granted by our government.

We cannot win. The Moros relives the Islam faith and Islam is not only a religion but also an ideology and not only any ideology but also a revolutionary ideology. This is what unifies them – the many socio-economic aspects emnodied by Islamic faith.

The war is an extension of politics. It is obvious that the government’s objective is to annihilate the Moros. The peace talks they are offering lies within the boundaries of the constitution when the Moro people doesn’t even recognize themselves as Filipinos.

The war is a big political gamble in the part of the government. The government has strategically started it amidst the anti Moro sentiments. But the war cannot stop the Moros from demanding that historical justice be served. It will not end by the government giving a deadline to the MILF. The government has made the biggest mistake against the Moros and we all will pay for it. In order for the government to end the Moro-GRP dispute, there are only two options; give the Moro people the self-determination or the autonomy guaranteed by the Tripoli Agreement or to proceed with ethnic cleansing of the Moros in Mindanao.

If the President has studied his homework well, it wouldn’t have been this way. But because of the President’s ignorance to the legitimate demands of the Moro people war has become the rule rather than the exception.

The situation gives us clear indications that there are a lot of things that needs to be addressed. We have given this government luxury of time to improve its type of governance and it seems that the Estrada Administration is enjoying what is happening now. With this, it deserves a spanking from the Filipino masses if that is the way to remind them of the faux pas they made.

Enough is enough. We have exhausted all forms of media to make our point, to express our views. We wrote endless position papers, press releases, letters to the editors, mass actions of different natures now it is time to show our force. The students must rally behind what we think is right. It is time to heed the call of the times. Let us marched down the streets and greet the President with a thousand students rallying behind the suppressed and the marginalized. Let a thousand flowers bloom in the streets of Batasan. We are part of the marginalized sector and the issue on education is ripe to be addressed now.

The government must pay for the many broken promises, the shattered dreams and the make believe peace and prosperity. It is time to recognize and support the legitimate struggle of the Moros in Mindanao. Introduce reforms to our worsening economic situation. Support the legitimate struggle of the student sector. Experts from the government have spoken, now let the people speak, let the Moro people decide, let the majority of the students be heard. Let the people transform this war against the Moro people into a protest against and reforms in the Estrada government. The war peddler Estrada is the real enemy of the people. We should all rage against the dying of the light.

Note: Should you have questions and other suggestions regarding our discussion paper and activities you may write or call us at the address and telephone numbers written in the letterhead. We have our pool of speakers and resource persons to discuss the issue further for you.