Philippines: How long the honeymoon?
1986Michael Schreiber 1986-04Read it in the scan (PDF at ETOL), page 1 →
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Socialist Action/ May May Gong April 1986 The U.S. war against Nicaragua escalated sharply this past month, underlining the Reagan administration's objective of over -throwing the Sandinista government.
"U.S. President Ronald Reagan has declared war on Nicaragua," noted the Toronto daily, The Globe and Mail (March 5, 1986), pointing to Reagan's lobbying and media blitz to obtain $100 million in military and economic aid to the contras.
Reagan said the Nicaraguan government was a "cancer" that must be removed. His administration also announced that U.S. Army units would be building a new military airstrip in Honduras only 20 miles from the Nicaraguan border and that two U.S. military maneuvers, involving up to 4400 U.S. troops, were underway in Hon -duras just six miles from the Nicaraguan border.
Although the contra aid request narrowly failed in the House of Representatives on March 20, it was evident that the Demo -crats would support most of Reagan's package at a later date. "That the president will get some military aid for the contras has been a foregone conclusion from the beginning;" said Norman J. Ornstein, a congressional analyst for the American Enterprise Institute.
The New York Times (March 29, 1986)
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Peace, Jobs March & Rally in San Francisco ients Vol. 4, No.4 In the weeks after a popular mobilization swept Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos from power, the struggle of working people has not let up. Last month, close to 22,000 workers went on strike at U.S. military installations. Thousands of cooks, janitors, and laborers joined picket lines at Subic Bay Naval Base and Clark Air Base. Barricades were constructed to seal off the gates.
Meanwhile, poor people in the Manila area have defied government housing authorities by occupying half a dozen housing projects and other undeveloped plots of land. The squatters claim that they are acting in accordance with Aquino's "people's power" slogan.
Unfortunately, the "people," 72 percent of whom live below the poverty line, remain unrepresented in President Corazon Aquino's big business-oriented cabinet. Reforms have been slow in coming, al -though the government did act to restore the writ of habeas corpus and release all political prisoners.
The recently declared "interim govern -ment" is dominated by conservative elements. Aquino is trying to hold together an alliance including the armed forces, the traditional wealthy families, and forces around the Catholic Church—as well as "modernist" businessmen who had been excluded from Marcos' favor.
The government's right wing-typified by Prime Minister Salvador Laurel's United Nationalist Democratic Organization (UNIDO)has expressed strong opposition to Aquino's "dictatorial" removal of local pro-Marcos officials. UNIDO hopes to win the Marcos officials to its perspectives.
Farmers demand land reform Plans for economic reform remain uncertain beyond vague encouragement to the "private sector." Last month, when Aquino ordered a 9-percent cut in fuel (continued on page 13, in “[A must for anti-apartheid (continued from page 1)…]”)