The conspiracy
By Noralyn Mustafa
Inquirer

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ON THE EVE OF THE FIRST DEATH ANNIVERSARY of Fernando Poe Jr. last December, I stayed up until past 3 a.m. watching his movie "Agila." I had chanced upon it on Cinema One as I surfed the channels for something to keep the TV on while doing some writing. I stayed there out of curiosity. But half an hour into the film I had to stop writing and, when the end credits came on, I sat there feeling so ashamed of myself for having seen only "Lo Waist Gang."

It was a strange feeling I had-alone with my naked thoughts in the bare, clean dark hours of the morning, that make one see with crystal clarity things he or she could be blind to in the harsh light of day. A year after his death, I got a glimpse of the character of the man who could have been president of this country, and he spoke to me through the medium he knew best, baring his soul as he shared his vision of a more decent world.

Fernando Poe Jr. was Daniel Agila. Daniel fought the lions. And Kahlil Gibran's eagle, to fly high, had to fly without its nest.

For his ultimate production, Poe tried to make Agila live his vision in the real world. So he acted it out, according to the terms of Agila. He was reviled and ridiculed for being inadequate-a high school dropout, totally without experience in both politics and governance, and worst of all, he was "a mere actor." Still, he played it out as Agila. Even when, according to the Commission on Elections of Benjamin Abalos, he lost in the elections, he went around to thank the people who had supported him in his bid for the presidency. But the functionaries of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo reminded him that you don't do such things in the real world.

They spooked him with "intelligence reports" that the New People's Army and other dark forces were out to kill him. For what, it was not clear.

Deep in his heart, like most people, Poe knew he had won the elections. So he tried to prove it according to the rules of Agila. He filed a protest although deep in his heart, too, he knew that it was an exercise in futility.

And it was here that the distinct difference between the real and the celluloid, between Poe and Agila manifested itself. Confronted with defeat and frustration, Agila was more fortunate. Going blind and almost infirm, he withdrew to the mountains and renewed his body and soul among those closest to the earth, planting and hunting for sustenance, communicating mostly with infinite truths. Which in the real world, ironically, should be the obvious option.

But in what was supposed to be the real world where Fernando Poe Jr. existed, where make-believe, dictated the rules, resignation was tragic. He chose to die.

It was then as I sat there, trying to fathom the mystery of it all, that I recalled what former Social Welfare Secretary Dinky Soliman disclosed in an interview, with remorse and guilt: she said she did what she did to help Ms Arroyo win the presidency because she was "afraid that another actor would become president."

Although one may not completely agree with how she justified her going around among squatter areas and slums in the guise of carrying out her functions but actually spying on poor folk on areas where a survey was to be conducted to get an "early warning system" and then to magically transform the findings into "military intelligence," one could believe that her fear of actors as presidents was real.

I can attest to this myself. Dinky, at least as far as I am concerned, was as much if not more the hero, of the so-called Edsa II than either Cory Aquino, Fidel Ramos, Jose de Venecia or even Ms Arroyo. In the last two days before Ms Arroyo grabbed the presidency from Joseph Estrada, it was Dinky's name on everyone's lips.

Although still with fever, cough and a runny nose, I had to finish a manifesto that a Muslim women's group, of which I was a member had asked me to write because it had to be submitted to Dinky, who at that point I wouldn't have known from Ms Arroyo.

At a store in the UP shopping center where I was looking for a black T-shirt for my daughter to wear at Edsa (my black Inquirer T-shirt printed with the witty slogan in reply to Erap's call for advertisers to boycott the paper was good enough for me), two women, also shopping for the same, asked me whether I was joining Dinky's group.

"I'm joining him," I replied as I approached Gary Granada (who I guessed was trying to bargain with the sales clerk over several shirts) and asked him to autograph one that I had selected as pasalubong for an activist-son; the one printed with the oft-quoted line of the Philippine Collegian's editor in chief, Abraham Sarmiento Jr., in his famous editorial: "Kung hindi tayo kikilos, sino pa? Kung hindi ngayon, kailan pa?" Gary didn't just autograph it, he wrote a short message: "Kapatid, tuloy lang." (If not now, when?) Which inspired me to buy the double-tape set of "Lean" who, like Gary, had a place in my son's pantheon of "idols."

Dinky was able to gather thousands of the hundreds of thousands who unwittingly became the persuasive props that convinced the television audience that this was Edsa II. But, in my observation, Edsa II was not an authentic people power movement.

Looking for something to drink in the heat, I wormed my way through the thick crowd until I got under the flyover where vendors were selling food and drinks. Then my attention was caught by a very fair, plump lady with golden hair furiously fanning herself, sweating all over, gasping for breath, visibly unable to contain her excitement as she told a group of similar types, obviously waiting for her reports: "Andoon na, andoon na si Reyes, inutusan na ni FVR, umalis na sa Linden." (Reyes is there as ordered by FVR.)

Dinky, look now upon your country and weep.

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