(4 of 5)
Among those most likely to be chosen as opposition standard-bearer is Corazon ("Cory") Aquino, 52, widow of the martyred Benigno Aquino, who has become the moral voice of the anti-Marcos parties. She is the one candidate who is considered capable of uniting the fractious democratic resistance to Marcos. Mrs. Aquino has said she would run only if her supporters collected 1 million signatures in her favor. The sole declared candidate to date is former Senator Salvador ("Doy") Laurel, 56 (see interview). Yale educated and the son of a former Philippine President, Laurel and his United Nationalist Democratic Organization (UNIDO) party have 49 of the 55 opposition seats in the National Assembly. His strongest challenger for the presidential nomination will probably be Liberal Party Leader Salonga, a center-leftist with strong nationalist leanings. Salonga, however, is blind in one eye, deaf in one ear and carries 100 pieces of shrapnel in his body as the result of a political bombing in 1971. Along with those debilitating injuries, he is a Protestant in a predominantly Roman Catholic country.
Despite nearly a year of discussion, the opposition has not yet agreed on its "minimum program" of government, which would serve as a campaign platform. Nor have the opposition parties finished organizing their campaign machinery in the archipelago's 73 far-flung provinces. Above all, the opposition suffers from a lack of money to carry on an effective nationwide campaign under the demanding conditions of the Philippines.
Yet another difficulty involves leftist participation in the election exercise. A substantial measure of leftist backing will probably be necessary if any opposition presidential candidate is to have a chance against the well-oiled Marcos machine. But the Communist-influenced National Democratic Front, an outlawed political organization that exercises considerable sway over more moderate leftist groups in the Philippines, has not yet decided whether to encourage participation in the snap election. Says Antonio Zumel, a leading member of the clandestine executive committee of the Front: "I think all this is designed to befuddle the opposition. They should know Marcos. He is playing them on the defensive."
Many moderate opposition figures were trying to delay the elections until March in order to get better organized. Without such a concession from Marcos, they were threatening the possibility of an election boycott. The Marcos regime has hinted that it might be accommodating. Said Philippine Defense Minister Juan Ponce Enrile last week: "We will be sportive about it."
In the most Machiavellian view of last week's events, however, opposition intransigence may ultimately prove to be exactly what Marcos wanted all along. Said a Western diplomat: "Marcos acts in a very tactical way to almost everything, and it is conceivable that his idea in calling the elections was to test a number of things. If the elections are blocked because they are declared unconstitutional, for example, he can say that he tried and he can blame it on those nasty oppositionists."