As the Nation Awakens: No Compromise with the Forces of Plunder
Nor its corrupted"Lesser Evil"
On this solemn Bonifacio Day, the Filipino people once more demonstrate their steadfast commitment to the Kartilya ng Katipunan's teachings and to the revolutionary spirit embodied by Gat Andres Bonifacio and the nation’s heroic forebears. Through the vast mobilization of the Trillion Pesos March, the masses reaffirm their determination to confront corruption, oppression, and exploitation with unwavering resolve.
Recent pronouncements from certain groups—calling for President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. to “step up” in order to apprehend the so-called “big fish” of plunder—have revealed an alarming political naiveté. Such appeals, couched in timid reformism, overlook an essential truth widely recognized among the vigilant sectors of society: Marcos Jr. himself stands as the most formidable symbol of systemic corruption.
To the Filipinos, it is increasingly clear that if corruption were an ocean, Marcos Jr. would be its apex predator. His signature upon last year’s budget, steeped in waste and concealed allocations, set the conditions for the trillion-peso debacle now engulfing the Republic. Under his watch, corruption has not merely survived but flourished, feeding upon the nation’s resources like a parasitic growth.
The 2025 budget—bloated with “allocable” and “unprogrammed” funds—mirrors the same reactionary decadence displayed in Sara Duterte’s notorious “confidential fund.” Far from representing competing visions, the Marcos and Duterte dynasties appear as twin factions of the same decaying political order. Their rivalry, however heated, does not shield the public from the structural rot that both clans perpetuate.
To frame the national crisis as a choice between these two families is to insult the intelligence and agency of the Filipino masses. Such a narrative reduces the people to bystanders in a private dispute among elites, demanding obedience rather than participation. The notion of selecting the “lesser evil” serves only to legitimize dynastic domination and to neutralize public outrage.
The growing sentiment among the people is incontrovertible: what the moment demands is not a Marcos who “steps up,” but a Marcos—and a Duterte—who step down. Only through the removal of corrupt officials and the pursuit of full accountability can the nation reclaim its institutions from the grip of reaction.
A Transition Council? Why?
In this context arises the proposal for a People’s Transition Council—a body anchored not in dynastic interests nor in elite accommodation, but in the democratic will of workers, peasants, youth, intellectuals, and all patriotic sectors striving for national emancipation. Such a council would serve as the stabilizing force in a period of profound national renewal: dismantling entrenched corruption, uprooting the structures of plunder, and guiding the state toward a just, humane, and sovereign future no longer dictated by the private whims of political clans.
This proposal finds its strength precisely because it rejects the deceptive logic peddled by certain commentators who urge the masses to view the current regime as the “lesser evil” in contrast to the Duterte faction. Such arguments, often promoted by timid reformists and opportunistic elements, represent nothing but the recycling of the same reactionary playbook that has long shackled the Filipino nation.
To portray Marcos as a bulwark against Duterte, or Duterte as a counterforce to Marcos, is to ignore a fundamental truth now evident to the conscious sectors of society: both dynasties are products of the same rotten social order, and both have thrived upon the same machinery of corruption, deception, and injustice.
They are not antagonists in a struggle for public welfare.
They are competitors in the plunder of the public treasury.
They are not defenders of the people.
They are defenders of their own dynastic survival.
In truth, the Marcos and Duterte factions are but two sides of a single reactionary coin, each having enriched themselves through systemic exploitation, each having expanded the very networks of patronage and corruption that now suffocate the Republic. Every peso stolen, every institution weakened, every right trampled bears the fingerprints of both dynasties—sometimes acting in partnership, sometimes in rivalry, but always with the same result: the suffering of the Filipino people.
Thus the call for a People’s Transition Council arises not from abstract theorizing but from historical necessity. The nation can no longer rely on the factional disputes of corrupt elites, nor on the hollow promises of politicians who have already betrayed the public trust. The people cannot liberate themselves by choosing between two varieties of the same decay.
A Transition Council stands instead as the instrument by which the masses may:
• Prosecute corruption not selectively but systematically, bringing both Marcos and Duterte to full account.
• Dismantle the dynastic networks that have converted public office into private wealth.
• Reassert democratic sovereignty against foreign manipulation, oligarchic dominance, and political patronage.
• Establish a government rooted in social justice, guided by the collective interest rather than elite survival.
By rejecting the illusion of the “lesser evil,” the people affirm a deeper principle: evil, even in its more polished form, remains an obstacle to national liberation. The Filipino masses refuse to be conscripted into the internal feuds of reactionary clans; they refuse to become spectators in a dynastic theater whose only purpose is to preserve the power of the few at the expense of the many.
The People’s Transition Council emerges, therefore, as the necessary bridge between the collapse of corrupt rule and the establishment of a truly democratic, just, and sovereign society. It reflects the historical consciousness of a nation that has suffered enough, and that now insists: no more compromises with corruption, no more submission to dynastic rule, and no more illusions that the people’s freedom can be delivered by those who have built their power upon the people’s misery.
In this awakening lies the path to genuine renewal—and in the resolve of the people lies the certainty that justice will prevail.
As the Filipino masses commemorate Bonifacio Day, they stand in continuity with the Katipunan’s legacy of courage and unrelenting struggle. Their aspirations echo across time:
A Philippines free from corruption.
A Philippines free from poverty.
A Philippines free from violence and exploitation.
A Philippines where governance serves the people, not a dynastic ambition.
Trying to uphold the established order, the reactionary forces tremble not at the actions of any single figure, but at the awakening of an entire nation. The people advance, united and conscious of their historic mission.
The struggle continues, and the future belongs to those who fight for justice.