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The men wore loose-fitting barong tagalogs; many of the women, designer dresses. The formality was appropriate for a presidential inauguration--even one called at short notice. But the dignitaries and affluent friends assembled at the Club Filipino in the Manila suburb of Greenhills merely formed a splendid backdrop for the more modestly attired guest of honor. Clad in a simple yellow dress, Corazon ("Cory") Aquino, 53, could hardly have imagined this moment three months ago, when her improbable quest for the Philippine presidency began. Her voice was calm and steady as she recited the presidential oath, her hand resting on a leather-bound Bible. "I am taking power in the name of the Filipino people," she declared. "I pledge a government dedicated to upholding truth and justice, morality and decency, freedom and democracy."

Less than twelve hours later her predecessor, Ferdinand Marcos, and his family climbed aboard four U.S. Air Force helicopters, bound for exile after more than 20 years of increasingly authoritarian rule. Aquino went on national television to assure the country that a great national crisis had been resolved. "We are finally free," she said. "The long agony is over."

The protracted and sometimes bloody effort to oust Marcos had indeed come to an end. Carried by a ground swell of popular emotion and aided by Marcos' Defense Minister, Juan Ponce Enrile, and Vice Chief of Staff, Fidel Ramos, who suddenly defected to their cause, Filipinos had mounted an essentially unarmed, democratic revolution and, perhaps to their own astonishment, triumphed. In a period of only 78 hours, as his troops and tanks backed off from confrontations with thousands of demonstrators, Marcos slipped swiftly from undisputed one-man rule to no rule at all. Just after Aquino took her presidential oath, Marcos had himself inaugurated at Malacanang; it was his last official act before fleeing to Clark Air Base, north of Manila, and thence to Guam and Hawaii.

In a fiesta of freedom, thousands of Filipinos paraded through Manila's Makati financial district under exploding fireworks and a shower of yellow confetti. On the sidewalks, vendors did a brisk business in T shirts emblazoned with CORY. Car horns honked in chorus. Occasional placards bobbed and dipped in the crowd. REBELLION TO TYRANTS IS OBEDIENCE TO GOD, read one. JUST LIBERATED, read another. As cars crawled along teeming Ayala Avenue, men, women and children, priests, nuns and soldiers stopped to greet each other with a salutation that somehow captured the moment: "Happy New Year."

Washington closely watched the power shift in Manila, partly because of the special relationship between the U.S. and the Philippines, a former colonial ward, partly because of the strategic importance of U.S. bases there, and partly because of what the White House saw as a timely confirmation of one of its most controversial foreign policies. In a meeting with journalists, President Reagan argued that the Administration's deft handling of the Philippine crisis strengthened the case for increased U.S. aid to the contra rebels, who are battling the Marxist Sandinista regime in Nicaragua. Explained Secretary of State George Shultz, who followed Reagan at the briefing: "We see in Nicaragua, much more than in the Philippines, a government at odds with its people." A State Department aide put it more politically. "We feel we're on a roll," he said. "Now we want to use that momentum and apply it to the contras."

Sweet as Aquino's victory was, the morning after for her fledgling government came all too soon. The triumph over Marcos may soon seem easy, compared with the tasks ahead. The once promising Philippine economy is moribund. The military is factionalized and riddled with corruption. A Communist insurgency mounted by the New People's Army threatens large areas of the 7,100-island archipelago. To this staggering array of ills, Aquino brings a moral force and a popularity that will buy her the indulgence and goodwill of the Filipino people, at least for a while. "There are big problems in the + Philippines," said a senior U.S. State Department official last week. "We have always felt that only a government that enjoyed a genuine popular mandate could effectively address them."

There is no question that Aquino, who was transformed from mere symbol to forceful leader over the past six months, has the mandate. What she lacks is experience in governing. At her first presidential conference, Aquino asked the country for patience. "I'm doing my very best," she said. "I only wish that people would give us time."

Such an appeal is hardly necessary as long as most Filipinos are caught up in the euphoria of what they call liberation. But the confetti and adoring crowds cannot last forever. "This government is sincerely committed to reform," says one Western diplomat. "But they will learn that this is easier said than done." There will be a honeymoon, perhaps six months, after which 56 million Filipinos will expect to see results from their new leaders. "No matter how good she is," observed Senator Joseph Biden, a Delaware Democrat, "she is almost incapable of meeting the expectations of the Philippine people." Said Ernesto Maceda, Aquino's Minister of Natural Resources: "There really was no forward planning for a sudden assumption of office. Our problems are just beginning."

That was apparent last week as Aquino gamely began tackling the job of governing. In keeping with its spontaneous beginnings, the new administration had a decidedly makeshift look about it. In the building that had served as her campaign headquarters, Aquino aides rubbed shoulders with foreign ambassadors, job seekers and influence peddlers. There, the Philippine President met with U.S. Special Envoy Philip Habib, who was dispatched last week by Reagan to convey his "warmest greetings" to the new government. Outside, a carnival atmosphere prevailed. The building's small parking lot was filled to overflowing with cars, jeepneys and diplomatic limousines, as vendors sold soft drinks and snacks to drivers and security guards.

Those Marcos ministers who had not fled the country stayed at their posts until Aquino met with them and appointed her own people. The new President assured most civil servants that they could keep their jobs, but questions remained concerning changes in policy and personnel outside the bureaucracy. "This is a government that doesn't even have a typewriter," said Presidential Spokesman Rene Saguisag, 45. Indeed, it had been so long since + the last transfer of power in the Philippines--1965--that no one in or out of government knew precisely how to go about it.

Aquino's first challenge was to establish a cohesive administration, a task made difficult by Marcos' debilitating legacy of one-man rule. Mindful of the dangers of a political vacuum, she moved swiftly to show that she was in charge. During her first full day as President, she appointed 17 Cabinet ministers and held her first news conference. In an effort to defuse the impulse to seek revenge on Marcos followers, she spoke forcefully of the need for reconciliation. The President, who has frequently called Marcos the "No. 1 suspect" in the 1983 assassination of her husband, Senator Benigno ("Ninoy") Aquino Jr., made it clear she would not seek the extradition of Marcos from exile, although she hinted she might reopen an inquiry into the murder. "I can be magnanimous in victory," she said. "It is time to heal wounds and forget the past."

Aquino acted quickly to fulfill one of her campaign promises. A day after her inauguration, she authorized the release of 33 of the 475 Filipinos imprisoned under Marcos' Preventive Detention Act and other statutes, laws that permitted incarceration without trial for a variety of alleged offenses, from antigovernment protest to suspected subversion.

Initially, Aquino announced that political detainees would be freed on a case-by-case basis. Those charged with spurious political offenses would be released, but Communist insurgents and those accused of violent crimes would be held for trial. That bothered many of her followers, who felt that she should show at least as much compassion for Marcos' victims as she had for Marcos. The next day Aquino ordered the release of all remaining political prisoners, subject to "certain administrative requirements." However, it was announced that four specific cases, including that of Jose Maria Sison, the 47-year-old head of the outlawed Communist Party of the Philippines who has been behind bars since 1977, would have to be carefully studied before any action is taken.

Questions remained about less fortunate enemies of the Marcos regime. In a television interview, Human Rights Lawyer Joker Arroyo, 58, now the President's executive secretary, compared the Philippines to Argentina and its grisly legacy of "disappeared ones," the estimated 9,000 victims of military governments in Buenos Aires who mysteriously vanished between 1976 and 1982. ! "When the history of the Philippines is known," Arroyo said, "perhaps we will beat the record of Argentina in magnitude and torture."

Arroyo's claim is probably exaggerated, but not by much. Task Force Detainees, a Philippine religious organization that investigates detentions, says that in 1985 there were 602 disappearances, 1,326 cases of torture and 276 political executions. Last week newly freed prisoners gave chilling accounts of confinement in Marcos' jails. "I experienced kicking, boxing and mauling," said Danilo dela Fuente, 36, a labor organizer who was among the first to be released. "My head was banged against a concrete wall. They put a gun to my temple and played Russian roulette. They put it in my mouth and twisted it. Once I was blindfolded for 17 hours, and they would whisper, 'You will be killed tonight.' " The new Aquino administration is considering the establishment of a presidential commission to investigate political assassinations and unexplained disappearances during the Marcos era.

In selecting her Cabinet, Aquino demonstrated an understanding of politics that impressed even her harshest Washington critics. Except for two Marcos holdovers--Defense Minister Enrile and Central Bank Governor Jose Fernandez --the 16 men and one woman given ministerial portfolios represent the spectrum of centrist opposition that supported Aquino's candidacy. The Cabinet has a firmly middle-class, moderate cast that is so reflective of Aquino's own background and political views that a reporter at her first press conference pointedly asked whether the choices were too "elite." The Cabinet selections did not please the far left, which decried them as "bourgeois," but the ministers' middle-of-the-road credentials should appeal to the business community and the international lending institutions on which the Philippine economy depends for recovery. As important, Aquino's choices were widely recognized in both the Philippines and the U.S. as competent and dedicated, a far cry from the Marcos period, when many top positions in government went to relatives, friends and palace cronies.

The most prominent member of the Cabinet is Aquino's Vice President, Salvador ("Doy") Laurel, 57, a childhood friend of her husband's and a former Marcos supporter who did not join the opposition until 1980. Laurel was also named Prime Minister and Foreign Minister. The triple titles and double portfolio were largely a prearranged reward for Laurel, who set aside his own ^ presidential ambitions last December to become Aquino's running mate in the Feb. 7 election. As her part of the deal, Aquino, who had no party affiliation, agreed at the time to run on the ticket of Laurel's party, the United Nationalist Democratic Organization (UNIDO). The compromise ensured a united opposition ticket but angered leftists, who distrust Laurel and what they describe as his pro-American views.

Two figures close to Laurel joined the Cabinet: Luis Villafuerte, 50, an investment banker and lawyer, who was chosen to head a presidential commission on government reorganization, and Ernesto Maceda, 50, also a lawyer, who received the Natural Resources portfolio. Both men, like Laurel, are former Marcos allies who severed their ties with him some years ago.

For balance on the other side, Aquino chose two center-left Assemblymen from the Pilipino Democratic Party-Laban. Aquilino Pimentel, 50, repeatedly jailed during the Marcos period for opposing the government, became Minister of Local Government, while Ramon Mitra, 58, an outspoken rancher, assumed the post of Minister of Agriculture. Aquino repaid debts to political independents who strongly supported her during the bitterly contested election. Among them: Jaime Ongpin, 47, the chairman of the Benguet Mining Corp. and one of her main campaign strategists, who was named Finance Minister, and Jose Concepcion, 54, a businessman and head of the National Movement for Free Elections, a citizens' watchdog group, who became Minister of Trade and Industry.

The most important carryover from the Marcos era was Defense Minister Enrile, 62, who, with General Ramos, mounted the daring rebellion that proved to be the catalyst for Marcos' fall and Aquino's ascension. Enrile's entry into the Aquino government changed the equation of power in the ruling coalition. The Minister is personally popular with many Aquino backers, but his longstanding ties to Marcos (whom he served as defense chief for 16 years) and his own undisguised presidential ambitions make them uneasy. They are aware that they would not have gained power had it not been for Enrile's defiance of Marcos, but there is resentment, even fear, of the influence the Defense Minister may exert, particularly if the coalition proves to be fractious. Sensitive to the criticism, the Harvard-educated Enrile went out of his way last week to underscore his commitment to the new government. "Do you think we would have laid down our lives for a corrupt purpose?" he said. "If these (doubters) will give me time to show them what kind of person I am, I will show them."

Aquino seemed less concerned than her colleagues about a long-term threat from Enrile and gave him credit for the critical role he played in catapulting her into office. "I am not engaging in a popularity contest," she said when asked about Enrile's new hero status among many Filipinos. Retaining the Defense Minister and General Ramos, 57, represents both pluses and minuses for the President. On the one hand, they provide vital links to the 230,000-member armed forces, which she needs to keep order and to fight the Communist insurgents. On the other hand, the duo's long association with Marcos may make them suspect in the eyes of her longtime aides, who are not totally convinced that their eleventh-hour conversion was sincere.

Although Aquino showed personal compassion for Marcos in the interest of national unity, she made it plain that she would spare no effort to reclaim the vast fortune the Marcos family is believed to have spirited out of the country over the years. She announced the creation of a Cabinet-level Presidential Commission on Good Government, headed by former Senator Jovito Salonga, 65. One of the panel's tasks will be the recovery of an estimated $2 billion in "hidden wealth" that the Marcos family has surreptitiously squirreled away in the U.S. and Switzerland. Salonga said he had already secured counsel in New York City to block the possible sale of more than $300 million in Manhattan properties allegedly owned by the Marcos family. "We will have no trouble recovering the assets here in the Philippines," Salonga said. "But overseas we will have to proceed according to local law."

Though acclaimed as President, Aquino is technically head of a provisional government. According to Enrile, it was he who suggested that Aquino be sworn in even before it was clear that Marcos would leave Malacanang. "I took the initiative because we did not anticipate that the President would get out," he said. "He had the constitution. But we had the people with us." The scheme worked, but it left Aquino presiding over a government that is legally outside the constitution. Thus early this week she is expected to ask the Batasang Pambansa, or National Assembly, to nullify its Feb. 15 resolution proclaiming Marcos the winner of the election. The former President's departure has persuaded most legislators in his New Society Movement (K.B.L.) / to promise Aquino their backing. A new resolution recognizing her as the victor is expected to pass, but it is questionable whether it will be valid in constitutional terms. The snap election, which Marcos claimed to have won, 54% to 46%, was so tainted by fraud, most of it perpetrated by Marcos supporters, that it is now impossible to say with certainty which candidate prevailed.

Once endorsed by the National Assembly, Aquino is likely to call a constitutional convention to rewrite the present document, eliminating some of its more authoritarian provisions. The plan is broadly supported by her advisers, even Enrile. "We should revise the constitution and remove its imperfections," he told TIME. "It was tailored to serve a regime." One of the first provisions to go will be Amendment 6, which granted Marcos broad decree-making powers. Aquino pledged during the campaign to repeal the amendment or, alternatively, to use it one last time to wipe out all of Marcos' repressive measures.

One of Aquino's main goals during her first days in office will be to throw some of the gears of government into high-speed reverse. "More than determining what government should be doing, we will attempt to define very clearly what government should not be doing," says Minister Villafuerte. The language sounds Reaganesque, but in today's Philippines, less government means greater civil liberties as well as unfettered markets. Aquino raised the issue of decentralization before the election when she outlined a detailed plan for her first 100 days in office. Among the promises: to unshackle the government-controlled press, expel corrupt judges, and repeal labor laws that permit police to order strikers back to work.

In the same speech, Aquino referred to the Philippines as the "basket case of Southeast Asia," an unflattering but all-too-accurate reference to the economic wasteland she has inherited. The Philippines' foreign debt exceeds $27 billion. The annual interest payment alone--about $1.7 billion--amounts to a third of export earnings. In 1985 the growth rate plunged to negative 3.5%, while per capita income declined to about $600 a year, no higher in real terms than it was in 1972. Almost half of the nation's 21 million workers are unemployed at least part of the year. One of the priorities of the new government will be to provide more jobs.

Marcos deserves much of the blame for the economic malaise. He vastly overspent the treasury, pumping public funds into 300 government-owned corporations, as well as flashy projects like luxury hotels and a nuclear- power plant. He lavished special attention on firms owned by friends and relatives, a practice known in the Philippines as crony capitalism. When the companies failed, the government rushed in with bailouts it could not afford. By 1983 the Philippines was so strapped it was forced to declare a moratorium on foreign-debt repayments. After a flurry of negotiations, the International Monetary Fund came to the rescue with standby credits, conditional on Marcos' adherence to an austerity plan that included severe budget cuts.

To this bleak scenario, Aquino brings the promise of honesty and the hope of political stability. "One very positive feature of her presidency," says Singapore Foreign Minister Suppiah Dhanabalan, "is that confidence, an important ingredient of economic growth, will be re-established." That was readily apparent last week, when some issues traded on the Manila Stock Exchange climbed by as much as 40%. On the American Stock Exchange in New York City, the price of shares in the Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co., the country's equivalent of AT&T, more than tripled in one day.

Aquino's economic program is strongly oriented toward the free market. She has pledged to dismantle the sugar and coconut monopolies operated by Marcos cronies, reduce regressive fuel and electricity taxes, and do away with seed and fertilizer levies that hamper agricultural diversification. She has said she will try to negotiate better repayment terms for the foreign debt in the hope that export earnings will be freed to stimulate growth. Not surprisingly, businessmen were among her most ardent backers, and Aquino's economic policies are certain to retain a pro-private enterprise tilt.

In naming Harvard-educated Ongpin her Finance Minister, the President made an especially wise choice. Ongpin promises to be a strong voice in the Cabinet. Even in his first days in office, he raised hackles among some UNIDO members by insisting that Jose Fernandez, 66, remain as president of the Philippine Central Bank. Ongpin's desire to keep Fernandez, a capable and widely respected financial expert, was eminently practical: he was a major architect of the IMF bailout scheme that saved the Philippines three years ago and will be a key player in ongoing consultations on the foreign debt.

Before the Aquino government can carry out a new economic program, however, it will have to stabilize the political situation. Aquino will have to neutralize remaining Marcos loyalists in the K.B.L., particularly the party bosses in rural areas, who rule their fiefs like medieval warlords. One group she probably will not have to worry about, for the moment at least, is the left, which seemed genuinely stunned by her success. Bayan, a federation of 1,000 "cause-oriented" groups, joined the outlawed National Democratic Front, the Communist Party's political arm, in boycotting the election. Last week the N.D.F. criticized Aquino's Cabinet choices but admitted in a press statement that the ouster of Marcos was a "significant victory in the Filipino people's struggle for genuine democracy and national independence." Bayan announced that it planned to play a "watchdog" role, apparently without sabotaging Aquino's efforts. But it was not lost on Bayan leaders that their absence from the Aquino campaign rules out a share of the spoils. Said one: "If we had participated, we could have easily meshed with Cory's organization."

The Aquino triumph is a setback, however temporary, for the Communist guerrillas in the New People's Army, whose numbers are estimated at between 16,500 and 20,000 armed men. Its strength, according to Pentagon officials, has grown 20% annually since 1983, when Aquino's husband was assassinated. During the campaign, Aquino often said that Marcos, who sought a military solution to the insurgency problem, was the N.P.A.'s best recruiter. Her hope is to eradicate the poverty and discontent on which the Communists build to promote their cause. "The N.P.A. sees that people are not willing to embrace any kind of repressive regime, whether from the left or the right," says Enrile. "Filipinos want a centrist, liberal, democratic person in government."

In this spirit, Aquino reiterated her campaign pledge last week to call a six-month cease-fire in the war against the N.P.A., which caused more than 1,200 civilian deaths in 1985. If the guerrillas would disavow violence, she declared, she would offer them amnesty. Said Laurel: "Given a credible government, a democratic moral order and a general amnesty, 90% of the people who are now fighting in the hills would lay down their arms and come home." In Washington, some Philippine experts dismissed such talk as naive. "Their plan seems unrealistic," said Larry Niksch, director of Asian affairs at the Congressional Research Service. "It will take the government a long, determined and very sophisticated effort to deal with the insurgency." Added one Western diplomat: "Aquino's success undoubtedly weakens the Communists' appeal to the so-called mass base. But one swallow does not a summer make." Unquestionably, Aquino's policy is a gamble. If she fails to make visible progress against economic problems, it is possible, even likely, that the insurgency will grow.

If that is the case, military strength will count all the more. Under Marcos' Chief of Staff, the despised General Fabian Ver, the Philippine armed forces became corrupt, undisciplined and top-heavy with overage brass. Ramos, the West Point graduate and respected professional who took Ver's place, says he plans to change that. One of his first acts last week was to retire 22 generals, including Ver himself and the chiefs of the major branches of the armed services. It was the first step in a military reform program long urged by the U.S. The Reagan Administration was delighted with Aquino's choice for Chief of Staff. "When you talk to Ramos about the problems of the Philippines," said a senior Pentagon official, "he can lay it all out."

Before the election, President Reagan promised the Philippines increased military and economic aid if the balloting was clean and fair. Washington intends to offer assistance to Aquino, but is not likely to act before ascertaining details of her overall plans. When the time comes, however, almost any request for military, economic and development assistance to the Philippines is certain to be well received on Capitol Hill.

Appreciation of Aquino in Washington is relatively new. Early on, many in the Administration dismissed her as inexperienced. They were especially concerned that if elected, she would demand that the U.S. abandon its military bases at Clark and Subic Bay Naval Station. There appears to be little danger of that, however. In a speech last month before the joint Philippine and foreign Chambers of Commerce, Aquino promised that she would consult other nations in the region and "especially" the Filipino people before signing any new treaty. Since then, she has repeatedly maintained that she would honor the present agreement until it expires in 1991, and between now and then keep her options open. As the campaign progressed, Aquino scored points in Washington, first for showing savvy and resilience on the stump, then, after the National Assembly declared Marcos the election winner, for keeping her + followers under control. "It became pretty clear that this was no ordinary housewife," said a senior State Department official.

During Aquino's 28-year marriage to one of the Philippines' ablest political figures, she seemed quite content to be a housewife and mother, and she was a genuinely reluctant presidential candidate. But she managed to channel widespread dissatisfaction with Marcos into a steamroller campaign that in the end swept him from power. U.S. pressure on Marcos surely helped, as did the last-minute defections of Enrile and Ramos. But at the center of it all was Aquino: petite, polite, increasingly self-assured, a woman who spoke for a country, molding an inchoate popular movement into a winning political force. The base of her appeal was a quiet strength, deeply rooted in her devotion to the Roman Catholic Church, which imbued her with seeming invincibility. "Ninoy you could hurt," said Teodoro Locsin, 37, Aquino's Minister of Information, last week. "But Cory you cannot hurt."

Aquino had the good fortune to lead a truly democratic rebellion, something quite different from the upheaval that ousted the Shah of Iran in 1979 and then degenerated into a regime of religious zealots. "This is not a revolt of the extremes," says Salvador Lopez, a former Philippine Ambassador to the United Nations. "This is a revolution of the center." For the moment, Filipinos, profoundly desirous of change, seem content simply to celebrate their emancipation. Says Lopez: "The people are happy that Marcos is gone, and that is the main thing." The challenge for the new President is to harness that spirit--and with dispatch--so that she can begin to tackle the array of problems confronting her. Says one of her supporters: "If Cory continues to be mesmerized by the euphoria of so-called people power and ignores the practical realities of politics, she will stumble sooner than expected." She clearly does not intend to fall into that trap.

Source: The Philippines Now the Hard Part

1: After this opened Job his mouth, and cursed his day.
2: And Job spake, and said,
3: Let the day perish wherein I was born, and the night [in which] it was said, There is a man child conceived.
4: Let that day be darkness; let not God regard it from above, neither let the light shine upon it.
5: Let darkness and the shadow of death stain it; let a cloud dwell upon it; let the blackness of the day terrify it.
6:As [for] that night, let darkness seize upon it; let it not be joined unto the days of the year, let it not come into the number of the months.
7: Lo, let that night be solitary, let no joyful voice come therein.
8: Let them curse it that curse the day, who are ready to raise up their mourning.
9: Let the stars of the twilight thereof be dark; let it look for light, but [have] none; neither let it see the dawning of the day:
10: Because it shut not up the doors of my [mother's] womb, nor hid sorrow from mine eyes.
11: Why died I not from the womb? [why] did I [not] give up the ghost when I came out of the belly?
12: Why did the knees prevent me? or why the breasts that I should suck?
13: For now should I have lain still and been quiet, I should have slept: then had I been at rest,
14: With kings and counsellors of the earth, which built desolate places for themselves;
15: Or with princes that had gold, who filled their houses with silver:
16: Or as an hidden untimely birth I had not been; as infants [which] never saw light.
17: There the wicked cease [from] troubling; and there the weary be at rest.
18: [There] the prisoners rest together; they hear not the voice of the oppressor.
19: The small and great are there; and the servant [is] free from his master.
20: Wherefore is light given to him that is in misery, and life unto the bitter [in] soul;
21: Which long for death, but it [cometh] not; and dig for it more than for hid treasures;
22: Which rejoice exceedingly, [and] are glad, when they can find the grave?
23: [Why is light given] to a man whose way is hid, and whom God hath hedged in?
24: For my sighing cometh before I eat, and my roarings are poured out like the waters.
25: For the thing which I greatly feared is come upon me, and that which I was afraid of is come unto me.
26: I was not in safety, neither had I rest, neither was I quiet; yet trouble came.

As a parody of democracy, the scene had a certain dramatic charm. Until they were ordered into silence, hundreds of colorfully dressed spectators in the galleries of the Philippine National Assembly cheered and booed passionately as politicians on the turquoise-carpeted floor below walked through their parts. One at a time, brown envelopes containing vote totals from each of the country's 147 voting centers were presented to the legislators for inspection. Tallies were read aloud, and results posted on green tote boards that were lined up before the 200 mahogany desks of the Assembly. Charges flew that some envelopes were improperly sealed, that entire towns had been eliminated from some of the tallying documents. Jeers and accusations rocketed back and forth, and recording the objections to all the voting certificates took hours.

Inexorably, the charade moved the Philippines closer to a new turning point in a potentially explosive national drama. At week's end the National Assembly, dominated by members of President Ferdinand Marcos' ruling New Society Movement, produced its tally after angry opposition members walked out of the legislative hall to protest government railroad tactics. The rump gathering declared that Marcos, 68, had defeated his presidential rival, Corazon ("Cory") Aquino, 53, by 10,807,179 votes to 9,491,716.

Thus, in a final travesty of parliamentary procedure, the Assembly formally declared that Marcos had been re-elected President, in an election whose outcome had been shaped by vote buying, intimidation, outright fraud and bloodshed. The legislative body also proclaimed the election of Marcos' running mate, Arturo Tolentino, 75, ending weeks of speculation that the autocrat might find a way to include Aquino's vice-presidential running mate, Salvador Laurel, 57, in his newly refurbished government.

As the counting proceeded in the cool confines of the Assembly building, each vote recorded for Marcos added anger and outrage to the tension building across the far-flung archipelago. Tentatively but with increasing signs of determination, Aquino supporters were starting to take their frustrations into the streets. Wav- ing clenched fists and chanting "Fight! Fight!," thousands of Filipinos marched in a 13-mile procession through the capital. They escorted the flag-draped coffin of Evelio Javier, 43, a regional Aquino campaign chairman who had been brutally gunned down days earlier in the province of Antique. Though far smaller in scale, the Javier funeral demonstration reminded many Filipinos of the huge outpourings of grief that followed the 1983 assassination of Aquino's husband Benigno Aquino Jr.

Meanwhile, the 104-member Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines added its powerful voice to the clamor of those who claimed that Marcos had stolen the election. After a two-day meeting, the clerics sharply attacked Marcos by asserting that "a government that assumes or maintains power through fraudulent means has no moral basis." To those who agreed with them, the bishops issued a call for a "nonviolent struggle for justice."

Watching closely was the slight, determined figure of Corazon Aquino. The quiet widow who had turned into candidate and crusader, who had ignited a popular passion for change during her 57-day election campaign, continued to insist last week that she rather than Marcos was the rightful President of the Philippines. Deliberately ignoring the National Assembly hoopla, Aquino went on the personal offensive. She staged a giant rally in Manila's Rizal Park on Sunday to protest Marcos' alleged election fraud. That event was the kickoff of a protracted "People's Victory" campaign of nonviolent rallies and boycotts in coming weeks around the country.

The culmination of the Victory plan would be a nationwide general strike, accompanied by other acts of civil disobedience. Aquino's goal was to make Marcos relinquish the power he has wielded from the presidential Malacanang Palace since 1966. Said she: "Let me appeal to all friends of democracy and supporters of freedom abroad. Stand tall by these principles that you and I hold dear."

Slowly but steadily, political events in the Philippines seemed to be rolling to- ward a point of no return. Where the pro- cess might lead was unforseeable. Once again the wily, ailing Marcos had seem- ingly entrenched himself by nominally democratic means, a strategy he has used on four occasions since 1972. But this time his victory, and his subsequent authority, seemed more hollow than ever.

Suddenly there was a prospect of dramatic political unrest and repression in the former U.S. colony, which might ultimately pose a threat to the two important U.S. military bases on the islands, Clark Air Base and Subic Bay Naval Base. The growing confrontation promised to redound to the benefit of the increasingly powerful Communist New People's Army, whose insurgency will soon, in the Pentagon's view, pose a real military challenge to the Marcos regime.

Few people had more reason to be concerned at the latest turn of events than President Reagan. Increasingly, the White House found itself on the spot in what Richard Holbrooke, a former Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia and Pacific Affairs, called "the most serious foreign policy crisis this Administration has faced."

As part of a U.S. bid to solve the crisis, Philip Habib, 65, a specially appointed U.S. envoy, late last week flew at President Reagan's behest to Manila. Habib's mission: to find some way of reconciling the opposing Aquino and Marcos political camps. On arrival, the diplomat immediately closeted himself for the weekend with members of the U.S. embassy staff.

Even as Habib winged on his way, the Administration was preparing to issue its statement in reaction to Marcos' proclaimed re-election. Among other things, it declared that the election had been "marred by widespread fraud and violence perpetrated by the ruling party." So extreme was the misdoing, the statement continued, that the election's credibility was "called into question, both within the Philippines and in the U.S." The White House then called on "all responsible Filipinos" to seek peaceful ways to achieve "stability in their society" and to avoid violence.

The Saturday statement, which Administration aides touted as a "major blow to Marcos," was the White House's way of extricating itself from a controversy over its earlier reaction to the questionable Philippine election. As official U.S. observers brought back eyewitness reports of widespread election cheating by Marcos supporters, President Reagan's response had been less outraged than many members of his own Administration would have liked --and than many Americans, treated to an unparalleled and intimate view of a foreign election, expected from their President. At a Tuesday news conference, Reagan had ventured the possibility that fraud "was occurring on both sides."

Reagan's words led to a flurry of congressional responses that might . ultimately end in a bid to cut off all U.S. aid to the Marcos regime. Said Democratic Representative Steven Solarz of Brooklyn, chairman of the House subcommittee on Asian and Pacific Affairs: "How we handle aid will be the test of how credibly we have disassociated ourselves from a discredited dictator."

Perhaps even more important to the Reagan Administration than the congressional reaction was a sudden freezing of relations between U.S. diplomats and the increasingly assertive members of the anti-Marcos opposition. Aquino charged the White House with tilting in favor of election theft, and anti-American demonstrations took place in front of the U.S. embassy in Manila. For his part, Marcos seized on Reagan's ill-considered remarks to try to bolster his own position.

The Reagan response raised a broader question of what exactly Washington could do to affect the political course in the Philippines, both to protect important U.S. interests and to further Filipino democracy. To many Administration critics, the answer seemed to lie in some form of anti-Marcos sanctions, but at the White House the problem was seen as more complex than that. Said an Administration official: "We're trying to stay as neutral as possible, gently pushing Marcos into making accommodations with the other side."

Neutrality had been the banner that the Administration carried into the Feb. 7 elections. Washington's oft-stated preference during the Philippine campaign was only for a fair and credible balloting process. The unprecedented foreign-press coverage meant that the campaign was scrutinized almost as if it were a U.S. election. Marcos and Aquino appeared repeatedly on interview shows; U.S. television networks sent anchors to Manila to broadcast the election finale.

What Americans saw on their television sets came as a shock. U.S. viewers were treated to a vivid documentation of Marcos supporters buying votes with money and rice, of poll watchers from the opposition who were beaten and shot after they tried to protect ballot boxes, of voting rolls that failed to include countless Aquino supporters but listed improbable numbers of pro- government voters.

The images of skulduggery at the polls were enhanced by the vast divergence in voting tallies that soon emerged between the official, Marcos-dominated Commission on Elections (comelec) and the volunteer watchdog organization known as the National Citizens Movement for Free Elections (NAMFREL). At times COMELEC had Marcos leading by as many as 600,000 votes, while NAMFREL showed Aquino ahead by about the same number.

The sheer range and flagrancy of the cheating charged against the Marcos camp were impossible to ignore. Nonetheless, the Reagan Administration held back its comments pending the return from Manila of Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Richard Lugar, who, along with 19 other delegates appointed by the President, monitored the voting. In interviews on the scene, almost all the observers professed themselves shocked by what they had seen. But even as the Lugar delegation arrived in Washington, the Administration was speaking in a variety of increasingly dissonant voices about how the election results should be viewed and how the U.S. should respond to them.

Privately, many lower- and middle-level U.S. diplomats were outraged by what they considered gross abuses of the democratic process by Marcos supporters. But on Monday, Deputy State Department Spokesman Charles Redman tried to put a conciliatory gloss on the tumultuous balloting process. Whoever was eventually declared the winner, he said, the U.S. hoped that "the two sides can get together to avoid violence." President Reagan struck almost the same note that day in a White House meeting with a group of regional U.S. newspaper editors. While noting that he was "concerned" about reports of election fraud, Reagan declared that the Administration wanted "to help in any way we can . . . so that the two parties can come together."

Those sentiments took on a more assertive tone at a White House press briefing. Spokesman Larry Speakes stated flatly that when the hotly disputed election results were "complete," both sides should "work to form a viable government without violence." A senior White House official was even blunter. Said he: "The main thrust of our statement is not to have demonstrations in the streets just because you did not like the election. A strong government is essential to maintain a peaceful resolution of the problems that face the Filipinos."

The White House remarks could only be interpreted as a warning for Challenger Aquino. The deeply religious mother of five had warned throughout the election campaign that street protests were likely if Marcos cheated during the balloting. But the White House remarks also reflected a more conservative view of the still simmering Philippine election crisis than that held by many officials at the State Department. Simply stated, the dilemma as seen on Pennsylvania Avenue was how to strike a balance between condemnation of Marcos' activities and support for the stability of an important Pacific ally. As a senior White House official later put it, "We're in a no-win situation at this point. If we accent the fraud, it gives Marcos an excuse to throw out the election. If we side with Aquino, it's a signal to her to take to the streets. We're opting for stability, that's the key word."

Whether the White House chose the correct way to achieve that objective is another question. If the Administration stressed stability above all else, it risked giving the impression that it was siding with Marcos. That was very unlikely to make him change his ways, and could conceivably give a helping hand to the country's radical left.

But behind the choice of language was an assessment that for all the uproar following the voting, President Marcos still had the upper hand, at least in the short term. There were no signs last week, for example, that the country's 230,000-member armed forces were about to disintegrate in Marcos' hands. Said a White House official: "It's obvious that Marcos has control."

Above all, White House concern continued to focus on the two U.S. military bases, Clark and Subic Bay. Some U.S. officials feared that if Aquino ever took power, she would prove more susceptible to leftist pressure to remove the bases from Philippine territory. Others were concerned that an Aquino government would be unequipped to cope with the growing Philippine insurgency. Many simply did not believe that Aquino could ever wrest power from Marcos with anything less than armed force.

At the same time, the Philippine President's grave problems with systemic lupus erythematosus, a disease that frequently attacks the kidneys, make it likely that there will be a change in power in the country before too long. Said a senior Administration official: "Marcos isn't going to last forever. We're trying to help hold things together over there until some of the personal obstacles to change are gone."

That line of argument came most strongly last week from National Security Adviser John Poindexter and his staff expert on Asian affairs, Gaston Sigur. Among others who reportedly felt the same way was White House Chief of Staff Donald Regan, an ex-Marine, who said on This Week with David Brinkley last ; month that the U.S. would condemn any electoral fraud, but added that "if it's a duly elected government, so certified, you'd have to do business with it."

There was a competitive edge to the White House analysis. Some staffers apparently felt that the State Department, and in particular U.S. Ambassador to the Philippines Stephen Bosworth, had prejudged the Philippine election. Said a White House official: "They in effect told us that unless Aquino won, that would be proof positive of widespread vote fraud. That falls into the realm of prognostication and outside diplomacy."

Finally, there still seemed to be a question in at least some White House minds about Aquino's qualifications for running the country. The Administration had previously said that it could work well with either presidential candidate. Last week, however, one White House official said in exasperation, "How State thinks that Aquino can govern on her own is just beyond us."

State Department staffers were dismayed by the statements that emerged from the Speakes briefing. The diplomats at Foggy Bottom requested a "clarification" of the White House views. But before that request was formally answered, President Reagan held a 40-minute meeting at the White House on Tuesday with the returning Lugar.

The Reagan-Lugar meeting was an ambiguous exercise. Sitting in on the session were Poindexter, Regan, Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger and Secretary of State George Shultz. Lugar spent much of his energy at the meeting trying to convince the skeptical majority of his Executive Branch audience that they should not give up too soon on support for the unobstructed democratic process in the Philippines. The normally terse Senator spoke movingly of brave souls like an ordinary Filipino housewife who confronted armed thugs in order to defend her ballot. He urged the White House not to resign itself to a Marcos victory too quickly.

Reagan replied with an anecdote of his own. He told of a Marcos election worker who had allegedly pitched a supply of Aquino ballots into a ditch, and he doubted aloud that anyone would try to cheat by doing that. Said the President: "If he was really trying to get away with fraud, you'd think he'd have burned those ballots."

When the President emerged from that session, he mollified some State Department concerns by describing the Philippine elections as "flawed" and "disturbing." He announced the appointment of Special Envoy Habib as a would-be mediator. The choice was shrewd. A tireless career diplomat, Habib is a veteran Asia hand who retired from the Foreign Service in 1983 after serving as the President's special emissary to the Middle East. Habib's new job, said Reagan, would be to advise on how the U.S. can "help the people of the Philippines overcome the grave problems their country faces, and to continue to work for essential reforms."

Less than five hours later, the President stunned Senator Lugar and most of the other election observers with his casual but devastating news-conference remarks. Reagan said Lugar's delegation had briefed him on the "appearance of fraud" during the voting. Then he said the observers had told him that "they didn't have any hard evidence beyond that general appearance." At this point he got in real trouble by adding that it was also possible that fraud "was occurring on both sides."

Reagan's contentious remark was a flub, pure and simple. It was based on intelligence reports from U.S. operatives in the Philippines, who stressed that fraud by Marcos forces was overwhelmingly more pervasive than any by the Aquino opposition. Reagan first made the accusation during a practice question-andanswer session with his staff before the Tuesday-night news conference. The President was corrected. But, says a Reagan aide, "he had it in his mental computer, and it couldn't be erased."

The statement turned out to be a painfully important mistake. Senator Lugar, for one, quickly bridled at the President's observation. Claiming that Reagan "was not well informed," Lugar asserted that the predominance of fraud "was by the government." Later the Senator said he would probably consider curtailment of U.S. aid to the Philippines if the balloting was discredited by an obviously orchestrated Marcos declaration of victory.

Intentionally or not, the President soon discovered that he had knocked down a hornet's nest. Increasing numbers of Congressmen used his remarks as a springboard for issuing their own foreign policy prescriptions for the Philippine mess. Two days after Reagan spoke, for example, Democratic Senator Sam Nunn of Georgia, an influential member of the Armed Services Committee, sent the President a two-page letter demanding "clear statements" that the Marcos regime had committed massive electoral fraud. Nunn asked for a pledge that the White House would refuse to recognize a Marcos election victory. Finally, Nunn wanted the U.S. to terminate all aid to the Philippines if, as he put it, "the will of the voters, as expressed at the ballot box, is not followed."

Another harsh reaction on the Hill came from Congressman Solarz. After Speakes' Monday press briefing, Solarz charged that "they are smoking hashish in the White House. They appear to have lost touch with reality." A number of other Senate and House Democrats vowed to cut U.S. military- and economic-aid appropriations for the Philippines (1986 authorization: $245 million) unless the Administration agreed to something like a rejection of the election results. After the proclamation of Marcos' win, prospects for a friendly reception in Congress for further aid requests looked even dimmer.

Finally, it seemed that the new situation was prompting some influential Congressmen to examine alternative sites for the valuable U.S. military bases in the Philippines. During his Tuesday news conference, President Reagan alluded vaguely to the existence of contingency studies on where to move the sensitive facilities, an extremely difficult and costly proposition. On Thursday, Senate Majority Leader Robert Dole of Kansas took that search a step closer to reality. He announced that he would formally propose legislation this week that would ask the Pentagon to evaluate the cost and feasibility of setting up alternatives to the installations. No one doubted that the cost of such a move would run into the billions.

What virtually everyone in Washington agreed on was that Marcos emerged from the election in a somewhat weakened position. Said a top Pentagon official: "It's an exceptionally unstable situation." The very instability compounded U.S. difficulties in deciding what to do next. Said a White House aide: "There's no magic solution to this situation. Nobody is claiming he has any inspiration on how to solve this."

Indeed, the number of short-term U.S. options for dealing with the Philippine crisis remained embarrassingly small. The decision to send Envoy Habib to the Philippines may have bought the Administration some time--but not much--to think further about the problem. Says a Pentagon official: "The longer it takes to come up with some sort of reasonable policy in the Philippines, the better it is for the Communists."

In that context, many of the more extreme proposals being advocated on Capitol Hill run the risk of proving counterproductive. Sweeping moves to cut off military aid to the Philippines (a modest $55 million this year) seem especially likely to do more harm than good. Morale among the often corrupt and ill-equipped Philippine armed forces is already bad. An aid cutoff might make things worse, although some Philippine military reformists dispute that. Even so, eliminating all American money might prove especially hazardous for armed-forces reformers, who have been chafing at the stagnation of the late Marcos years. Without protective U.S. influence, many of the approximately 1,200 reformers in the 14,500-member Philippine officer corps might be purged.

Selective withholding of funds, however, might have positive effects if properly done. Such calibrated coercion might allow the Administration to demand specific reforms that would allow some degree of reconciliation to take place in the Philippine political cauldron.

There is a great deal to be said for statements like the one the White House made on the weekend. As a senior Senate Foreign Relations Committee aide points out, every U.S. President has enjoyed enormous prestige in the Philippines--more, perhaps, than any Philippine incumbent. Marcos is aware that public U.S. statements deeply affect his legitimacy, and the threat of further broadsides might force him to make political concessions.

But the stark fact of Marcos' stubbornness cannot be overlooked. On the basis of his track record, it is not clear that Marcos would submit to even the toughest U.S. pressures. Indeed, the Philippine President, who has long honed his skills as a ruthless infighter, might lash out independently if he felt he was dangerously cornered. In an explosion of violence, the lives of his opponents might be even more directly at risk.

The limited range of those options underlined the importance of Aquino and her proposed nonviolent campaign. This is a mighty challenge for someone who has spent most of her life in the wings of politics rather than at center stage. Aquino's wrenching entry into an active role in Philippine public life can be dated from Aug. 21, 1983. On that date her husband, Opposition Politician Benigno Aquino Jr., was gunned down while getting off a China Airlines Boeing 767 at Manila International Airport on his return from three years of exile in the U.S. Suddenly his wife was catapulted into the position of a national saint.

Politics, however, had always been in her background, and she was hardly an average homemaker. The daughter of one of the Philippines' patrician political families, she was a helpmate during 28 years of marriage to the country's most prominent opposition figure. As a spouse, Aquino remained largely on the political sidelines, but within eight months of her husband's assassination, she was stumping the Philippine countryside on behalf of opposition candidates for the country's 1984 National Assembly elections. She was prodded into running in the presidential campaign by, among others, Jaime Cardinal Sin, leader of the Roman Catholic Church in the Philippines.

Once committed to the presidential race, Aquino quickly showed a steely determination that belied her reserved, soft-spoken manner. She displayed remarkable stamina. The galvanic response that she elicited from ordinary Filipinos as she flew from town to town during the 57-day campaign came to be known as "people power." Now a battle-hardened political veteran, Aquino intends to harness the same force in her dangerous and quixotic struggle to occupy Malacanang Palace.

Last week she spent much of her time huddling with aides and planning strategy. Aquino and her closest advisers realized very early that they had been outmaneuvered by Marcos in the questionable election balloting. On Tuesday, the day that President Reagan gave his news conference, a group of pro-opposition legislators told top Aquino campaign officials there was no way to stop Marcos from steamrolling to victory in the National Assembly tallies. Reason: he has complete political control in two important areas of the northern island of Luzon plus the central Visayan islands. In all those regions, he would be able to pad voting results with impunity, thus overcoming any Aquino lead at the polls elsewhere.

The Aquino camp was badly shaken on Tuesday when Javier, the campaign director of Antique province, was brutally and publicly murdered by men with alleged ties to a prominent leader of the Marcos forces in the National Assembly (see box). Late last week the bodies of ten more people, all said to be opposition supporters, were reportedly discovered in northerly Quirino province. At least 156 people have been killed in election-related violence since the presidential campaign began.

That grim figure was above average even for the Philippines, where violence is a traditional fellow traveler of politics. In 1961, for example, before Marcos appeared on the presidential scene, 35 people were killed during an election campaign; that is still considered a postwar low. In 1984, during National Assembly elections, more than 100 fatalities were reported.

Aquino last week was watching Washington for important political signals. She was badly stung by President Reagan's offhand reference to opposition fraud during the election. She responded immediately with a press statement that coolly noted the appointment of Envoy Habib but observed that on his last White House assignment before retirement in 1983, Habib had failed to end civil strife in Lebanon. Said Aquino: "I hope neither Mr. Reagan nor Mr. Marcos is expecting to see our beloved country go the same way." Claiming that she had been cheated out of as much as 25% of the national vote, she declared that it would be folly for her supporters to "settle down to a Western-style opposition role."

After Reagan's press-conference remarks, U.S. Ambassador to the Philippines Bosworth arranged a meeting with Aquino to discuss Special Envoy Habib's impending visit. The atmosphere during the session was both awkward and frigid. Bosworth, a highly regarded career diplomat who has worked hard to gain the opposition's confidence, had apparently been taken by surprise by the President's remarks. Says a key Aquino supporter who walked in on the Bosworth-Aquino meeting: "I don't know what the Japanese Ambassador looked like when they were bombing Pearl Harbor, but I imagine he looked like Steve."

Any pessimism that Aquino may have been feeling about the future, however, did not impede her actions. Before the memorial service for Javier, she paid a luncheon call on the country's 104-member Bishops' Conference to lobby for support for her People's Victory campaign and to assure the bishops of her commitment to nonviolence. Shortly afterward she went public with her Victory plans.

A key factor in Aquino's decision to go forward quickly with a civil- disobedience campaign was the fear that her moderate forces would soon be overtaken by pro-Communist groups eager to exploit the popular frustration at Marcos' formal election victory. As she planned her forthcoming rallies, Aquino continued to act forcefully to keep radical leftists from climbing aboard her campaign. One would-be partner: the 1 million-member leftist coalition known as Bayan, whose leadership is widely believed to have links to the Communist New People's Army. Aquino has every reason to be leery of newfound leftist allies. Throughout the campaign, she was repeatedly forced to rebut Marcos' accusations that she was little more than a stalking horse for the Communists.

Aquino's closest supporters are aware that leftist forces are still waiting in the wings. Says an Aquino campaign troubleshooter: "The biggest problem we have is that if Cory does not act, the moderates will be put out of business." On the other hand, he added, "if Cory acts, it will place this country on the brink of revolution."

Aquino's continuing resistance to Marcos' victory is nothing more than a calculated gamble that may yet provoke incalculable upheaval. Says Ramon Mitra, a National Assemblyman and an Aquino adviser: "We don't know whether we will be able to keep control over this. But we thought we would take the risk. We have to send a message to our friends that we are not taking this sitting down."

That stark problem was clearly in the minds of President Reagan's White House advisers when they drafted his weekend statement. It was impossible to deny that, as Reagan noted, the people of the Philippines are "at a major crossroads in their history. There are no easy answers. And in the last analysis, they will have to find the solutions themselves." One way or another, Aquino and Marcos will soon determine that solution.

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Going Into The Street (Monday, February 24, 1986)