Introduction
In the Philippines today, the political climate is beginning to echo the upheavals of 1986. Back then, Ferdinand Marcos called a snap election for February 7, 1986, hoping to reassert his mandate. Instead, the widespread perception of massive cheating unleashed a political storm.
It created an atmosphere of anomic instability—dark clouds of anger, lightning strikes of defection, and gale-force protests—that culminated in the historic People Power uprising later that month. Forty years later, another tempest has emerged with similar volatility: flood control corruption.
If the fraudulent snap election symbolized the arrogance and decay of a dying dictatorship, the billion-peso scandals in flood control projects have come to represent the entrenched rot of governance in our time. The floods are not just natural disasters; they are man-made calamities—storms born of siphoned budgets, substandard infrastructure, and a political class fattened on pork-barrel largesse.
The Parallels: 1986 and 2025
1. Crisis of Legitimacy
1986: Marcos still commanded military loyalty and controlled the electoral machinery, but the brazen fraud of the February 7 snap elections destroyed his moral authority. The cheating became the eye of a storm, destabilizing his rule until the People Power revolution swept him away.
2025: While the ruling coalition still claims strength, the spectacle of ghost dikes, overpriced pumping stations, and favored contractors has eroded confidence. Each downpour exposes the cracks, and every flood swells into a storm of discontent.
2. Middle Class Anger
1986: The urban middle class was jolted awake by the COMELEC walkout and televised fraud. Their outrage gathered like storm clouds and burst into massive street protests.
2025: Today, it is the middle class that bears the brunt of every flood—cars destroyed, homes submerged, jobs interrupted. Their anger is no longer distant or abstract; it has become a storm surge, rising fast and eroding what little trust remains in government.
3. Fractured Elites
1986: Key figures from business, the Church, and even Marcos’s allies began distancing themselves after the election fraud, sensing the typhoon about to hit.
2025: Cracks are forming in today’s ruling alliances. When the very families who bankroll flood control projects are also the families funding campaigns, political storms brew within the palace gates.
The Differences: 1986 vs 2025
1. The Nature of the Trigger
1986: A single dramatic event—the perception of massive cheating in the February 7 snap elections—ignited a storm of outrage almost overnight.
2025: Corruption in flood control is a slow-burning storm—each rainfall adds water, each ghost project piles wind to the gale. The anger builds cumulatively, not explosively.
2. The Role of Social Media
1986: Newspapers, Radio Veritas, and television acted as storm sirens, rallying people into the streets.
2025: Social media is a swirling whirlwind—spreading outrage instantly, but also dispersing energy, mixing truth with disinformation, and complicating sustained mobilization.
3. The International Context
1986: The Cold War framed Marcos’s regime, and U.S. pressure acted like a typhoon warning, pushing Marcos to the brink.
2025: The geopolitical climate is multipolar, a storm with many winds. The U.S. still wields influence, but China, ASEAN, and global markets now buffet Philippine politics, making external pressure less decisive.
4. Opposition Leadership
1986: Cory Aquino became the calm at the storm’s center—moral, unifying, and steady amid chaos. She gave Filipinos a clear direction for democratic renewal.
2025: The opposition is fragmented, storm-tossed without a unifying figure. Some speculate that Vice President Sara Duterte could assume such a role if her father were to pass away. But unlike Cory, who embodied renewal, Sara is tied to dynastic politics and carries a polarizing legacy. If she does not calm the storm, she may deepen it.
5. The Military Factor
1986: Military defections—Enrile and Ramos breaking away—were lightning bolts that split Marcos’s fortress.
2025: Today’s armed forces are more professionalized, less openly political, but storms of factionalism still swirl beneath the surface. Whether lightning strikes again is uncertain.
6. A Lesser Role for the Church: No Cardinal Sin
1986: Cardinal Jaime Sin’s call over Radio Veritas was the thunderclap that summoned millions to EDSA, lending the storm moral power.
2025: The Church is quieter now, its voice a drizzle compared to the past. We definitely have no Cardinal Sin. Civil society groups, NGOs, and digital networks have become the new storm-bringers.
The Probability of a “Snap Election”
The prospect of a snap election—or its modern variant, an early destabilizing vote—is not far-fetched. History shows Filipinos have little patience for leaders who appear both corrupt and incompetent in times of crisis. The next presidential election, that of May 8, 2028, is two years and seven months away: many of them might not be willing to wait that long.
But the probability depends on two brewing storm fronts:
Escalation of the Flood Crisis. If another catastrophic flood paralyzes Metro Manila and Central Luzon, exposing shoddy DPWH projects, public outrage could spiral into a typhoon of accountability.
Elite Defection. If key political blocs—business magnates, regional kingpins, even factions within the ruling party—withdraw support, the ruling coalition could collapse like a levee in a storm, just as Marcos’s allies did in 1986.
Projections
Opposition Opportunity. A credible opposition figure could channel the flood narrative as Cory Aquino once harnessed the electoral fraud storm. The challenge: fragmentation and lack of a unifying anchor.
Youth Mobilization. In 1986, students filled the streets; in 2025, youth anger swirls faster through social media, like a tropical storm forming in real time. Viral flood videos may unleash a generational backlash.
Church and Civil Society. Then, the Catholic Church’s pastoral letters shook consciences. Today, civil society groups—engineers, environmentalists, civic clubs—may carry the lightning rod of moral outrage.
What Lies Ahead
Short-Term: Expect protest actions to gather like thunderstorms, framed not in ideology but in urgent demands: “Stop the Flood, Stop the Theft.”
Medium-Term: If corruption exposés multiply, whistleblowers may strike like lightning from DPWH and LGU offices, forcing the regime into a desperate electoral gambit—a premature plebiscite, referendum, or snap election.
Long-Term: Whether or not a snap election is called, the erosion of legitimacy could become a typhoon-force rupture. It may bring a peaceful transition—or a more turbulent reconfiguration involving military adventurism.
Conclusion: The Coming Deluge
In 1986, it was the perception of massive cheating in the February 7 snap election that unleashed the storm that toppled Marcos. In 2025, it may be the floodwaters lapping at doorsteps that spark the next reckoning.
History does not repeat itself exactly, but rhymes are unmistakeable. And the rhyme of our political history suggests that when Filipinos are battered by both flood and fraud, they will reach for the first lifeboat—be it a snap election, a protest wave, or a revolution by another name.
The danger is that while storms may sweep away rulers, the channels for genuine reform are weaker now than in 1986. With a fragmented opposition, a less assertive Church, and dynasties steering the ship, the lifeboat may drift in circles.
The challenge for Filipinos, then, is not only to weather the storm but also to rebuild institutions strong enough to withstand both the natural disasters and the corruption.
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