MGG Pillai - writing about recent events in the Philippines that ousted former president Joseph Ejercito Estrada - asserts that [#1] People Power is not the proper way[/#] (Jan 23). The writer frames such contention with the analysis that rather than demonstrating the effectiveness of people's power, events of the recent past instead demonstrated the "decline of democratic institutions."

The writer also seems to lament that the man who was voted into office by more than 10 million Filipinos - as Estrada's defenders constantly harped on - "is forced out by a miasma of unproven allegations." The writer goes on to ask whether President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo was "properly elected", and raises the same question about whether Corazon Aquino was also "properly elected in 1986" when Filipinos installed her to the presidency after kicking out Ferdinand Marcos.

The writer is only partly correct in saying that the popular uprising against Estrada reflected the decline of democratic institutions in the Philippines, but not for the reasons that the writer cited. On the contrary, the people rose up against Estrada precisely because the constitutional process that was the impeachment trial did not serve its end, i.e. to determine on the basis of evidence whether the (former) president was guilty of the crimes he was accused of.

Anyone who has been in the Philippines since the start of the trial on Dec 7 last year can attest to how Filipinos gave the benefit of the doubt to the impeachment process. Surveys conducted during the period showed that majority of Filipinos were willing to suspend judgment while the impeachment process was going on.

Even the anti-Estrada rallies waned at this time, precisely because the impeachment trial seemingly provided another forum from which to ferret out the truth about Estrada - whether he partook of illegal gambling collections, earned millions of pesos from stock market manipulation, took a 60 percent cut of the tobacco excise tax, coddled big-time smugglers as presidential friends, and the like.

Indeed, contrary to Pillai's assertions, these accusations were not simply "unproven allegations". Sure, if the judicial process is applied, that may be correct in the sense that the prosecution of the case was suspended before Estrada could mount his legal defence. But damning evidence - documentary as well as corroborated eyewitness testimony - was already being presented at the impeachment trial and before millions of Filipinos who watched on national television, and only the most die-hard of followers as well as lawyers who make a living out of twisting facts by hiding behind the technicalities of law can deny Estrada's guilt in any of these accusations.

Many Filipinos preferred to see the impeachment process through, but when before their eyes the 11 senator-judges allied with Estrada shamelessly disregarded critical evidence that would prove that the president accumulated ill-gotten wealth during his two-and-a-half-year-old term, it became clear that the battle was no longer on the impeachment court, because no "impartial justice" could ever be obtained as long as senator-judges preferred to protect selfish political interests.

The writer asserts that "All it needs to replace a leader in Southeast Asia is to have massive crowds demonstrating against him in the capital" and at the same time expresses fear that the "widespread belief that people's power is more powerful than people's choice brings into governance not orderly governance but rabble politics". I disagree with such a sweeping and historical conclusion.

The issue in Edsa 1986 and 2001 is legitimacy : Marcos and Estrada lost legitimacy, legal processes such as the snap elections in 1986 and the impeachment trial in 2001 lost legitimacy, and people poured into the streets to withdraw that recognition of legitimacy - a kind of withdrawal that could no longer be expressed through political institutions and processes whose credibility had been severely damaged in the popular mind.

The people at Edsa took direct action because those who held power undermined the means of constitutional redress. The writer says that "to force a change outside the constitution - which is how every leader is run out in Southeast Asia - undermines the sinews of administration and politics", but forgets that political systems in the region - be it in the Philippines or Malaysia - have yet to reach the level of maturity where citizenship rights, including the right to hold their leaders accountable, can be meaningfully exercised within constitutional parameters.

Patronage politics, authoritarianism, cronyism, nepotism - all this and more, retard the political progress of Southeast Asian countries, and for as long as constitutional processes are subverted by those who are sworn to protect them, people will always find reason to resort to extra-constitutional means to make themselves heard.

As for People Power introducing "rabble politics" in governance, Philippine history belies such fear, at least in the country's context. This can be attributed in no small part to the strong tradition of people's movement in the Philippines - the presence of a highly organised and disciplined "civil society" that provides direction and sense of purpose to people's action. This is the difference between People Power and mob rule, which the Philippines have been fortunate to avoid even in the most tumultuous periods of its history.

Were Aquino in 1986, and Macapagal-Arroyo in 2001, "properly elected"? That, for many Filipinos, is beside the point. The two women are considered legitimate rulers, installed by people's power. Legality is not the issue here; after all, what we had last week and in 1986 was a political revolution.

Finally, while Estrada appears to "represent the unempowered poor against the empowered middle class" let me say, as someone who has worked with the poor all my life, how revolting Estrada bought off the dignity of the poor, paying each of them the equivalent of RM15 to RM40 just to attend pro-Erap rallies. If this is the kind of leader who will represent the unempowered, better a government led by an "empowered" middle class.

No one is guaranteeing that all will be well now that Estrada is out; after all, what needs cleansing is the entire political system. The people's vigilance is demanded, lest the present leaders who rode on the wave of People Power begin to forget the reasons why they now rule in the presidential palace. The march of history did not end at Edsa, and it will be a farcical repeat of history if Filipinos - by sheer political forgetfulness - will allow another Estrada, or another Marcos, to enter their midst and reign supreme in politics.