EDSA at 40: Against Dynasty, Corruption, and State Terror

Forty years ago, the Filipino masses rose in a historic uprising that brought down the fascist dictatorship of then-President Ferdinand Marcos Sr. The EDSA People Power Revolution was the culmination of decades of resistance: workers striking against exploitation, peasants and Indigenous communities rising against landlessness and militarization, students filling the streets, journalists defying censorship, and the Bangsamoro waging their struggle for self-determination in the face of state repression.

Under the US-Marcos dictatorship, Indigenous Peoples and the Bangsamoro bore the brunt of state violence. Martial Law paved the way for massive land dispossession, the entry of destructive logging and mining concessions, dam projects, and plantations imposed on ancestral lands and territories. Entire communities were militarized, displaced, massacred, and tagged as “enemies of the state” for defending their lands and rights. From the Cordillera to Mindanao, Indigenous and Moro resistance was met with torture, enforced disappearance, and extrajudicial killings. The dictatorship was sustained through plunder and violence, and billions of dollars were stolen while the people paid in blood.

EDSA was a historic rejection of tyranny and grand corruption. It was the collective assertion that no political dynasty has a natural claim to power, and that the Filipino people are not the private property of any ruling family. Yet the return of the Marcos dynasty to Malacañang reveals the unfinished tasks of EDSA. The dictator was removed, but the system that enabled plunder, impunity, and elite rule remained intact.

Today, the same atrocities that defined Martial Law remain. Extrajudicial killings, red-tagging, the militarization of Indigenous and rural communities, attacks on schools and human rights defenders, and the weaponization of the law against dissent persist with chilling familiarity. Corruption remains rampant. Bureaucratic capitalism—the use of public office for private enrichment—has only deepened, as political power is wielded to entrench dynasties, protect cronies, and advance economic interests tied to foreign and elite control.

Bongbong Marcos sits as the King of Corruption, with Vice President Sara Duterte as his Queen—an alliance consolidating the legacies of Martial Law authoritarianism and the bloody impunity of the sham “war on drugs.” Even if cracks and public attacks emerge between their camps, these are not battles of principle but contests over who controls the country’s economy and political machinery. The Filipino people must oppose both factions, for neither represents genuine accountability, democracy, or the interests of the masses.

The threats of “no permit, no rally” echo the logic of dictatorship. We condemn any attempt to curtail the people’s right to peaceful assembly and expression. EDSA itself was not born out of permits granted by those in power. It was forged by the collective will of the Filipino people, determined to end tyranny. The lessons of EDSA are clear: it is the organized and united action of workers, peasants, Indigenous Peoples, the Bangsamoro, youth, church people, professionals, and the urban poor that brings about change. When the people move as one, dictators fall.

Forty years on, the issues that compelled millions to rise along EDSA remain unresolved: landlessness, foreign domination, elite rule, systemic corruption, human rights violations, and the distortion of history. Tuloy ang laban. The struggle continues because injustice continues.

The victims of Martial Law continue to cry out for full accountability, just as the victims of today’s killings, repression, and state violence demand justice. The ill-gotten wealth remains largely unreturned, while history is being distorted to recast a period of terror and plunder as a “golden age.” We will never forget the victims of Martial Law and state terror, the plunder of the nation’s wealth, and the crimes committed against Indigenous Peoples and the Bangsamoro. The demand for justice unites the past and the present: never again means never again—now. Remembrance without resistance is meaningless.

Accountability does not rest with the powerless; it rests at the highest office of the land. The demand for impeachment and genuine accountability embodies the true spirit of EDSA: that no one is above the law, and that betrayal of public trust must be answered.

The spirit of EDSA lives wherever people resist oppression, defend human rights, and fight for genuine democracy and social justice. It lives in every community defending ancestral land, in every family demanding justice for victims of killings, in every youth refusing historical distortion.

The people made history once. The people can—and will—do so again.

#ImpeachDuterteNow

#ImpeachMarcosNow

Reference: Beverly Longid, national convener