EDSA III
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 |
This article may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. Please discuss this issue on the talk page or replace this tag with a more specific message. This article has been tagged since October 2006. |
| Attempts at regime change in the Philippines (1970–2006) |
|---|
|
Civil unrest (1970) |
EDSA III (pronounced EDSA Tres) was a very large protest rally that was sparked by the arrest in April 2001 of newly deposed President Joseph Estrada of the Philippines. The rally was held for several days in a major highway in Metro Manila, the Epifanio de los Santos Avenue or EDSA, which eventually culminated in an attempt to storm the Malacanang presidential palace. Taking place four months after Edsa Dos, the protests were asserted as a more populist and representative uprising in comparison to the previous demonstrations in the same location, in January 2001. The protests and the attack on the presidential palace, however, failed in their objectives. Participants continue to claim that it was a genuine People Power event, a claim disputed by the participants and supporters of Edsa Dos. President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has acknowledged the divisive nature of the two terminologies by saying in one statement that she hoped to be the president of "Edsa Dos and Edsa Tres."
Contents |
[edit] Events
[edit] April 30
- See also EDSA Revolution of 2001
The crowd swelled to a high of over 3 million[citation needed] in the evening of April 30, most of whom were members of the urban poor and members of the Iglesia ni Cristo which institutionally supported Estrada, gathered at EDSA Shrine,a public place, the site of the January EDSA II revolt which had toppled Estrada from the presidency.
The protest was led by members of the political opposition of the time, most notably Senators Juan Ponce Enrile, Miriam Defensor Santiago and Vicente Sotto III.
[edit] May 1
The rally aimed to remove Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo from the presidency and to reinstate Estrada. The rally came to a head on the morning of May 1, 2001 most of the people left specially the Iglesia ni Cristo members as an agreement of their leaders and the government. Still hundreds of thousands of protesters stormed towards Malacañan Palace, the presidential residence; government soldiers and the policemen dispersed the marchers, causing violence. Several broadcast vans of ABS-CBN were torched by members of the crowd, while others attacked the police and soldiers with rocks, sticks, and pipes. The police and military responded with force after implementing a "maximum tolerance" policy, which led to the injury of many of the protesters. [1]
[edit] Aftermath
Hours after the crowds of EDSA III were dispersed, representatives of the Archdiocese of Manila and Civil Society supporters of the Arroyo administration reclaimed the Edsa Shrine where there had been alleged acts of vandalism and garbage everywhere and the vicinity stank of human waste.
Critics of "Edsa Tres," styled after the EDSA Revolution of 1986 and 2001, argue that while this was a major protest, the spirit of it was unlike of the first and second protests. Supporters of "Edsa Tres" journalism allege that EDSA's I and II's participants were made up of the middle and upper classes and thus, not democratically-representative unlike those who participated in EDSA Tres. Other arguments also point to the success of the first two to remove the presidents targeted, versus this event's failure to do so.
