Shoes That Tell A Despot’s Days

“Termites, storms and neglect have damaged part of former Philippine first lady Imelda Marcos’ legendary collection of shoes and other possessions left behind after she and her dictator husband were driven into U.S. exile by a 1986 popular revolt”, said the intro of “Neglect ruins Marcos prized shoes”, an AP exclusive by Jim Gomez from Manila.

The report, wired a few days ago, informed: “Hundreds of pieces of late strongman Ferdinand Marcos’ clothing, […] have also begun to gather mold and fray after being stored for years […] at the presidential palace and later at Manila’s National Museum.”

After two decades of brute rule, lies, mockery and forgery Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos had to flee to Hawaii at the climax of a 1986-popular upheaval. A helicopter from a naval fleet of US, an old, trusted friend of the despot, took the defeated and devastated couple from the presidential Palace. The US had no other alternative other than whisking away the despot they backed wholeheartedly over a long period of rule.

In a changed political reality, with active US role, the army led by Fidel Ramos stood by the “people power” upsurge. The shoes, the shirts of the fallen dictator were left back. The stultifying power had no energy and time to pick those up. Absent were the faithful and obedient persons, cronies and courtiers, to provide that service. At that tragic-comical moment of the crumbling rule, there was no crony around. A number of them turned turncoats.

The couple and their cronies stole a lot, amounting to billions of dollars. So far, $2.24 billion worth of cash, bank accounts and prime real estate have been recovered from the Marcos and co.

Imelda, with her children returned home years later. But the glee was gone. Absent was the dictator’s ghastly glory.

Imelda had to leave behind at least 1,220 pairs of shoes including famous European and American brands like Pierre Cardin, Gucci, Christian Dior. She had a battery-operated pair that blinked when she danced. Was that a dance-macabre?

She donated a pair of shoes to a US charity, and in auction that fetched $10,000. An act of benevolence after appropriating a staggering amount!

More than 150 cartons of clothes including about 100 of Ferdinand’s white barong shirts emblazoned with the presidential seal on its pocket, relics of greed, were transferred to the National Museum two years ago after termites, humidity and mold threatened those, said the AP report.

Those, captive of rapacity, lay abandoned there in a padlocked hall with leaked roof. The designer shoes, the shirts, Imelda’s leather bags, the gowns were wet, not with tears, but with rain water that dripped through the leaked roof. Termites, as the report informs, had damaged the heel and sole of a Pierre Cardin shoe. A sleeve of Ferdinand’s one presidential shirt was nearly torn off.

Her empress-ive shoe collection, a symbol of nimiety, captivated ordinary minds left to deprivation. Millions of them have not heard, even for once in entire life time, the brand names.

The people power revolt was not without after-shocks and consequences. One of those was making the despot couple’s crude life style public. Imelda’s shoes were displayed. That was a symbol of indecent life that despots and pirates aspire for and worship.

Imelda once made historic claims: Most of her foreign-branded shoes were faux and many of the shoes were gifts from Filipino shoe industry owners. Officials in Marikina city, the Philippines shoemaking capital, borrowed 800 pairs of her shoes in 2001 for a shoe museum she inaugurated. Tourists now visit the museum. Unapologetic Imelda said her shoes, “beautiful shoes” as she defined, turned her best defense, the report said.

Do the despots and the rich use all the resources they accumulate? Do they have that energy and time to enjoy all they appropriate? Don’t they get tired?

How much resource and energy do the despots and the rich need to safeguard the resources they appropriate? Who provide that resource and energy? Who extend the backing? Are those also from acts of appropriation? Is it that they safeguard all the appropriated resource with all the appropriated resource? Is it a totally unknown arithmetic?

Despots, the rich, the powerful, the appropriators always appall, astound and amuse people. It’s two ways of life; it’s two ways of looking at life and comfort: One of the people, and another of the rich. Two different world views differentiate them, put them in two camps. Two poles, opposite and antagonistic, emerge. These facts, disliked by a section, have been told and analyzed by many.

Despots don’t crop up from a void or don’t usurp all power overnight. Ruling elites create despots as their savior, to ensure their democracy, a dictatorial power over people. An individual dictator carries out tasks of a class dictatorship.

But mainstream finds it safe not to identify the class dictatorship. It’s not that mainstream don’t know and understand class dictatorship. The stream understands it in a much better way than the stream opposing it. The Mainstream shrouds class dictatorship with confusion to make the rule safe. The individual dictator is identified, and removed, the moment it feels that unseating the despot is a safer approach to ensure dictatorship of the ruling elites.

In societies, at times, elites find no alternative political process to deal the distribution work other that resorting to dictatorial process as existing political process fails to preside over their competition for grabbing, encroaching, plundering resources in respective societies. At times, elites’ existing process turns ineffective to coerce, silence and control (CSC) masses of people. Appropriated properties feel threatened if people aren’t CSCed. Elites’ only alternative appears resorting to dictatorial rule. The elite power, embodied in a dictator, thus stands on a weak foundation.

Brute face of a dictator is the face of helpless ruling elites, whose only path to secure rule is nothing but brutalizing the ruled. Crude culture a dictator practices is the culture of ruling elites as the dictator represents interest and culture of the ruling elites.

It’s an insidious culture of lies and plunders with iron hands, exhibition of extravagance, vulgar life style, rotten “aroma” and unsophisticated ideas. Their songs turn loud; their dances turn hops and jumps, their literature looses life, their games turn gamble, their intellectuals turn clowns, an act of perfidy to people.
And, the rule turns ineffective and weak. The elites not only fail to deliver prosperity to the ruled, but also fail to distribute booty among them to the satisfaction of all their factions. At least a section of them falls apart. At least a section of the ruling elites perceive corruption and coercion make their class rule vulnerable. Their masters, sitting across oceans, also gain the same knowledge that was taught by reality.

Process to unseat the dictator is initiated. But the dictator with a brain turned sterile by intoxicating power and privilege feels comfort with infantile easiness.

Dictator’s and the dictatorial elites’ imbalanced corrupt senses shamelessly gets shaken the moment they are thrown into a bin of despise. Disdain only accompanies the individual dictator and the ruling elites’ dictatorship. Like shadows, their shoes wait to be tattered by time, to be despised as those bring up memories of despotic rule, of a shameless ruling culture.