By afternoon, the stretch of asphalt that once carried tanks now carried tension.

Forty years after millions of Filipinos flooded Epifanio de los Santos Avenue to topple a dictatorship, the anniversary of the 1986 uprising — EDSA@40 — unfolded in a way that would have been unthinkable to those who linked arms before Camp Crame: the heirs of “people power” could not stand on the same ground at the same time.

The Akbayan bloc staged its own mobilization at the EDSA Shrine, commemorating the revolution with speeches on democratic renewal and social justice. Their flags waved, their program proceeded. Nearby, however, progressive and mainstream left organizations — led by Bayan Muna, Sanlakas and Partido Lakas ng Masa — found themselves blocked by police as they attempted to approach the shrine to express their own views.

Barricades rose where once there had been rosaries and flowers.

It would be easy to treat today’s events as mere logistical friction — a matter of permits, traffic flow, or crowd control. But anniversaries are symbolic by design. They are rehearsals of memory, carefully staged narratives about who owns the past and who speaks for it. And what unfolded at EDSA this year revealed something deeper and more unsettling: the fragmentation of the progressive ranks that once formed the moral spine of the revolution.

The divided heirs of People Power

In 1986, ideological differences were real, sometimes sharp. Yet a broad coalition — church leaders, business elites, reformist soldiers, urban middle classes and left-leaning activists — converged on a shared objective: the end of authoritarian rule. The miracle of EDSA was not that Filipinos agreed on everything. It was that they agreed on enough.

Forty years later, that fragile common ground appears fractured.

The Akbayan bloc, long identified with reformist and parliamentary engagement, positioned its commemoration as a call to defend democratic institutions from erosion. The mainstream left, represented by Bayan Muna, Sanlakas, and Partido Lakas ng Masa, sought to frame the anniversary as a critique of persistent inequality, impunity, and elite capture of the state.

Both narratives draw from EDSA’s legacy. Both claim fidelity to its spirit. Yet today, they did not march together.

The police decision to block one set of groups while allowing another to proceed — regardless of the official justification — sharpened perceptions of unequal access to the symbolic heart of the revolution. The shrine is not merely a location. It is a stage upon which the meaning of EDSA is performed and contested. To be denied access is to be denied narrative space.

Fragmentation and its beneficiaries

Political fragmentation is not new to the Philippine left. Ideological splits, tactical disagreements, and personal rivalries have long complicated efforts to build coalitions. But at a moment when economic inequality remains stubborn, and public trust in institutions wavers, such disunity carries consequences beyond internal debate.

When progressive forces are divided, those who benefit most are not the poor or the disenfranchised. They are the entrenched elite families who have mastered the art of survival across administrations — as contractors, legislators, governors, and cabinet officials.

For decades, watchdog groups and investigative journalists have documented procurement anomalies, infrastructure cost overruns, and sweetheart contracts that funnel public funds into private hands. Estimates from various audits and anti-corruption advocates suggest that cumulative losses from graft and waste in major infrastructure and public works projects over multiple administrations may reach into the trillions of pesos. The figure often cited in public discourse — roughly 2 trillion pesos siphoned or misallocated over time — may be debated in precision, but not in direction. The hemorrhage is real.

Those funds could have transformed public hospitals, modernized mass transport, strengthened disaster resilience, and expanded social protection. Instead, they enriched networks of power that transcend party labels.

Fragmentation among progressives does not create corruption. But it weakens the only countervailing force capable of challenging it at scale: a unified moral and political front that can mobilize both street pressure and electoral leverage.

The choreography of exclusion

What happened at EDSA today was not merely about who got a permit and who did not. It was about choreography — who is seen as legitimate, who is deemed disruptive, who is granted the microphone, and who is kept behind metal barriers.

The presence of police blocking certain groups from reaching the shrine introduced an uncomfortable echo. EDSA’s mythology is built on the image of unarmed civilians facing down armed authority. To see barricades deployed against groups seeking to commemorate that history carries symbolic weight, even if the circumstances differ.

Authorities will argue that order must be maintained, that overlapping mobilizations risk confrontation, and that security protocols require control. All of that may be administratively sound. But symbolism does not obey administrative logic.

When one bloc commemorates while another is contained, the message — intended or not — is that memory is selective.

A revolution still unfinished

EDSA was never meant to be an endpoint. It was a reset — a reclamation of democratic space after years of repression. The promise was that institutions would be strengthened, corruption curtailed, and inequality addressed.

Forty years on, the record is mixed.

The Philippines has held regular elections. Independent media persists. Civil society remains vibrant. Yet dynastic politics endure, wealth concentration deepens, and public frustration simmers.

The fragmentation on display today reflects a broader malaise: the difficulty of sustaining a united reform agenda in a system designed to reward patronage and punish dissent.

Some within the progressive camp argue that ideological clarity requires distance from more moderate allies. Others contend that strategic alliances, however imperfect, are necessary to prevent backsliding. These debates are not trivial. They shape tactics, messaging and electoral strategy.

But when fragmentation spills into public commemoration — when groups that share overlapping critiques of elite dominance cannot coordinate even symbolic unity — it signals a weakening of collective leverage.

The elites’ quiet calculus

While activists debate strategy, elite families calculate quietly.

They do not need unanimity among progressives to maintain influence. They need only division. In a fractured field, they can fund multiple candidates, hedge political bets, and pivot as administrations change. Infrastructure contracts can be renegotiated, alliances reshuffled, narratives rebranded.

The 2 trillion pesos that critics say have been diverted through graft over the years did not disappear in a vacuum. They flowed through networks — boards of directors, procurement committees, local government offices — often populated by relatives and allies.

Such networks thrive in opacity and discord. A divided opposition is easier to outmaneuver, easier to caricature, easier to ignore.

The question EDSA@40 poses

Anniversaries are opportunities not just for remembrance but for reckoning.

EDSA@40 forces a question that cannot be answered with slogans: Who owns the revolution’s legacy? Is it a static memory guarded by select institutions and sanctioned blocs? Or is it a living, contested tradition that must accommodate dissent, even when that dissent is uncomfortable?

The sight of one progressive bloc commemorating inside the shrine while others were held at bay outside is a metaphor for the broader condition of Philippine politics: access unevenly distributed, unity elusive, power entrenched.

If EDSA taught anything, it was that seemingly immovable systems can shift when disparate actors converge around a shared objective. The revolution did not erase ideological differences. It temporarily subordinated them to a larger cause.

Today, that larger cause — accountability, equitable development, institutional integrity — remains unfinished.

The fragmentation of the progressive ranks may be understandable. Movements evolve; alliances strain. But unless those who invoke EDSA’s spirit can find ways to coordinate strategy and defend democratic space collectively, commemorations risk becoming ritual rather than renewal.

Forty years ago, Filipinos stood shoulder to shoulder before tanks. Today, they stood on opposite sides of barricades.

The asphalt of EDSA remembers both.