Freedom of the editor, by Teodoro M. Locsin, April 10, 1965

Freedom of the editor
April 10, 1965

By Teodoro M. Locsin

WHAT is this freedom of the editor that is the subject of this morning’s discourse?

It is the freedom to say the truth, of course. But what, to quote Pilate, is truth—although Truth stood whipped and battered before him?

It is freedom to spread, in the best over-developed tradition, lies about those who are less fortunate, whom one had exploited and must now degrade?

I have read little truth about my country in the so-called free press of the democracies. Friendly democracies. With such friends, who needs enemies?

What is this freedom we are so hot and bothered about?

Is it the freedom to prostitute the press?

The freedom to distort, malign, spiritually colonize?

Or is it not freedom from pride and prejudice?

Which is preferable—slavery or degeneracy? Fear or venality? What is freedom if it is merely freedom to be stupid and ignorant—or to betray?

Those who would write truthfully about other people—let them think of Lawrence of Arabia who put himself in the place of an alien race and paid the price. He wound up no longer feeling like an Englishman but knowing he was not an Arab, and madness, he said, was never far off. But how else may one write about an alien people?

A foreign correspondent, if he is not to be merely a foreign agent, sent abroad to tell lies about other people, so his people may be entertained or remain in blissful ignorance, must turn spiritual traitor, turn alien. If he is not prepared to do this, he can do truth a service by staying home.

What is freedom—of the editor or of anyone?

It is freedom to be intelligent and informed. Freedom to be ignorant is not freedom, for what is freedom? Is it not liberation? And what is ignorance but a prison?

One should be prepared to die for freedom—and how silly it would be to die for one’s ignorance!

Freedom is responsibility and the affluent as well as the slave hate it.

Freedom is a dirty word to those who do not believe in freedom but merely preach it. It is Luce talk, a loose expression, and can be made to mean anything. Freedom is slavery in George Orwell’s 1984. Freedom is freedom to be fired—in the usual democracy.

What is freedom? What is the freedom of an editor? It is freedom—

To study. (And having to go over so much in order to turn out a respectable paper—a paper one can respect—makes study almost impossible.)

To think. (And how can one think in a hurry?)

To express oneself. Freedom not to say the opposite of what one thinks. Freedom to tell one’s publisher to go to hell. But if one did that, one would go jobless while the publisher would not go to hell; he would merely get himself another editor.

How many publishers want an editor who believes in freedom?

Freedom of an editor is not to have to say the opposite of what he thinks—but what if what he thinks is not worth a damn? Would it not be better for all concerned, including the readers, if he simply shut up or were made to shut up? The publisher would be doing the readers a favor.

Freedom of an editor is freedom—to resign if his publisher is not a proper publisher, and how many publishers are proper publishers? Let us be truthful. We know one another.

“The public be damned! What’s good for me is good for the country!”

Are these or are these not our sentiments?

But what if the editor himself is an improper editor, without any encouragement from his publisher?

Freedom is inseparable from character.

Let us think more about this freedom business.

Freedom is a condition created by the free play of intelligence. (The racist is free—to spew out his poison. Exterminate him? We must be patient. Not extermination—he may have the arms—but time and education may do the trick. Meanwhile, let freedom reign. Freedom as degradation. As devourer. The crocodile should be free—to eat you. All god’s chillun got wings, including the vampire bat.) What is freedom? It is freedom to love truth and go in search of it.

To love truth is to hate lies, or what one believes to be lies. But what are one’s beliefs worth? Hence, the need for humility.

Though we think we are right, we know we may be wrong.

Let us consider the serious practitioners of this thing called journalism. Not the press prostitutes and degenerates that give the profession such a bad name, assuming it can have a better one. . .Many papers are mere extortion sheets, demanding payment, monetary, political or otherwise, to be quiet. Let us consider the serious practice of journalism.

If one would practice journalism in a serious fashion, one must be free, but the freedom of a writer, the freedom of an editor is merely an extension of the freedom of the publisher. And the publisher is under constant pressure, the pressure of—

1. His financial interests, that is, his dependence on advertising, his other businesses.

2. His lack of education and information.

3. His natural stupidity.

4. His nationality—“My country, right or wrong, but my country!”

5. His sheer humanity. His childhood, his sex-life, his family, his—his humanity. To err is human. To publish is to err.

Let us cultivate silence. “But what will happen to democracy?” Freedom of the press is a necessary evil, okay?

What is the press? The press is a mass medium for the circulation of truth and error. All one can hope is that what is circulated is not mainly error.

Now, let us take up the subject of advertising. Advertising income depends on circulation. Why advertise in a paper nobody reads or is given away to promote the illusion of circulation? But what is circulation? It is based on what? One people’s stupidity, bias, hunger for triviality and sensation? What would be the circulation of a truly serious paper?

How many papers dare to be serious, to be free? To dare is to rely on the proposition that the relationship between advertiser and paper is strictly a business one, that what is important to an advertiser is not what you think, with which he may disagree, but how many copies with all kinds of opinion—and the proposition that your readers are, as the syllogism goes, rational animals. That reason would prevail—a risky proposition.

I have expressed myself badly. One starts to write something and something else comes out. This is what I am trying to say: No matter how serious one may be, how dedicated to journalistic ideals, if one does not have enough readers, therefore enough ads, one will go out of business. It is not enough to be serious, to be free—one must earn the right to be taken seriously. To establish intelligence and integrity takes time and unceasing effort of both mind and will. The exercise of freedom is fraught with consequences. Freedom must be earned. It must be based on a long record of dedication to reason.

And where is reason to be found if not in a “free market” of ideas? In unlimited discussion? That is why a publisher who would truly practice journalism must be prepared to stake all on this skeptical notion of truth, as the product of free thought and expression. And on belief in the natural dignity of man, which calls for freedom to express his convictions. His honest convictions. And how is dishonesty to be exposed except through constant contradiction?

Journalism may be viewed, but humbly, as a mission. It is literature in a hurry. The refuge of failed poets and novelists, or would-be reformers who have not yet learned hot to wipe their noses, of rejects of other profession. A man must be crazy to want to be a newspaperman. A serious newspaperman. A doctor save a life. What do you think you are saving?

But having committed oneself to journalism, there is the matter of self-respect. Of respect for the craft which one would practice. We must do our best or cease to be men. Prostitution is a feminine occupation or should be. A female prostitute is pitiful, a male one disgusting.

Journalism as a craft calls for skill, for scrupulousness, for integrity. One does not build a wall with too much sand and too little cement, a house with rotten timber. There must be a sense of involvement in one’s work, which is not possible if one thought of it as merely a living. There must be a capacity for generous anger, which must be distinguished from merely a lousy temper, at the same time, a reluctance to hurt for the sake of hurting, a painful sense of obligation to let one’s spear know no brother.

Journalistic integrity is difficult to claim, but its lack is even more difficult to expose. For one may wear a mask of disinterestedness not easy to penetrate. The real face of journalism is not always visible. The acts of darkness may consist of commission and omission. By silence one may respectable betray and go against the honor of the profession.

It is doubtless romantic to view journalism as engagement. This is peace, not war. Resistance against an enemy calls for engagement, total engagement. One recalls Filipino resistance under threat of torture and death. One must be prepared to give up everything for the cause, for what could be greater than the cause? Not to be afraid to die—that, one suddenly realized, suddenly experienced like a breath of fresh air in prison, when the doors opened, was freedom. Journalism as engagement? Yes, for journalism must be free if it is to be journalism, and freedom calls for total engagement in war and in peace.

One must believe in journalism as one must believe in any other human occupation to practice it properly. That is why we speak of “following” an occupation. Whatever it is, one follows or one goes against. Whatever the occupation, one should make the most of it, not contribute to its diminution or violation. It is just a living? It can be a meaningful one. What is life without meaning?

We are not as needed as doctors, subtle as lawyers, constructive as engineers and obstructive as officials, but we exist and have a proper function. The mite is a state of being as complete and purposeful—unless all of creation is absurd—as the star. We should be more than mere gossips, sensation-mongers, wheeler-dealers, running-dogs of imperialism, domestic and foreign. We should not be anybody’s organ—an expressive word—the instrument of anything. We have our own specific being, our particular existence. Let us be what we are or are supposed to be. If we cannot be more, let us not be less than journalists. Let us practice journalism.

PostScript

TO repeat, the freedom of an editor is an extension of the freedom of the publisher, unless the two are one. An editor is only as free as his publisher will let him. How free an editor is, therefore, depends on what kind of a man the publisher is. Does the publisher believe in freedom of expression? If he does, there should be no problem.

How about the freedom of the writer, the reporter? He should have freedom, of course, but, in the end, he is accountable to the editor for his use of that freedom. IF he misuses it, if he reports as happening what never did, as true what turns out to be false, and if he does this too often, he leaves the editor no choice but to fire him. He is giving the paper a bad name. He is either too stupid to do his job properly or he has been bought.

What do I mean by press prostitutes? Those who promote special interests, whether those of others or their own—whether they are reporters or editors or publishers. To praise what should not be praised, to blame the blameless—for money or other unworthy consideration—is, to put it mildly, not to practice journalism. A paper is sold on the understanding that it is dedicated to the public good. If it is dedicated to some private good alone, it is being sold under false representations. It is a fraud. It’s like selling love—which cannot be sold. That’s what I mean by prostitution, journalistic or otherwise.

The writer is accountable to the editor, the editor to the publisher, the publisher to himself—if he is worthless, this is not a problem—and the readers. A worthless publisher can always be punished by the readers by refusing to buy his lousy paper. He will go out of business. Of course, if he has other sources of income, if he is very rich and uses the paper to promote his non-journalistic interests, as a club—he can always use his paper’s losses as an income tax deduction. He can lose and lose, and still come out winner. But not as a journalist.

A publisher who is conscious of his accountability to the readers, depending on their faith, on his paper’s credibility as a true paper and not a club, a private organ—such a publisher must believe in, has no choice but to practice, open-mindedness. The paper must present both sides of a controversy, present all views. It must be fair. The readers must never be given reason to think that they are being led by the nose, that they are being taken advantage of, that they are being fooled. The journalistic dice must not be loaded. The roll must be honest. The house does not always win but should also lose. If journalism is a game, it should be a game; it should not be rigged.

Is there no limitation to freedom of the press? How about dangerous ideas? All one can say is, if they are wrong, they can’t be really dangerous, for they can be both published and exposed. The question is: Are we right? If we are right, we can always prove the other wrong in free debate. We may be wrong, of course—then, we would be in trouble.

A paper needs advertising, of course, unless it is subsidized, but to be slavish toward advertisers is to stop being a paper, being believed in, being read—and to lose the paper. And the advertisers. What is the use of advertising in a paper few or nobody reads? One must be prepared to lose an advertiser in order to keep one’s paper, to keep the rest of one’s advertiser. And a certain restraint is always helpful. One should not advertise everything. Anything. A certain lack of greed is support for one’s independence.

Should a paper present, in the national interest, only the shining aspects of the nation? Why concentrate on the ugly as the Philippine press seems to be doing? What sort of an image does the Philippines have abroad? Personally, I do not care how we look abroad; what is important is how we look to ourselves. Let us publish what’s wrong with us—perhaps, enough indignation may be aroused to right it. Expose the evils—to stop them. What do they thing? We know what’s wrong with them. Never mind what they think. We must make democracy work here—or lose it. That’s what is vital. The freedom of an editor rests, ultimately, on the success of freedom.

The “Untimely Withdrawal” of Roger de la Rosa

The “Untimely Withdrawal” of Roger de la Rosa
By Quijano de Manila
November 1961

EXPLODING ten days before E-Day, the opposition’s 50-megaton bomb has, during these last rapt days of the campaign, been spreading lethal fall-out—in the NP camp, say the LPs, who claim that the hysteria with which NP spokesmen reacted to the bomb betrayed how utterly the majority party was demoralized by it; in the LP camp, say the NPs, who claim that defections to the Garcia camp of some of Roger’s followers, with whom the LPs might have proved that politics is addition, indicate that the bomb may have blown up in the LP’s faces, because a lot of people, disgusted by it, have abandoned both Roger and Macapagal.

Both claims may be correct. It’s impossible, after all, of control the drift of fallout; and the opposition bomb could have caused damage in all the three camps involved. But the resonance of the explosion, the brilliance of the publicity, could have done the LPs no harm at all, being worth several months of campaigning and a million pesos’ worth of propaganda, focusing, as it did, national attention on the Liberals. And the beauty of it is that the NPs themselves helped whip up national interest in the LP show.

The LPs had the bomb ready by November 2, were set to detonate it, with grisly humor, on November 4, President Garcia’s birthday—but how get the public to wait agog for the explosion? To enhance the force of the bomb, public interest and suspense should precede it—but how build up the suspense? The LPs thought of putting ads in the papers bidding the public watch out for a terrific event, but the ad gimmick had been worked to death this election year: one more political ad promising a sensation might create no sensation at all.

Then providence stepped in. Somebody (the LPs suspect a disgruntled ex-adviser of Roger de la Rosa) leaked the news of Roger’s withdrawal to Malacañang. “And Malacañang,” happily grin the LPs, “did the rest.” The LPs have reason to describe initial NP reaction to the bomb as “hysterical,” for the first public announcement of it was made by radio news commentator Rafael Yabut, on November 3.

Mr. Yabut, never a tepid speaker to begin with, was more overwrought than usual as, with a shocked sob in his voice and much banging of his fists, he informed the nation that, even as he spoke, a dastardly plot was being laid, a monstrous deal was being consummated, and a presidential candidate was withdrawing from the race for unspeakable reasons, reasons that had driven the candidate’s wife, in disgust, to attempt suicide.

Mr. Yabut named no names, but everybody knew whom he was accusing of such fearful stratagems.

Mr. Yabut was followed by Malacañang Press Secretary Jose Nable, who, the next day, had even more lurid revelations to make.

Mr. Nable declared that:

“The presidential aspirant agreed to withdraw from the race in favor of the other candidate in consideration of the staggering amount of P500,000.

“In addition to the P500,000, the withdrawing candidate would be granted complete and absolute control of the Central Bank and the Commission of Customs, and the freedom to fill up any three Cabinet positions;

“The withdrawing candidate had proposed identical terms to President Garcia but President Garcia had rejected the proposal outright as he condemned the attempt to commercialize the highest post in the gift of our people, and bluntly told this particular candidate that the post of president can never be for sale;

“As a result of this withdrawal, and after failing to dissuade her husband, the wife of the withdrawing candidate took poison and was committed to a private hospital.”

Mr. Nable had taken the trouble to dig up all these horrors so that “the entire Filipino people” might be warned against “this great conspiracy” against them.

Cried Mr. Nable, aghast:

“The Judas in Philippine politics, who has all this time campaigned and posed as the champion of the common people, will betray the very masses whom he swore to defend and protect. The Biblical sale of Christ for 30 pieces of silver has found its counterpart in the twentieth century.”

And he branded this attempt by the withdrawing candidate “to deliver to a political ally the votes that were entrusted to him by a trusting electorate” as “the most unique in double-cross,” apparently forgetting that the Nacionalistas had nothing but praise for Ambassador Romulo when Mr. Romulo withdrew from the presidential race in 1953 to support the Nacionalista candidate. Did not Mr. Romulo, too, deliver to a political ally the votes entrusted to him by a trusting electorate—or is sauce for the goose applesauce for the gander?

Nor should Mr. Nable be so worried that this “unholy alliance” has brought about “a national shame that mars the good name of our country before the eyes of the nations of the world.” Politics is understood to be naughty everywhere in the world; even in such a civilized country as the United States, a politician of the stature of Mr. Richard Nixon, who is planning to run for governor of his state, can be and was recently accused of trying to persuade, with a very juicy deal, the incumbent governor not to run again—and the Americans are not exactly hanging their heads in shame.

Moreover, Mr. Nable’s use of such epithets as “Judas” and “double-cross” are so passionate one begins to wonder if the passion is really in behalf of the voters whom, after all, the Nacionalistas have always contemptuously characterized as the ignorant fans of a movie idol. To call somebody “Judas” is to imply that he was the confidant of whomever he betrayed; and the term “double-cross” presupposes a shady deal. Was Mr. Nable trying to say that a third party—of whom Roger was a confidant and with whom he had a deal—had been made a fool of?
Mr. Nable’s metaphorical language is rather obscure; Roger himself is more forthright. At the November 4 press conference he remarked casually: “The rumor is that Malacañang paid me to run.” Roger dismissed the rumor as just a rumor; so why should Mr. Nable persist in hinting that a Dr. Frankenstein was assaulted by his own creature?

The story is that whoever was helping finance Roger’s campaign got scared and furious when Roger started invading the South; so the subsidy stopped. The break may be roughly dated about three weeks ago, after Amang Rodriguez had bluntly declared: “At this stage of the campaign, De la Rosa is getting more votes from Garcia than from Macapagal.”

And at this stage of the game, do all the NP innocents whose sense of honor has been so deeply outraged have to be told that politics is rough and dirty and that little boys who play with fire can get burned?

Unextended run

The Yabut broadcast started a run on the bank. From noon of November 3, the bakya-and-salakot crowd began storming Roger’s house, wanting to know if his slogan—“We Shall Return To Malacañang With Roger De La Rosa As President”—had indeed shrunk to a starker notice: “No Returns, No Refunds.”

His henchmen say they were afraid there would be trouble that night, so ugly was the temper of the idol’s fans. The early-evening crowd, mostly from the suburbs, eventually dispersed; but by two o-clock in the morning another crowd, from more distant hinterlands, had formed in front of the senator’s gate and was demanding to be let in. These indignant visitors were admitted and staged what practically amounted to a sit-down strike in the large nipa house on the senator’s lawn.

“Let us not move from here,” said they, “until he himself comes and tells us what he really intends to do.”

Noon came, and they were still there, squatting inside the nipa house and along the driveway, but their leader had still not appeared to them.

Only a few of them were allowed inside the senator’s residence, and there they found not Roger but his brother Jaime, who, when asked about Roger, replied with a scathing attack on the administration.

One thing must be said for Roger: he really drew the peasant crowd, for the faces one saw on his lawn that morning had the look of the Philippine earth: burned black by the sun and gnarled by misery. The men were in cheap polo shirts, the women in shapeless camisolas. It was obvious they had dressed in a hurry. One heard that this one had come all the way from Quezon, that one all the way from Cagayan; a man said he had flown in from Mindanao. All had a common complaint: why did they have to learn about this from Yabut? Why hadn’t Roger taken them into his confidence? They all claimed to be volunteer workers who had used their own money to spread Roger’s cause. If Roger backed out, they would lose face. How could they return to their barrios if they had lost face?

They all clung to the hope that all this was but more “black propaganda.” Their boy had not withdrawn; or if he was thinking of doing so, they would persuade him to continue the fight: let him but appear before them.

A cry rose up:

“Matalong lumalaban, huwag matalong umuurong (To go down fighting, not to go down retreating)!”

Had he lost heart because he had run out of funds? There was still some money they could scrape up among themselves; one man said he had already contributed P3,000 and was willing to contribute more; after all, there were only ten days left of the campaign. It didn’t matter if Roger was a sure loser.

“Let the votes we cast for him,” cried a bespectacled woman from Binangonan, “be a clear picture for 1965!”

The cheers that greeted this seemed to indicate that the Roger extravaganza would, by insistent public request, be extended for another ten days. Poor deluded rustics who did not know that the decision had already been made! They could cheer and argue and weep all they wanted; they were standing outside a closed door. Their fate was being settled, without their knowledge, in other rooms of other houses behind other doors, while they offered their very blood to the cause.

But as the day climbed toward noon and no Roger showed up, hope became feebler, the mutterings became darker. Inside the nipa house and all over the driveway, angry knots of disciples debated what to do.

Some said they would still vote for Roger, even if he had withdrawn, even if their votes should be “nulo.” Others cried that Roger could commit himself but not them to another candidate. The angriest spoke bitterly about the quality of Pampango blood and swore that they would, in protest, go over to the Garcia camp. A few still wistfully hoped that Roger would come and tell them that the show would go on.

By five that afternoon, the hope was dead. Roger had appeared on TV, with Macapagal; the withdrawal had been announced, the change of stand had been made.

That night, Roger’s house stood dark and silent. Gone were the noisy folk who had filled the lawn all day. The angry ones made good their threat and went over to the Garcia camp that very night. The undecided ones crept back to their barrios, wondering how to save face. The trip back must have been agonizing: whichever way they looked they saw that handsome face smiling from posters, from billboards, from streamers hung across roads, promising Malacañang to all these pathetic folk who had hitched their carretelas to a star.

Operation Rabbit

They did not know it, but they had been looking up that day at a dead star, a star that had ceased to exist days before, though seemingly “still in its appointed place in the heavens,” a star that had, in fact, begun to fade away two weeks before, in mid-October, which was when negotiations started between he Roger and Macapagal camps.

The initial feelers were made by two men who are, like Roger and Macapagal, from Lubao; all four were boys together. In Roger’s camp was Atty. Antonio Ybarra, his legal adviser, who had begun to feel that carrying on the fight was futile. In Macapagal’s camp, the contact man was former Pampanga governor Jose Lingad, whose intent, at first, was merely to effect a reconciliation between Roger and Macapagal. The two had been like brothers since boyhood; Lingad felt that even politics should not have turned them into mortal enemies. Why could they not continue to be friends though rivals? When Lingad discovered that Roger, faced by a financial crisis in his campaign, might not only be willing to re-establish friendship but might even be persuaded to back out in favor of Macapagal, what had started as a peacemaking mission turned into a frantic political operation.

Two more men entered the picture: Jaime de la Rosa from Roger’s camp; Amelito Mutuc from Macapagal’s camp. Lingad continued to be the liaison man, traveling from one camp to another, following the two candidates to the field, and sending back to Manila coded messages on the progress of the negotiations.

The strategists named their project Operation Rabbit; to ensure secrecy they have every participant a code name. Macapagal and Roger were respectively referred to as Oscar and Cesar, the names they had used in zarzuela days; Ybarra was called Paul (because he warbles in the Paul Anka manner); Lingad was dubbed Bob Steele (because he looks like a brawny cowboy); and Amelito Mutuc, over his indignant protests, was named Nehru. Mutuc says that the others could never remember his code name; one time he sent Lingad a telegram signed Nehru and Lingad wired back: Who the hell is Nehru?

Negotiations were going smoothly when something happened that almost blew them up: two sisters of Roger, Africa and Gloria, suddenly decided to come out in favor of Macapagal and campaign for him. Later, people would put two and two together and hazard the guess that the decision of the sisters was part of the plot to capture Roger and should have been read as a portent of Roger’s withdrawal; but the organizer’s of Operation Rabbit say that they had nothing to do with the decision of the sisters and were, in fact, more dismayed than delighted by it. For Roger flared up and accused them of bad faith, of continuing the war against him even while discussing peace terms. “Look,” he said, “you’re even using my sisters against me!”

He was finally convinced that what had happened was a fortuitous coincidence, and Operation Rabbit went on. His two sisters were turned over to LP campaign manager Taning Fernandez, who was soon heard loudly wailing: “Now I have three prima donas on my hands—Lacson and the two De la Rosa sisters!”

After two weeks of long-distance, proxy talks, Roger agreed to a face-to-face meeting with Lingad and Mutuc. The site chosen was Ybarra’s house, which is in a wild lonely hinterland of Quezon City. The appointment was for Halloween night, but Roger, who was campaigning in Laguna, did not show up until two in the morning. He came with his brother Jaime. Waiting up for him were Ybarra, Lingad and Mutuc.

The two LP men at first kept the talk on Roger’s campaign, praising his ability to draw the masses. Says Mutuc: “Roger is a sentimental man and is really sincere about wanting to improve the conditions of the masses. Talk to him about them and he softens up. Then it’s easy to reason with him.”

They asked him what his conditions would be for withdrawing. Roger said he wanted his program of government to be adopted by Macapagal, no retaliation against his men, and the promise that he could continue to do what he had been doing: acting as a “bridge” between the people and the government. He made one tangible demand: that he be given a higher place in the LP hierarchy.

Mutuc scoffs at the rumors that the withdrawal was a financial bargain: “As a matter of fact, I felt sure that one of Roger’s conditions would be reimbursement of his campaign expenses, but he didn’t even ask for that.”

Mutuc says that Roger said that he was impelled to consider withdrawing from the race by the thought of his followers: he himself was not afraid of defeat but he did not relish the thought that he was surely leading his followers to defeat; by leading them into the Macapagal camp, he felt he was leading them to victory. Roger, it seems, has been misunderstood by those of his followers who thought he had betrayed them: what he did, he did for their sake.

The conference broke up at dawn, with Roger assuring the LP men that he was ready to withdraw the moment Macapagal accepted his conditions. Mutuc at once sent a telegram to Macapagal, who was in Iligan City: “Operation Rabbit successful. Bob Steele flying to see you.”

Lingad booked passage on a plane and was at the airport at seven that morning. November 1. The plan was that he was to brief Macapagal on what had happened, then fly back to Manila with Macapagal the following day, for the signing of the pact. The withdrawal would be announced that very day, after Roger and Macapagal had signed the pact.

But toward seven in the evening of November 1, Mutuc almost collapsed from surprise when Macapagal walked in. Mutuc lives in Forbes Park; Macapagal had gone there from the airport, was still in his campaign cap and jacket. Nobody knew he was in town.

“But where’s Lingad?” asked Mutuc.

“I don’t know,” replied Macapagal. “I just got his telegram.”

It turned out that Lingad, who was merely a chance passenger on the plane, had not been able to get a seat and didn’t go to Mindanao at all. He had merely sent Macapagal a wire bidding him come to Manila at once. How secret Operation Rabbit was kept may be deduced from the difficulties Lingad had in determining where to send the telegram. He called up LP headquarters for a schedule of Macapagal’s Mindanao tour but the LPs at the headquarters, not knowing that Lingad was on an important mission, refused to tell him where Macapagal was. Lingad had to find out for himself, correctly sent the telegram to Sindangan, Zamboanga del Norte. Macapagal had just arrived there when the wire came; he at once boarded the plane again and flew off to Manila.

Macapagal told Mutuc that he wanted the pact signed that very night if possible because he had to go back to Mindanao the next day for very important rallies. But the pact could not be prepared without Ybarra and Lingad, and Mutuc could not locate them either. Whenever he called up Ybarra, Ybarra’s phone was busy.

“Everything,” sighs Mutuc, “seemed to be happening to me that day!”

Macapapgal, impatient, rushed off to his own house, to greet his wife. It was her birthday and he had a very nice present for her: the news that Roger was practically set to withdraw.
Mutuc finally drove over to Ybarra’s house; he found nobody at home and the telephone receiver improperly hooked: that was why it had been buzzing all the time. He learned that Ybarra and Lingad had both gone home to Lubao, to spend All Saints Day there. He wired them to return at once.

They arrived at two in the morning and, with Mutuc, began drafting the joint manifesto of Roger and Macapagal, the separate statements of each, and the letter to the Commission on Elections. To polish the grammar and give the documents a literary tone, they summoned a veteran workhorse of the Liberal Party: Hermie Atienza.

By five a.m., the papers were ready, Macapagal was called up and came running. Over breakfast, he went over and revised the drafts. Then Ybarra and Lingad rushed them over to Roger’s house, with instructions that they were to be signed at once because Macapagal had to fly back South at ten that morning.

But ten o’clock struck and the emissaries had still not returned. Then word came that Roger had asked for two more days, to consult his leaders, and that he wanted a “confrontation meeting” with Macapagal that noon.

Macapagal decided to defer his trip and consented to the meeting.

He waited in a bedroom of Ybarra’s house, with Lingad, Ybarra and Mutuc. The vice-president was moody and nervous. He said to the three men with him:

“You are close to me, Pepe, and you, Tony, and you, Mel. But I tell you: no one is as close to me as Roger. It nearly broke my heart that the one closest to me should be the one to oppose my bid for the presidency.”

Roger and Jaime de la Rosa arrived and were shown up to the bedroom.

“Pare!” cried Roger when he saw Macapagal.

“Pare!” cried Macapagal as he strode toward Roger.

The two men fell into each other’s arms and burst into tears. The brothers-in-law have, since they grew up, been calling each other pare, being compadres.

The rest of the group left the room, leaving the two erstwhile rivals alone. They had a lot of unburdening to do. They were alone together for an hour, were red-eyed from weeping when they finally called back the others.

Mrs. Ybarra sent lunch up to the bedroom—a festive lauriat she had ordered from a restaurant—but her guests were much too excited to eat. Macapagal said all he could take was boiled eggs.

As he was peeling the eggs he said: “Just look, even this habit of mine of eating boiled eggs, I got from Roger. When I was a sickly body he told me I should eat boiled eggs—and I’ve been doing so ever since.”

Suddenly he began to shake with laughter, leaning toward Roger: “Remember when you and I—the eggs?”

Roger began to roar with laughter too: “And the neighbors chased us?

They had been boys together and this was one of many private memories: one day they had picked up some eggs from a neighbor’s yard and almost got caught.

At three in the afternoon they parted, after another embrace and more tears; and Macapagal flew back to Mindanao. He had managed to sneak away to Manila without making the newsmen in his entourage suspect that something was afoot. The inquisitive ones were told that he had merely gone to greet his wife on her birthday.

Three days later, on November 4, he was back in Manila. After four that afternoon, he and Roger stood side by side before the TV cameras, announcing to the nation that the Pampangos were solid again. The monster bomb had gone off.

Everybody agrees that the timing of the bomb was terrific, though the NPs can be forgiven for saying that the day chosen, President Garcia’s birthday, revealed the quality of the minds behind the bomb.

Together again

The most explosive announcement of this pre-election period was made in a studio of the ABS Station, before a crowd of newsmen and jubilant LPs.

Macapagal arrived first, looking exultant, in light-violent trousers and a silk-colored baro embroidered all over with the LP shield. He strode to the row of newsmen and shook hands with all of them. “I can’t get over the habit, you know,” he quipped.

Lacson was there, and Senator Marcos, and Hermie Atienza, in one of his old suits. Hermie Atienza is one politico who has not been converted to the barong Tagalog; he persists in wearing prewar suits—and do they look prewar. Malicious folk, observing his frayed cuffs and lapels, remark: “The LP really should win, if only so Hermie can buy himself new suits.” But Hermie says that, after his party wins, he will have to give up suits and adopt the baro: “Macapagal says that coats like this one I’m wearing have too many pockets!”

Applause greeted the entrance of Roger, and a shock of surprise, for with him was his wife Lota. She looked like a Garbo, in a dark-chocolate frock and a severe hairdo, the hair swept tight from her face and knotted into a bun that crowned her head. Pale and grave, stark and statuesque, she drew all eyes and necessitated a revision of the program. She said she wanted to speak.

(The joke then current was that Lota had been deeply upset by Roger’s “untimely withdrawal.”)

Roger was in gray trousers and a white shirt with thin check-stripes in blue, and he looked very quiet and serious too, speaking in a very low, often inaudible voice.

Said he:

“After deep soul-searching, I have come to the firm conclusion that the only way we can effect a change for the better in the life of our people is to unite against the present administration. I have thus decided to withdraw my candidacy for the presidency of the Philippines in favor of Vice-President Macapagal.

“Believe me, my friends, my decision was not easy to reach. It means a great personal sacrifice for me and my wife, and for thousands of our friends, sympathizers and supporters who have fought for what we believed to be a just and rightful cause: the cause of the common tao.

“But even the noblest idealism must give way to the unbreakable wall of realism.

“Divided, the opposition will fall; united, it will triumph.

“The presidency, however exalted the office, is and should merely be an instrument for the achievement of the public good. It should never be proclaimed or seen as an end in itself.
“What have I proved during these months that I have been campaigning for the presidency? This: that the masses are no longer the docile, helpless creatures that the political bosses take them to be. They are no longer content to play a passive role, taking what comes as their fate. They are ready and willing to take political action. This I have learned in the few months of my presidential campaign; and to those who seek to betray the people, I say, beware of their power.

“I will not stoop low to answer at this solemn moment the malicious and evil propaganda that are being spread about this decision I have taken. Suffice it to say that my conscience is absolutely and clearly satisfied that this is the best that could be done for our fatherland. Let our people and history be the ultimate judge.”

Macapagal praised the “patriotic step” Roger had taken. “United Opposition victory is doubly assured,” cried he. “This marks the end of the venal Nacionalista regime!”

Then Lota de la Rosa joined her husband and Macapagal at the table in front of the cameras to speak for herself. Her voice is deep, husky and emotional; whenever she mentioned her husband she turned her face toward him.

She said:

“I have decided to appear here this afternoon because of ugly rumors that have been spread to the effect that I am opposed to my husband’s decision to withdraw. This is not true. His decision is my decision.

“Some people, in their evil desire to destroy us, have spread the yarn that I have tried to take my life because of this decision. This is nothing but a lie—a monstrous, evil lie.

“It is true, my friends, that I have been to a hospital. But it was due to my low blood pressure, aggravated by the fatigue and exhaustion caused by the rigors or the campaign. That malicious people in the pay of the powers-that-be have dared distort this fact is evidence of the extent to which they will go in order to continue holding on to that power.”

Afterwards, Roger was interrogated by the newsmen. Did he think his withdrawal enhanced Macapagal’s chances of winning? “As far as I am concerned,” he replied, “the elections are over.” What did he think of Malacañang folk’s comments on his withdrawal? “Tell them,” said he, “to start packing.” And he said he would file libel charges against certain of those folk.

As he spoke, his brother Jaime and his sisters Gloria and Africa stood in the background weeping. Theirs was the only show of emotion during this TV spectacle in which one felt rather than actually saw the drama, watching those two brothers-in-law together again under the spotlights, who had spent their youth together before the spotlights.

Yet the brilliance of the spectacle only heightened the darkness of the mysteries behind it, mysteries that promise more bombs and explosions, mysteries that include two foreigners, one accused of having put up the money for the withdrawal, the other suspected of having leaked the news of the withdrawal to Malacañang. The NPs are especially incensed against the former, having apparently forgotten all the Americans involved in their capture of the Palace in 1953. The LPs are talking deportation too, being wrathful against the other foreigner, whom they believe to have been Roger’s “evil genius,” the one who lured him away from the Liberals.

But the most attentive spectator of that TV spectacle must have been the man in whose honor and on whose birthday it was staged. Down in Tagbilaran, President Garcia turned 65, had a birthday cake, got a kiss from his wife, another kiss from an impetuous lady physician, was at home all day to hundreds of well-wishers. His leaders say that he was undisturbed by the Roger withdrawal, so unconcerned by it that he even laughed merrily as he discussed it with his leaders—at three o’clock in the morning.

The LP bomb seems to have been a multiple birthday present—for President Garcia, who celebrated on November 4; for Mrs. Macapagal, who celebrated on November 1, even for Roger himself, who celebrates on November 12. All these people believe that the bomb increased their respective parties’ chances of winning.

All are sure that the birthday bomb will result in a joyful message on November 14:

“Many happy returns!”

Red flags and raised fists

Red flags and raised fists

By Dan Mariano

Special to the Century Book

DURING the 1950s and early 1960s, nationalism was equated with communism. Filipinos were, in general, perfectly content to be regarded as the Americans’ “little brown brothers.”

Yet, in this sea of colonial mentality emerged islands of nationalism that invoked the unresolved conflict between Philippine Independence and America’s Manifest Destiny at the turn of the century.

These nationalist pockets were initially manned by politicians such as Claro M. Recto, Jose P. Laurel and Lorenzo Tañada, who gave inspiration t o associations like the Movement for the Advancement of Nationalism (MAN). By the mid-l960s, nationalism began to attract a younger crop of Filipinos.

In l964, a group of university students founded the Kabataang Makabayan. By l968, the KM’s patriotic platform was reinforced by Mao Zedong Thought. Later, that same year, its leading members—who had previously been associated with MAN—and several Huk commanders disenchanted with the old PKP declared the “re–establishment” of the Communist Party of Philippines along Maoist lines on December 26.

On March 29 of the following year, the New People’s Army (NPA) was organized, announcing the CPP’s determination to capture state power through armed struggle.

IN 1969, with the relaxation of sexual standards came the proliferation of pornography. Local movie producers made a killing out of films that titillated previously conservative Filipinos with frontal nudity and graphic bed scenes. A mere decade was all it took for the local film industry to take a licentious leap from wholesome, family-oriented movies like “Ibiang, Mahal Kita” to the salacious “Ang Saging ni Pacing,” which left little to the imagination.

Adding to the Mardi Gras-like atmosphere of 1969 were the lavish parties that the elite threw, giving currency to the phrase “ostentatious display of wealth.” The grandest of these was a banquet staged by the Lopezes—kingpins of the sugar bloc and owners of the country’s biggest broadcasting network and electric utility—where champagne flowed, literally, from a fountain.

IF 1969 was Fat Tuesday, 1970 became the nation’s Good Friday when popular passions reached boiling point.

Ferdinand Marcos had just won an unprecedented second term in an election that his political rivals and independent observers alike claimed were the dirtiest in the nation’s political history. Nevertheless, Marcos felt that his reelection vindicated the “record of performance” of his first term, which witnessed an explosion of public works construction that, for the most part, was financed with Japanese war reparations.

Although the country had more roads, bridges, dams and irrigation systems than ever before, the economy had begun to nose-dive. The peso underwent 100-percent devaluation, with the exchange rate going from P2:$1 to P4:$1, then P8:$1. The prices of basic commodities rose out of the reach of the working population, whose wages were not allowed to keep up with inflation.

When he delivered his State of the Nation Address on the afternoon January 26, 1970 before a joint session of Congress, the popularity that allowed him to win reelection the year before was already badly eroded.

Outside the legislative building, hundreds of moderate student activists were demonstrating to urge the government to call a constitutional convention. As Marcos stepped out of the building and onto the driveway, a papier-mâché crocodile (representing government corruption) and a make shift coffin (symbolizing the death of democracy) flew in his direction. Security aides quickly hustled Marcos into his waiting limousine and sped off away from the angry mob. Moments later, Manila police armed with truncheons and rattan shields attacked the student demonstrators who fought back with empty soft drink bottle, rocks and the wooden frames of their placards.

The first encounter of what would later be called the First Quarter Storm (FQS) of 1970 ran for several hours with either side gaining, losing and retaking ground on. J. Burgos Street in front of what was then the congress building. Another phrase would gain currency that evening: “police brutality.”

Rarely did the protesters number more than 10,000 at any given demonstration, but the impression they left was of a whole generation rising up in rebellion.

THE main focus of 1971 was the election for eight seats in the Senate. The bloody events leading up to the voting would exert a marked influence on the outcome.

Emboldened by the phenomenal growth of the youth movement, UP students occupied the Diliman campus and barricaded its main roads. In this, they won the support of the faculty, non-academic personnel and virtually the entire UP community.

The campus remained under the students’ control for several days until the university radio station began broadcasting a tape recording purportedly of Marcos making love to an American starlet, Dovie Beams. That proved to be the last straw. The President ordered the PC Metropolitan Command (Metrocom) to retake the campus. The first thing the troops did after dispersing the protesters was to smash the transmission equipment of DZUP, which was never heard from again.

On the eve of the by-election, the opposition Liberal Party was holding its final rally at Plaza Miranda when all of a sudden the stage was rocked with an explosion that was soon followed by another. The grenade attack killed about a dozen people and injured scores of others, including LP senatorial candidates Jovito Salonga, Ramon Mitra, Eddie Ilarde and Eva Estrada Kalaw.

The blame quickly fell on Marcos, who merely encouraged the popular suspicion by suspending the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus that same evening.

BY 1972, the feeling of dread that Marcos was up to no good had become so palpable that even sections of the press that had once given him favorable coverage began to turn critical and pro-opposition. Thus, when Senator Aquino delivered a privileged speech exposing an alleged plot to justify the declaration of martial law, the media painted the town red with the explosive disclosure.

The plot, codenamed Oplan Sagittarius, contained all the incidents that had already taken place that would lead the public to conclude that the situation was getting out of hand, the communists were running berserk, the political opposition was encouraging civil unrest and, therefore, the government had to step in to regain control.

All that needed to be carried out, according to the plot, was an attempt on the life of a high-ranking official of the Marcos administration.

That scenario unfolded one night in September 1972. The following day, the newspapers ran pictures of a car assigned to Enrile that bore so many bullet holes only a miracle could have made the defense secretary come out of it alive. Years later, after leading a coup against Marcos, Enrile would confess that the ambush had been staged.

Days later, Filipinos woke up to find their radios eerily silent. No newsboy came around to deliver the papers. Later in the afternoon, the television station owned by Marcos crony Roberto Benedicto went on the air and asked viewers to stand by for a very important announcement direct from Malacañang.

The talking head that eventually came into view belonged to Francisco Tatad. With all the solemnity that he could muster, the press secretary announced that Marcos had issued Proclamation No. 1081 placing the entire country under martial law.

The nightmare had begun.