Again? Editorial for January 23, 1971

January 23, 1971

Again?

THOSE who lived through the Japanese Occupation, and that includes Pres. Ferdinand Marcos himself, know what a total horror it was, how people were tortured and heads cut off on mere suspicion of resistance to Japanese military rule—and how it did not discourage resistance. Everybody was a guerrilla, or claimed he was.

President Marcos keeps hinting at the imposition of military law on the Filipino people when he does not hint at the suspension of the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus. With the suspension of the writ, President Marcos could order the arrest of anyone and keep him or her in prison or in a concentration camp at his pleasure—that is, indefinitely. With the imposition of martial law, that is, the establishment of a military dictatorship, “Congress might as well close up,” as one congressman has observed. And the courts might as well close up, too, for Marcos would have absolute power. The independence of Congress and the Judiciary would be a thing of the past. Marcos’s rule would be absolute. He would be king.

Is the fate in store for the Filipino people to live under the sovereign will of “King Ferdinand”—and “Queen Imelda”?

As noted in the article beginning on page 2, the demonstrations in the United States have been marked by violence which makes the demonstrations here models of law and order by comparison. A magazine, Scanlans, features in one of its issues “Guerrilla Warfare in the U.S.A.,” and presents, in a most graphic fashion, the almost countless acts of sabotage, dynamiting, attacks on persons in authority and other acts of war against the government and the Establishment it is supporting—yet the American president, Richard Nixon, has never ventured to speak of the possibility of suspending the writ or imposing martial law. Were he to do so, he would be promptly impeached and removed from office.

Why does President Marcos keep on talking about suspending the writ or imposing martial law? One would think he could hardly wait to do so. And what good would that do? What good would that do him? Never mind what good it would do the country, but what good wold to do him? Having imposed martial law and become a dictator, how could he ever leave Malacañang and rejoin a people finally free of his rule? He must be a dictator for life to be secure.

He’d never be safe otherwise, no more than the Japanese—what was his name?—who headed the Kempetai could have lived with any sense of security among Filipinos once the Japanese forces had been disarmed. As a matter of fact, the Marcos Administration is reaching the point of no return to a democratic regime, for with so many young Filipinos killed merely for demonstrating against the manifest injustices of the government, how safe would Marcos & Co. be when no longer in power? Could Marcos afford to be no longer in Malacañang if more of the young should be slaughtered?

Was it necessary or wise to arm government forces with Armalites to maintain order during the demonstration in Plaza Miranda last week? Armalites are used in war. (The Americans use them in their war in Vietnam.) Has Marcos declared war on demonstrators, whose right to demonstrate he continually affirms—after all, it is a constitutional right and he is supposed to uphold the Constitution—that he must have his forces armed with Armalites when they confront the demonstrators?

Is there a war on?

The British, confronted with rampaging Chinese Communists in Hong Kong at the height of the Cultural Revolution, kept their cool. They sent police with only truncheons to meet the mob. If the mob should break through the police lines, it would be met with police armed with tear gas and riot guns. Only if the demonstrators should be able to overwhelm the second police contingent would the government give them the works. Armalites are the works—and the Marcos regime resorted to their use last week, killing four and wounding many others—almost as a matter of course.

After “Black Wednesday,” military rule and a Marcos dictatorship would seem to be an inevitable development. The further use of Armalites against demonstrators and the slaughter of more who cannot stomach the Marcos Administration would make it certain.

What would life under Marcos dictatorship be like—and its political and other consequences of the Republic?

With the courts and Congress reduced to impotence and the independent press shut up—with publishers who dare to disagree with Marcos placed under house arrest or in concentration camps where they would be joined sooner or later by outraged justices of the Supreme Court, senators and representatives who would not lick the boots of Marcos, as well as others who would not submit to tyranny—the nation would be “polarized.” the Philippines would be divided into Marcos collaborators and those who love liberty and are branded “misguided elements” (as during the Japanese Occupation) and declared enemies of the Marcos state.

Marcos, as a former guerrilla leader, should know how the Japanese failed to stop the Resistance against their rule. The more atrocities the Japanese committed, the more Filipinos they tortured and killed—the more joined the Underground. It became a matter of honor to do something against the oppressors, whether it be merely to contribute money to the guerrillas or to commit some act of sabotage against the government if not actually to go to the mountains and take up arms against the regime. Filipinos in tremendous numbers found they were not afraid to die for freedom. They were suddenly free from fear. Marcos himself got a lot of medals for not being afraid, and many more showed the same lack of fear though they got no medals for it. The country became one vast concentration camp except when men dared to be free.

Life under a regime of martial law or a Marcos military dictatorship would be little different from life during the Japanese Occupation. How many would submit to it? And how would Marcos ever dare restore civil law? Would he dare to leave Malacañang? Would he not  be compelled to declare himself President for life, that is, a dictator forever? And how long would “forever” be?

Our republican institutions suffer from corruption but they do guarantee certain civil liberties—like freedom from arbitrary arrest and indefinite detention without trial and the right to demonstrate peaceably against the government for redress of grievances and to write an editorial like this. The denial of such liberties in all-too-many cases does not argue against the goodness of the institutions. Because there are thieves does not make the law against theft a bad one but only makes enforcement of the law more necessary than ever. Under our republican institutions we enjoy certain liberties, to repeat—if not too much economic progress. Justice is often mocked, true, but under a military dictatorship, there would be no justice at all, no liberty at all, and even less progress than ever. The entire economy would be organized into a government corporation run by Marcos & Co., and one has just to contemplate how Nawasa, the Philippine National Railways and other government corporations are run to know how the people would suffer under such a regime.
Only Marcos & Co. would profit from martial law. They should. They would be the law. The rest of us would be mere subjects—or outlaws.

Those who wish the President well should advise him to stop talking about martial law. Whatever he and his friends get out of it—would it really be worth it?

The Survivor: Man of the Year for 1987

January 9, 1988
Man of the year

HOPE springs eternal, as in the case of the political prisoner being blindfolded before the firing squad. It might misfire.
One clings to life, however miserable. Life is better than none—except to the would-be suicide. He does not think so, and pulls the trigger. A martyr to his conviction. But just to go on living, under the most adverse conditions, is worth it. Just survive!
But is life, as it is, better than none—to the wretched of the earth? Perhaps, life after death will be an improvement.

There’ll be pie
In the sky
By and by.
It’s a lie!

So went the International Workers of the World’s gibe at organized religion’s panacea. Suffer here, enjoy there— forever! Opium of the people? But relaxing!

And what if there is no life after death? Well, who can tell? Who really knows anything about “that undiscovered country from whose bourne no traveler returns”? Ask no question and you will be told no lies. A question without an answer is a silly one. But there is a question that may be reasonably asked:

“Is there life—after life?” After birth?

Life worth living?

Is living in Smoky Mountain life? Worth living?

Must be. Or so many thousands of human beings—like you and me—would not be living there. Not rising in revolt against their inhuman condition and burning the city down. They’re alive. Enough reason for being.

Life is good—however its condition. That is the ultimate affirmation of faith. That is the Survivor’s Creed.

The Survivor, then, is the Man of the Year. He took all that life and the regime he suffers under but still maintains,  with protest but also with patience. Showing “grace under pressure”—to the exasperation of those who would replace the present dispensation with its flawed rights and liberties with a dictatorship, fascist or Communist, that would strip him of all rights but promises rice for his liberties. He’s still free—to suffer but protest against his suffering. Still being robbed but protesting the robbery. Still being tortured—as that poor young man who was burnt with lighted cigarettes and had electrode wires attached to his genitals if he did not come across with P10,000 for the police…

Life is good—despite the Government and the Opposition, fascist and Communist, offering only the alternative of the Tiger or the Hyena. One suffers and labors and provides, however inadequately, for the needs of those one loves, one’s family, the Real Country—without hurting others. One is a good man or woman. One survives—remaining human.

“To the Survivor!”

The Man of the Year.

Gaudencio Antonio, Man of the Year, 1967

January 6, 1968

Man of the Year

WHO is the man of the year?

THE politician of the Year is, undoubtedly, President Ferdinand Marcos. He dominated the Nacionalista convention and six of his senatorial candidates for the Senate won in the elections. The overwhelming majority of the Nacionalista candidates for governor won, and the same is true of the Nacionalista candidates for city mayor. Since Marcos made his administration the principal issue in the elections, it may be said that, of all the winners, he is the greatest winner.

Why is Marcos not the Man of the Year? He has scored a tremendous political victory, but he has not solved any of the big problems that have beset the country since it gained political independence. Corruption is rampant in the government, and nepotism is more flagrant than ever. He has built roads, more roads than any of his predecessors, but it is only a beginning. Thousands of kilometers more of road must be built before the Philippines can be said to have an adequate road system. There is the “miracle rice,” but it was developed not under him but under previous administrations, and with American funds. Marcos was the Man of the Year two years ago, when he won against Diosdado Macapagal, who used all the power and money at his command to crush his rival—in vain. Marcos showed it was not enough to have money and power to remain in Malacañang. One must deserve to be there. But under Marcos as president… Here is a letter from a reader to The Manila Times which expresses much of what most people feel today:

“Life is so difficult nowadays. One ganta of rice costs over P2; movie prices have gone up; one small calamansi is worth 5 centavos. Even a trip to Baguio is now more costly; toll fees have been jacked up from P2 to P4.

“The Marcos administration is to be congratulated for its success in making the people believe that the situation is not as difficult as it really is. The President’s bright boys talk of ‘miracle rice’; but has the price of rice gone down? They build a Cultural Center; but, does this alleviate the plight of the poor? They plan grandiose state visits; but, will these visits make life a little more bearable? What the people need are bread and butter, not circuses fit for kings!”

If the candidates of Marcos won in the last elections, it was because the opposition had nothing better in the way of principles or candidates to offer the electorate. The voters were sick and tired of the old political vicious circle. If the candidates of the two major parties were interchangeable, why bother to vote or, if one must vote, why vote for the opposition—which was really no opposition at all, being no different from the party in power?

This is not to say that Marcos has not done some good as president, but so much more must be done that to name him Man of the Year is to lull him into complacency; it is not to drive him to do better. And he must do better if his administration is not to be, in the end, just another administration, no worse, no better, and not good enough.

Benigno Aquino, it has been suggested, should be the Man of the Year, for did he not win in spite of all the Marcos administration did to stop him? Aquino certainly came out well—second—in the senatorial election, but a lot of the credit must go to Malacañang, which did all it could to make a political martyr of Aquino. The stupidity of the Palace should not make anyone Man of the Year. Political Beneficiary of the Year, perhaps, but to be Man of the Year, one must have done something extraordinarily good for the people—or bad. One must be the cause of great social, economic, political, moral, scientific or some other kind of change. The victory of Aquino has changed nothing.

The Man of the Year is the late Senator Gaudencio Antonino.

Rejected by the Nacionalista convention because of his unrelenting campaign against the shameless and criminal allowances congressmen were giving themselves, Antonino ran as an independent candidate, died in a helicopter crash the day before Election Day—and the name “Antonino” was written on more ballots than the names of 14 living candidates of the Nacionalista Party and Liberal Party. “Antonino” came out third in the senatorial race.

“I don’t have to win,” he said to the Free Press. “If I get a million and a half votes running on the issue of congressional allowances and running alone, congressmen will know how strong is the sentiment against congressional allowances. Imagine if I got more than two million votes—how would they dare vote themselves their old allowances? But if I don’t run, then the congressional allowances issue will be dead and they will vote themselves all kinds of allowances, in the Senate as well as in the House, without fear of the people’s anger. The issue will be politically dead with me.”

“You have a heart condition, I understand. You know what it will mean running alone. You will have to cover the entire country by yourself or try to. How can you stand it? Don’t you think of your family?”

“I have talked it over with my family and they agree I should run. If I have four years to live and I lose two, that will be all right by me. When I filibustered against congressional allowances in the Senate, there was a nurse with an oxygen tank standing by in case I had an attack.”

He concluded:

“I will not be a Nacionalista candidate nor a Liberal candidate but the candidate of the people, I will tell them. All they have to do is drop one and put me in his place if they want the fight against congressional allowances to go on. If I lose, they lose with me.”

Millions not only voted “Antonino” but also voted against increasing the number of congressmen and allowing them to serve as delegates to the constitutional convention without forfeiting their congressional office. Both the Nacionalista Party and the Liberal Party were for the proposed constitutional amendments; their sample ballots had “Yes” under each of the amendments, but millions disregarded the instruction. More congressmen would mean more congressional allowances, and with congressmen dominating the constitutional convention, it would be no different from Congress. Why hold a constitutional convention at all?

How much Antonino’s campaign against congressional allowances contributed to the overwhelming vote against increasing the number of congressmen and allowing them to serve at the same time as delegates to the constitutional convention, one cannot exactly tell, but it must have been a great deal. The nation owed Antonino much while he was alive and should remember him now that he is gone. He fought to reduce congressional allowances, ran as an independent and “won.” There will be the same number of congressmen, not more, and the constitutional convention will not be just another Congress—thanks, not a little, to him!

Gaudencio Antonino is the Man of the Year 1967.