Category: marcos

why sept 21 #MartialLaw

manolo quezon rightly points out that martial law did not begin on the 21st.  in the explainer The big lie manolo tells us how things unfolded over the 21st and the 22nd to the 23rd of september 1972.  as a matter of fact we were still a free people on the 21st.  in fact marcos gave the GO signal only after enrile was ambushed kuno, that is, on the evening of the 22nd.  and yes we only found out on the 23rd when we awoke to a multimedia blackout that lasted almost all day, and we went to sleep with tv images of marcos declaring that martial law was in place, like it or not.

… martial law was announced with silence: people woke up to discover that TV and radio stations were off the air. Later in the day, some stations started playing easy listening music and some stations aired cartoons. But Marcos’ speechwriters were slow, then the teleprompter broke down, and the speech had to be hand-written on kartolina. So it wasn’t until dinnertime that Marcos finally appeared on TV and the country found out martial law was in place.

So, why do so many people who actually lived through martial law, misremember when it was proclaimed?

Marcos once said that the people would accept anything so long as it was legal. Marcos said he’d imposed martial law on September 21. We know this wasn’t true, because the document itself was co-signed, not by Alejandro Melchor, his executive secretary, but by a presidential assistant. This was because Melchor had left for abroad before Marcos actually signed the martial law proclamation sometime between the evening and early morning of September 22 to 23.

marcos was known to believe in the occult, and in the magic of the number 7 and its multiples such as the lucky 21, which could be why proclamation 1081 is dated sept  21 even if it was not signed until sept 22, or maybe 23.

Marcos went further to wipe the public’s memory clean. He later proclaimed September 21 as Thanksgiving Day. And in every speech, every documentary, every poster, September 21 was the date enshrined as the birth of the New Society. So much so that the public forgot what it had actually lived through. This is the power of propaganda. By altering the date, Marcos helped erase not only September 21 as the last day of freedom, but also how that freedom was lost between September 22 and 23. His lawyerly piece of paper, his Proclamation 1081, became the ultimate instrument for national amnesia.

So, remember September 21 by all means. Not as the fake news date Marcos wanted you to remember, but for the things he wanted you to forget: a still-independent Senate, freedom of assembly, and a free press. But remember what he wanted you to forget: that it was on September 23 that the nation woke up to discover all these things were suddenly gone. And that the next day, the last institution standing, the Supreme Court, received the warning: play ball, or be abolished. They played ball.

indeed 21 worked for marcos but only in the early years of martial law.  parang 22’s vibe kicked in towards the end, but that’s another story.  anyway, 21’s vibe is good for people getting together, rising above self-interests, reconciling differences for the good of the whole.

and it’s not all that inappropriate, marking the 21st as a day of infamy, the day that marcos marked as thanksgiving day, the day marking the birth of “the new society” — THAT was the big lie.  the promise of “bagong lipunan” didn’t pan out, except for the crooks.

notes on edsa uno, change in a time of chaos

we get asked: paano ba mag-edsa.  aliw.  naging verb na ang dati ay noun, which is good. it’s a good question to be asking, and to be thinking on.

in october last year, in the run-up to the burial of marcos sa libingan ng mga bayani, when there was dilawan talk of ousting duterte by staging an edsa in support of the president’s impeachment or a coup d’etat, i said no way.  i was sure there was no ousting duterte: aint gonna happen.

…their best hakot efforts would be as nothing compared to the throngs that the duterte camp is certainly capable of mobilizing throughout the country.  of course they could also shoot for a “crony”-business boycott a la pre-EDSA 86, but the duterte camp could just as easily mount a counter-boycott of the vp’s business allies, and it’s easy to imagine kung sinong pupulutin sa kangkungan.

but here we are again.  and this time, ubos na, said na, ang benefit-of-the-doubt.   read radikalchick’s How we lost our rights in 15 months #Duterte.

i thought the CHR one-k budget was past the limit and hoped it would be the last of the offensives for the nonce, coming so soon after the marcos 100 celeb sa libingan ng mga bayani.  like, you know, give us a break?

instead it got worse.  nasundan ng sereno impeachment — one of two complaints found sufficient in form and substance by house justice  committee (next week pa daw si bautista) —  na nasundan pa ng ombudsman’s indictment of pNoy over mamasapano, this while the president warns against violent protests on sept 21, the war in marawi rages on, finance sec dominguez salivates for the marcos wealth, jinggoy is suddenly out on bail, and the president just called out chr chief gaston: why daw does he care so much about male kids being killed. omg, the president doesn’t care?  it would seem that they really have no valid case vs gascon, and so they’re resorting to dirty tricks to pressure him into resigning.  (why kaya aren’t they doing that to comelec chief baustista instead?)

“You are so fixated with the death of young males, kaya nagdududa ako na pedophile kang gago ka.”

offensives galore.  nang-iinis, nambabastos, nananadya, dismissing us as bleeding-heart dilawans (which most of us are not)  or subversive communists (which most of us are not either), hoping to provoke us, no doubt, deliberately fueling a simmering rage, the kind that could lead to angry protests that could turn violent which would give him the excuse to sic the police on protesters, sabay declare ng martial law.

paano nga ba mag-edsa.  all i know for sure is that it will take more than one huge protest rally where dilawans and leftists, and everyone in between, come together for a common cause.  the september 21 rally of the multisectoral Movement Against Tyranny (MAT) that very specifically seeks only an end to drug killings and the attendant fascism is one such common cause that both extremist dilawans and extremist leftists (both affirmists and rejectionists) should have no difficulty getting behind in union with independent middle forces.

lampasan muna sana yung “but i want duterte ousted” at yung “but i don’t like leni” for maximum effect in the context of a process unfolding.

the template, of course, is the august 1983 to february 1986 movement that started out as a call to justice for ninoy, justice for all that only towards the end evolved into marcos resign.  it bears pointing out that the ruling mantra of every rally over those 30 months was NON-VIOLENCE.  it helped, of course, that the cops practised maximum tolerance then, kept their distance, marcos was on his best behavior since ninoy’s assassination, the world was watching kasi.

the world is still watching, but these are different times.  we have trigger-happy cops and a president who threatens martial law if rallies get out of hand.  sana the cops keep their distance on sept 21.  but if not, don’t push back, don’t strike back with sticks or stones, don’t burn rubber tires, not even effigies.  where there’s smoke, there’s fire.

non-violent tactics worked then and can work now as long as everyone’s on the same page.  one page at a time.

100 years of ferdinand marcos

BATAC CITY—Opening a forum here on the legacies of Marcos, whose 100th birthday on Sept. 11 had been declared by Malacañang as public holiday in Ilocos Norte province, Imee referred to her late father’s comment when they landed at the Hickam Air Force Base in Honolulu after their ouster following the 1986 Edsa People Power Revolution.

“We were all in tears and everyone said, ‘The end is nigh, it is finished, we are dead and doomed,’” Imee narrated.

“My father said, ‘No, children. To my family and to everyone, history is not done with me yet.”

… Imee said some people had described the Marcos 100 Forum as “very disappointing because it is very simple.” But the family organized a “humble celebration for an extremely austere and simple almost monkish man like my father,” she said.

She said: “There will be no parade, like what my mother [former first lady and now Ilocos Norte Rep. Imelda Marcos] wants. No concert, like what [former Sen. Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr.] wants, and there will be no shows and dancing, like what I want.”

Instead, the family and the Ilocos Norte government organized debates, storytelling sessions, and a lecture series “that will define Marcos 100 in this very reflective effort, the Marcos legacy,” she said.

hard naman to fault the wife and children, family and friends, for celebrating the centennial of ferdinand marcos in as big a way as possible.  ferdinand marcos, after all, was, truly, unlike any other president we have had. 

The forum, hosted at the Mariano Marcos State University (MMSU) Teatro Ilocandia from September 8-9, is an effort of the Marcos family to make this year’s commemoration of their patriarch’s birthday mirror his character: “very cerebral, reflective, and mindful.”

It contrasts previous celebrations of FEM’s birthday every September 11, which had involved parades, flash mobs, concerts, and other festivities. Governor Marcos explained, “Gawin natin ang gusto ng tanging ama ko: simple, diretsuhin, payak, intelektwal, at palaisipan.”

“The North remembers,” she said, “Ferdinand E. Marcos is, after all, every Ilocano. The story of every Filipino is embedded in that biography of being born of an arid and harsh landscape, struggling through life and every adversity, and finally coming out triumphant.”

Gracing the forum as lecturers are De La Salle University (DLSU) Professor Antonio P. Contreras; Former Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP) President Dr. Raul M. Sunico; UP Prof. Clarita R. Carlos; lawyer Estelito P. Mendoza, solicitor-general during the FEM presidency; Marcos’ former Budget and Education Secretary Dr. Jaime C. Laya; and the former president’s namesake, Former Senator Ferdinand “Bong Bong” R. Marcos Jr.

Discussions revolve around Marcos’ sense and narrative of nationalism; the “Golden Era” of arts and culture during his administration; his foreign policy; FEM’s martial law; the Philippine economy during that time; and the barangay in institution-building.

“Why is it that this debate, this argument about who President Marcos is, continues to burn, unabated, a hundred years after his birth? What is his legacy? What do we bear today that bears his mark and will have changed the Filipino people forever and made the Ilocanos what they are today?”

the non-ilocanos remember, too.  i look forward to transcripts or videos posted online.  it could be enlightening to read / hear what some of our public intellectuals are saying about the marcos dictatorship these days, 28 years after his death, 31 years after his ouster.  palaisipan naman talaga.

“Ang problema kasi noon, ang dami-daming trabaho ng papa ko na lahat umaasa sa kanya. Sa bandang huli, noong nagkasakit, nagkaloko-loko na kasi. Either talagang nakikinabang, o nag-abuso, o hindi alam ang ginagawa yung mga nasa baba. Kasi everybody, for years and years, siya ang inaasahan (The problem then was that my father was loaded with work that everyone relied on him. Towards the end, when he was sick, things got crazy. People below him either gained, abused or didn’t know what they were doing because everyone relied on him for so long),” the governor pointed out.

it can’t be easy spinning marcos history, especially now that they’ve offered to return some of the wealth that imelda had always claimed to be rightfully all theirs. i wonder now if duterte wasn’t supposed to announce it until after the centennial fiesta, but he couldn’t wait, needed to distract us from all the killings?

marcos was right, history is not done with him yet.  or with imelda and kids.  heto nga’t magsosoli daw ng yaman na hindi daw nila sadyang natangay.  kaloka.

by the way, it is not the first time such an offer has been made.  back in ’89, said vp doy laurel, marcos’s dying wish was to come home and be buried beside his mother, and he was prepared to donate 90% of his wealth to the philippine government and the filipino people via some foundation, except that imelda was willing to donate only 75 to 80%, and anyway cory didn’t even want to hear of it.

so this is a take two.  90% sounds good to me, actually.  that is, 90% of ALL the wealth, found AND unfound.  time to come clean.  may the spirit of the “monkish” father so inspire.

and then maybe let’s put it all in a trust fund of sorts, waiting for a visionary kind of president who truly cares, and actually knows what to do, to make the economy, and the politics, work not just for the few rich but for the many, many, many more who are poor.

a marcos milestone: an admission of “questionable wealth”

so, is it to distract us from the alleged links of paolo duterte to smuggling and shabu, this startling revelation by the president that the marcoses are offering to return some of the “questionable wealth” to help the economy?

“The Marcoses, I will not name the spokesman, sabi nila (they said), ‘we’ll open everything and hopefully return yung mga nakita na talaga (those that had been discovered),’” he added. The President said the Marcoses are also willing to return a “few gold bars.”

“Sabi nila na, malaki ang deficit mo, maybe the (sic) projected spending pero hindi ito malaki baka makatulong, but we are ready to open and bring back, sabi niya, pati yung a few gold bars (They said that, your deficit is high, maybe the projected spending but this is not big, maybe it will help, but we are ready to open and bring back, they said, even a few gold bars),” he said. 

in barely coherent sentences, but yeah, we get the drift even if  the president was very careful to say just enough so we get it that there is an offer, and he is open to the offer.  gov imee marcos, for her part, does not deny it, though parang she was caught unprepared, parang the prez didn’t warn them that he would be making it public when he did?

Imee pins hopes on Duterte to end all charges vs Marcoses
MANILA – Ilocos Norte Governor Imee Marcos on Tuesday kept mum about the possible return of the family’s ill-gotten wealth to the government, saying there are no formal negotiations about the matter.

“Wala pa, wala pa. Tiwala kami sa President na siya ang makakapagtapos ng deka-dekadang kaso at yung pamilya nag-uusap pa pero nasa kamay ng mga abogado,” she said when asked if negotiations have started about the return of the Marcos wealth.  Asked if there was an intention to return, the governor said: “Pag-usapan na lang ng mga abogado.”

The governor refused to take any more questions, advising media to instead wait for the statement of their legal counsel.

this distraction is up there as the most distractive of recent times.  because this is the first time ever that the marcoses are conceding that some plundering of the nation’s wealth did happen under ferdinand’s watch.  there is even a justification offered, acc to duterte:

“Sabi nila, isauli nila para walang ano—and the only reason, sabi nila, was the father was just protecting the economy for the [eventuality] na umalis siya. He thought of regaining the Malacañang, that is why ganito ang lumabas na parang naitago,” he added.

ferdinand and fabian did plan to recapture the palace.  the story is, marcos and ver meant to regroup and set up government in paoay kaya lang the marcoses made the mistake of asking the americans, and not the presidential pilots with choppers on standby, to fly them out of the palace.  upon cory’s request and reagan’s instructions, the americans flew him to hawaii instead.  which is why imelda and bongbong insist that they were kidnapped.

this is not to say that if marcos had made it to paoay, naisoli sana agad o nagamit nang maayos para sa bayan ang questionable wealth.  the only thing that’s clear is that if he had made it to paoay and managed to regroup and challenge the legitimacy of the cory aquino government, it would have meant civil war.  at ibinato pa rin sa kanya tiyak ang isyu ng nakaw na yaman, nadiskubre pa rin tiyak ang mga secret $ accounts at ang tone-toneladang ginto, at kung ano-ano pa.

it is quite conceivable, actually, that this is a sign na suko na, give up na, si imelda at ang magkakapatid.  maaaring ngayon lang nila na-realize o natanggap na hindi bibitawan ever ang isyung plunder in the time of marcos, and they’re finally tired of being the bad guys, still the kontravidas in the current telenovela of nation.  i imagine that they must really really like to be done with this three decades old case and wipe away the stain on the marcos name if only for the sake of the grandchildren and, sige na nga, ferdinand in his centennial year.  why not indeed.  in effect, this is a win for nation, panalo ang bayan — the marcoses blinked first.

save the nation movement‘s butch valdes thinks it’s a real offer.

Butch Valdes : … but it would need the cooperation of Duterte to make official requests to intl banks holding the gold. Their previous condition was that the Marcoses are exonerated from all cases against them by the Phil govt. FM’s will indicated that 90% be given to the filipino people thru acceptable foundations. I think Imelda wants it implemented before she goes.

siyempre galit na galit ang mga anti-marcos sa parteng ito: …”we’ll open everything and hopefully return yung mga nakita na talaga (those that had been discovered),” at dito rin: ‘The President said the Marcoses are also willing to return a “few gold bars.”’  dapat daw ay isauli LAHAT ng ninakaw.  at ang tanong nila ay, ano ang kapalit, ano ang ex-deal with the marcoses.  exoneration from all cases din kaya, as with international banks?  read  Palace vows return of Marcos wealth will adhere to laws.

it would be naive to think that the marcoses would ever give up EVERYTHING.  no doubt imelda has documents galore to prove that some of the wealth is legally theirs.  and they will surely quote from the bible: the child will not be punished for the parent’s sins; nor the wife for the husband’s, yes?  heto nga’t gusto na nilang magsauli ng hindi sa kanila.

kung magmamatigasan, negotiations could take another decade before a final settlement.  but because duterte needs the money now na, who knows, baka ma-fast-track nang katakut-takot, and next thing we know, done deal na.  according to justice sec vitaliano aguirre:

“The president is authorized and has the power to make compromise or any agreement with the Marcoses. If there will be a new agreement, there should be enabling law or initiative law to be issued by the President himself,” he said.

top off my mind:  if imelda and the children are now admitting that ferdinand was guilty of some plunder, is he now still deserving of the burial as bayani?  what about imelda’s jewels?  will she continue to claim them as legally hers?  sana ibalato na niya sa taong-bayan.  she can spin it anyway she likes, basta she gives up her claim on condition that the jewels are showcased along with her shoes and ternos, soaps and perfumes, as artifacts of a time when she was quite the queen.  as tourist attraction, this would be a gift that won’t stop giving.