Resurrection of a Dictator

Rachel Megan R. Aglaua

Philippine Collegian

The mundane scene of Manila traffic has again settled and lured me to think.
Every time the taxi would move, I would see the picture of the urban life
expand more and more – children asking for alms in the pavements and
juveniles running from something I do not know.

Whatever they were running from, wherever they must have arrived at, I simply
whisper a prayer that they wouldn’t end lifeless at the middle of a road, with a
bullet imbibed in their system, with a cardboard attached to their body, with a
death that needed no burial.

Everyday, the deaths of an alleged drug pusher add to the myriad of cadavers,
which stay lost in the surface, having no place to rest. Everyday, a new name is
added to the list of bodies that are disposed, all wrapped up to euphemize the
grotesque nature of today’s so-called justice.

The situation seems to resonate the deaths of Archimedes Tejano and Dr. Juan
“Johnny” Escandor that happened during the Martial Law. Both corpses were
found mangled terribly, wreaking havoc to the families that have seen them.
Even with this circumstance, families of Tejano and Escandor are still
considered lucky, as the bodies were still found amidst the morbidity of it all.

The former President Ferdinand Marcos promulgated this nightmare. The

continuous plunder of the country’s fund, the abuse of foreign assistance, and
the parasitic cronyism that infiltrated the bureaucracy, even up to this day,
formulated the rhetoric behind “Never Again” and “Never Forget.”

However, President Rodrigo Duterte’s persistence to have Marcos be buried in

the Libingan ng mga Bayani discredits the EDSA revolution in 1986. A
generation is made to forget about the desaparecidos of the time. It dismantles
the Martial Law’s victims’ fight for justice as it buries their voices first and
foremost. This is an action that finalizes the collective amnesia of the country –
no holds barred and no going back.

Autopsy

Decades have passed since the declaration of Martial Law and yet, the
conception of it as a “Pistaym Prosperity” epoch continue to misconstrue the
generation today. More accurately, Martial Law became an epitome of
constitutional authoritarianism and a manifestation of false empowerment due
to the faulty land reforms it imposed.

The bombing of the Plaza Miranda and the First Quarter Storm, which is the
height of student insurgency, were said to be utilized as bases to suspend the
writ of habeas corpus and would later result to the imposition of Martial Law,
said Chito Gascon, Chairperson of the Commission on Human Rights and
Former student activist during the Martial Law.

Moreover, the former president’s continuous reiteration to save the republic by

establishing a new society made Martial Law more acceptable to the public.
With the song of Bagong Lipunan bombarding all media outlets, this
propaganda justified the peoples’ fears and appeased their fantasies of living in
a perfect and just nation.

But behind this peaceful facade lies a dark, cynical truth that involves a
terrifying tapestry of arbitrary detention, serious physical injuries, killings, and
forced disappearances. “Ginamitan ako ng kuryente sa iba’t ibang parte ng
katawan ko, hinubaran, binuhusan ng tubig” said Satur Ocampo, the co-founder
of National Democratic Front, in an interview.

With a number of 200,000 victims of human rights violations during the

Martial Law Period, 10,000 sufferers filed civil cases in US courts. Through the
Republic Act 10368 -a law providing reparation and recognition of victims of
human rights violations during Marcos’ term - 75,730 individuals came
forward to ask for reparation, said Gascon.

Embalming

For anyone who has studied history, Marcos would appear as a tyrant who
indulged in the country’s resources by making his subordinates rich and his
family richer. The bloodshed in his presidency should serve as evidence as to
why he should be declared as a dictator who trampled on the very spirit of the
country.

Still, President Rodrigo Duterte would rather believe the opposite. For Duterte,
the late dictator should be buried in the Libingan ng mga Bayani because
regardless of the plunder, torturer, murderer, manipulator and liar Marcos the
whole world knows, Duterte still sees him as a hero.
Aside from the fact that Duterte wants to maintain close-ties with Bongbong
Marcos, it cannot be denied that there are some resemblances in the two
regimes.

Regardless of the massive extrajudicial killings that became sporadic in both

terms, the increase of military personnel and military funds became major
agendas for both presidencies.

Duterte’s platform, “Change is coming” justified all the shenanigans he has

done in the election period and in the early stages of his term. Juxtaposing it
with Marcos’ Bagong Lipunan, these two presidents forwarded a utopic fantast,
or an illusion rather, that comforted the Filipino people amidst the dystopian
violence that is overwhelming the status quo. More than that, Bagong Lipunan
was the lullaby that lured people to sleep, lured the Filipinos that these killings
– these abuses – would all lead to a new society.

Eulogy

As the taxi finally moves on, I cannot help but wonder about Primitivo
Mejares’ son. I wonder how loud he must have cried when his father went
missing or how high he must have jumped when somebody told him that his
father was found. Little did he know that this was the military’s way of luring
him to their hole, with their blueprint to torture an innocent young boy already
laid out for application.

I could not accept that the President who tortured Filipinos to death would even
be considered a hero, would even be buried beside soldiers who risked their
lives in order to save the country from the same atrocity Marcos inflicted on the
people.

Burying Marcos in the heroes’ cemetery just because he was president

manifests a shallow analysis of RA 289. Individuals deserving to be buried in
the said cemetery should be worthy of emulation. The law did not predict that a
president could be as inhumane as Marcos.

Regardless of RA 10368’s existence, the reparation of the victims of Martial

Law will never be satisfied if the Marcos’ burial in the Libingan ng mga Bayani
will continue on. The law might fulfill monetary justice to the victims but it
will never grant them the symbolic compensation these sufferers rightfully
deserve.

To bury former President Marcos in the Libingan ng mga Bayani is not an act
of moving on – it is an act to acquit him. The day Marcos will be buried in the
heroes’ cemetery will be the day that his atrocious legacy will become alive.
The day Marcos will be buried in the Libingan ng mga Bayani is the day a
dictator will be resurrected.

(Author's note: This was my first draft for the Philippine Collegian's 3rd issue
of AY 2016-2017 but it never made it to its pages. I wanted my first drafts not
to go to waste so instead of restoring all of my supposed 'failures' in my laptop,
I might as well make my blog a repository of articles that could have landed in
the pages of the student publication. But any which way, I will forever be proud
of the thoughts that I have invested in this article. And whatever people might
say about it, this does not stop me from treasuring my mistakes.)