A Marcos loyalist shows the back of her membership card.
MARCOS loyalists don’t get any respect these days.
Just ask Josefina Mangilit, the 59-year-old Quezon City coordinator of the Friends of Imelda Romualdez Marcos (FIRM 24K), which she says has 13,000 members across the country.
Everytime she goes out to attend the group’s twice-weekly meetings—Saturdays in Quezon City, Sundays at the Luneta—she dons a bright red vest that displays her affiliations (an outfit the group calls its uniform). Read the rest of this entry »
Picture from an eBay.ph seller
“In the beginning there was a marked reluctance among witnesses to come out and contradict the military theory [that Rolando Galman shot Marcos opposition leader Benigno Aquino Jr.]. In fact, people like Butz Aquino [Aquino's brother] openly stated that he had eleven witnesses to the assassination, although admittedly he only spoke with two; he refused to allow any of these witnesses to testify. As Butz Aquino reasoned out, these witnesses feared for their lives and the [Fact-Finding Board] did not have the power to protect them, moreover, he did not recognize the legality of the Board nor did he have any faith in its ability to arrive at a fair decision. Personally, I did not give credence to his story. It made front-page news, but as far as I was concerned it was patently a political decision. He had nothing to gain by presenting these witnesses if they really existed. On the witness stand they could have easily failed to test or they could have been exposed as keeping skeletons in their closet; skeletons totally unrelated to whatever they imagined they have witnessed. Butz Aquino had come out with a definite theory as to how his brother was assassinated. This earned him some publicity without exposing his witnesses to the risk or probably likelihood of being discredited. If the Board’s decision went his way he could say, “I told you so.” Either way, he was a winner. From a non-political standpoint, there was no justification for his stance, which so exasperated me that, for solace, I bought myself a new set of golf clubs.”
– From The Public Has The Right to Know, an account of the activities of the Fact-Finding Board created to investigate the assassination of Benigno Aquino Jr. written by Bienvenido A. Tan Jr., the Board’s Public Coordinator, who would later become the late president Corazon Aquino’s Bureau of Internal Revenue Commissioner.
It’s also the title of a Ninotchka Rosca novel.
Except that I haven’t read it yet.
But these two words can also describe what my life is like right now, despite the pressures of meeting rent payments while keeping at least six bottles of beer in the fridge. (Not an easy balancing act, I can tell you that.)
A few years back, for no apparent reason, journalist and writer Frank Cimatu — whom I still have to meet in person — asked me to submit one of my short stories as part of Mondo Marcos, an anthology of short fiction and essays about the experience of a generation to which I am ashamed to belong (and only because it reveals my age): Martial law babies.
And now, that volume, to be published by Anvil, will be launched this year. Or so Frank has told its contributors on Facebook.
If it does get produced, the book will be the second anthology featuring my work.
Another short story of mine — The Man Who Came Home — was included in Nine Supernatural Stories, which was published by the University of the Philippines.
And for these achievements however minor, I deserve an ice-cold beer.
The question now is: how many short stories should I chalk up to entitle myself to a deep and meaningful relationship with a really hot chick?
Just thinking out loud of course.
