Scare tactics on the young

Never Again! It has been branded in the hearts of those who experienced martial law that never again should Filipinos have to bear the killings, torture, plunder and other transgressions of human rights by a dictator and his politicized military. And the younger generations must know about these, and know all in truth — not in the revisionist telling of inveterate liars, who have benefitted from martial law, changed loyalties to succeeding democratic leaders, and are now changing coats again, back to dictator-type governance.
Revising history by denying the atrocities of past martial law and yet using the very same invented claims of “destabilization” that justified the Marcos dictatorship: that is manifestly the intensified concerted drive of the present leadership. And the targets are the young — those still in university — who are perhaps grandchildren of those in the generation who lived through Marcos’s martial law in the seventies.
Armed Forces Chief of Staff Carlito Galvez, Jr. declared last week that the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) was “infiltrating” schools for the “Red October” plot, the “broad coalition” of communists and opposition groups that President Rodrigo Duterte himself had earlier accused of scheming to oust him from office. “Actually, si [CPP founder] Joma (Jose Maria) Sison has conducted a lot of conferences with the University of the Philippines (UP),” he added, saying he was ready to reveal documents related to the ouster plot in an executive session of the Senate (ABS-CBN News, Oct. 3, 2018).
Students were in an uproar. “Those are all are lies, propaganda to trick Filipinos,” University of the Philippines (UP) students protested. Gen. Galvez’ identified ten universities grew to a list of 18 universities as his deputy Chief of Staff, Brigadier General Antonio Parlade, Jr., embellished details, “May ongoing film showing sila about dark years of (Marcos) martial law sa mga class to incite students to rebel against the government,” he told ABS-CBN News (Ibid.).
De La Salle Philippines President Bro. Armin Luistro, Secretary of Education in the term of former President Benigno Simeon Aquino III, was first to speak out. “Sept. 21 (the 46^th anniversary of Marcos’s martial law proclamation) was just around the corner. Universities, obviously, because of all the historical revisionism happening, are showing films on the martial law to explain the facts, the past realities that happened to us. There is nothing wrong in a university setting where many ideologies are discussed. Connecting that with an actual plot to overthrow government is an entirely different matter” (ANC Alerts, Oct. 3, 2018).
Bro. Armin said the military should have first talked to university officials before releasing a list to the media. He wondered why an “intelligence report” which should be the highly-classified basis for intelligence operations should be shared with all even before such “secret” operations commenced. UP-Diliman Chancellor Michael Tan said the military must provide evidence for their allegations. “We will not allow this to be a witch hunt. We are still a democracy, although it is a democracy under assault,” he said (ABS-CBN News, Oct. 4 2018).
Fr. Jose Ramon Villarin, S.J., president of the Ateneo de Manila University, said “there is no present evidence to even suggest” that the school is exposed to any grave risk. He reiterated the Ateneo’s support for democratic institutions and said the university “will not shirk from its mission to holistically educate our youth in proper history and ethics, particularly on the matter of Martial Law and its impact on Philippine society” (Ibid.).
For University of Santo Tomas Secretary General Fr. Jesus Miranda, O.P., the burden of proof lies with the military. Lyceum of the Philippines University, University of Makati, Far Eastern University, Emilio Aguinaldo College, among the 18 universities tagged by the military in the alleged CPP recruitment effort, denied knowing of and promoting efforts to destabilize the government (Ibid.).
But the angriest were the students, the real victims in all this: “The UP Diliman University Student Council strongly condemns this blatant act of red-tagging students of these universities. It is a clear threat to the students who bravely criticize the government and the president himself,” the young voices protested (Ibid.).
Note that when Gen. Parlade came out with his “intelligence list” of 18 universities, the Philippine National Police (PNP) candidly declared, “In our intelligence community, we have no information yet of recruitment in schools and universities. But that’s not surprising. They’ve been doing that since its creation, almost 50 years ago,” he said (ABS-CBN News, Oct. 3, 2018). “The CPP (is) having a hard time recruiting students because they (students) cannot be easily manipulated and swayed into committing actions that would be considered rebellious to the established government,” PNP spokesperson Benigno Durana, Jr. said (Ibid.).
Perhaps that was meant to be a paean to the Duterte myth of invulnerable and accepted autocracy. But the PNP spokesman unwittingly acknowledged the invulnerability of the students within themselves — not to blindly embrace the radical ideology of communism as they would not blindly accept and live with the abuses of a democratically elected, yet dictatorial leader. If one is against the establishment, one is not necessarily a communist.
Bro. Armin describes it as “a created fear. They’re creating a scenario that’s not even there by talking about the supposed ‘Red October’ plot. And to me, that’s the scary part. If your official intelligence group talks about that scenario, I think they have a modus that’s out of the usual” (ANC Alerts, Oct. 3, 2018). The educator knows too well the delicate balance between the positive guidance by a parent to a child and the fearsome consequences of scaring the child to self-discerned action that may be good or bad. Will the reaction of the students be that since they are identified with the communists out to depose Duterte, perhaps communism is good since they have coinciding ideals of truth and righteousness with the Reds?
Perceived coinciding objectives with the CPP in the Marcos dictatorship was what brought young students to be the most pitiful statistics in Amnesty International “conservative” estimates in the 1972-1986 Martial Law years: 70,000 were imprisoned, 34,000 were tortured, 3,240 were killed (Tiongson, Lito. Batas Militar: 1997).
Imagine the fear of parents who must now caution their young adults — stop getting involved with national politics, stick to your school work; it is so dangerous for you to be identified as “communist” — we know what happened to student activists in Marcos’s time.
And we know the fear and frustration of educators who have kept to their fundamental vows of teaching truth and integrity in scientific theory and in moral and ethical practice. Echoing statements of tagged educational institutions, Lyceum of the Philippines University President Roberto Laurel said, “As an advocate of nation-building, our institution upholds the principles of democracy and abides by the supreme law of the land — the Constitution” (ABS-CBN News, Oct. 4, 2018).
Scaring and threatening the students is probably the most grievous sin of Duterte in his war for continued autocracy.
 
Amelia H. C. Ylagan is a Doctor of Business Administration from the University of the Philippines.
ahcylagan@yahoo.com