Name: Jenine Anne I.

Dahunog Course&Yr: BSN-1

“All Kings Will Fall”

It is said that The 1972 Martial Law is the rise and the fall of The Golden Age
of The Philippines, which ironically crippled the rights, security, safety and
freedom of its people most especially the freedom of the press. The detesting abuse
of power was greatly evident; the one significant reason that caused the vilification
and stigmatization of the Filipinos onto the image of the once hailed former
President Ferdinand E. Marcos.
But as a youth born in the year 1999 decades after this Martial Law had both
taken place and been dethroned; what do I know and must I know about it?
Certainly there are questions accumulating in my head, yet one strikes me the most
and that is “What have we learned from it?”
As sources are free and available in the internet, it is no longer an excuse for
us to know nothing about this significant event. And it is our responsibility to
explore and know our history for this will forever define us and our country.
In Hermie Garcia’s Batas Militar, the state of The Philippines under martial
law has been depicted and narrated. It has been shown that The Marcos
Administration had started off impressively, productively and promisingly. It had
taken The Philippines to its path to a golden age, made it a competent country, a
country that was looked up to, respected and even treated equal with other great
countries such as The United States of America. The economy once soared high
because of this administration, it roared like a tiger, ranking up as one of the richest
countries in Asia that came second to Japan. Through the efforts of The Marcos
Administration, The Philippines had once dared to dream for a bright future, but
then in the early 1970s unfortunate events sufficed that threatened that radiance
to fade and for us to falter from the heights.
In 1969, Marcos has been elected on his second term as president of The
Republic but there are allegations that this victory is rendered from an electoral
fraud. This election costed heavy campaign spending which resulted to a drastic
economic falter, where peso is devalued and inflation soared high. And these
made the nation grow increasingly frustrated with the government. Protests for
different issues of the country are everywhere, the nation then thirsted for change,
everything went chaotic, and even the safety of the Filipinos was at risk, bombings,
terrorisms, violence and deaths threatened the people who were just simply asking
for justice and solution for the corruption, the inflation, the crisis, and the
seemingly increasing gap between the rich and the poor. Political warfare have
caused damages to the nation involving innocent civilians to the fatalities.
Especially in the 1971 senatorial elections, where one horrifying event provoked
the Filipino voters to abolish and no longer support the rotten system of the
current administration and to its Nationalista Party. This event is none other than
the bombing at The Plaza Miranda which injured hundreds of civilians and the
line of the campaigning Liberal Party running against Marcos’ Nationalista Party.
The opposition pressed charges against Marcos and his party, but they did not
claim responsible for the bombing. Some people believed that Marcos was
responsible for the said bombing they hypothesized that maybe the administration
was putting the nation under pressure so that it could implement Martial Law and
could hold an absolute power over the country. Yet some believed that Marcos’
mortal enemy, Senator Benigno “Ninoy” Semion Aquino was the one behind the
bombing for he was the only one from The Liberal Party who haven’t arrived yet
at The Plaza Miranda by the time of the bombing and was allegedly connected to
the communists, this man who was originally a Nationalista changed hats
immediately after he found out some anomalies in this party. He was also the only
one from the Liberal Party to have taken a seat at the senate where The Nationalista
have ruled upon. Nonetheless, it was a straight win for The Liberal Party in the
1971 senatorial elections, threatening the power of The Marcos Administration.
In the next years, terrorism continued to happen, which the administration
pressed charges to Communist Party of The Philippines (CPP) for these acts. The
limit has been reached and the last straw was drawn when the allegedly staged
ambush to the Secretary Juan Ponce Enrile happened. But he survived the incident
and he will eventually confess to this staged ambush years later. Enrile is then a
member of Marcos’ Rolex 12 which allegedly are the ones helping Marcos for the
planning, legalization and implementation of the Martial Law. This staged
ambush played a vital role for the declaring of Martial Law in September 23, 1972
just a day after it happened, but dubiously, the official date of the proclamation of
Martial Law was actually in September 21, 1972.
When Martial Law operated, leaders of the opposition such as Benigno
Aquino and Jose Diokno were arrested, rebels and those who were guilty of
treason were put behind bars. Marcos started off great again with his promise of
another fruitful beginning, a start of a new and reformed nation, implementing his
sole philosophy, The Constitutional Authoritarianism which secured his throne to
be the king of everything at that point in time. No one could go against him in
rectifying this new constitution which obviously was on his favour.
When Martial Law ruled over the Philippines, power is given to the military
forces. Those who go against the law or the supremacy of Marcos will be captured.
Some were said to be detained, raped, tortured, and even killed. There is truly an
injustice in the system but this was greatly denied by The Marcoses. And these
abysmal truths will never dare to suffice by the time of The Marcos Regime, even
the press who were allowed to air by that time was owned by Marcos, the press
who was once dubbed as the freest in Asia is now silenced and repressed by this
abusive regime.
In the 1980s, the economy faltered again. And the elections in 1978 is clearly
just another manifestation of an electoral fraud and so is that in the 1981
Presidential Elections. By the 1980s, The Martial Law finally came to its end but
the ruling remained the same.
When Marcos was secretly dying, Benigno Aquino who was by then
residing in Boston America turned wearisome for the succession of power in The
Republic, so he decided to come back to The Philippines where he was shot dead
just after arriving. And this was on the day of the anniversary of The Bombing at
The Plaza Miranda. The primary suspect was General Vera, one of those who
allegedly had the motive to the succession of Marcos’ power, but he was not
convicted for Aquino’s murder which dismayed a lot of Filipinos and sparked to
unite for the overthrowing of the Marcos Regime by People Power Revolution. It
was successful and thus marked the start of a new administration and a new
republic.
All sorts of things have happened in this country, and all I can say is that
nothing has changed, corruption, poverty, inflation, and abuse of power are still
evident in this country even without Martial Law. The difference is it just has
become more bearable. It is also fair to say that The Martial Law more specifically,
The Marcos Regime has both helped and repressed our country. Though, it is true
that I am young and have not experienced Marcos’ Dictatorship, but I am now
well aware of it and it is substantial enough for me to render a reflection about it.
And the most significant thing that I have learned from all of these is that politics
is dirty, and nothing good will ever turn out from the abuse of power. Certainly, I
find nothing wrong with Martial Law if it’s just Martial Law itself, but I most
greatly do in the abuse of power, corruption and avarice. I also stand for the
principle of not taking sides over this matter, because the bottom-line is it’s
everyone’s fault. It’s not about blaming and depending our fates to an idol or
whoever we call a leader, even though this sounds too impossible and naïve, but
I believe that if we all must have one common goal and act as one country we can
do everything. Certainly, Marcos have fallen, and a new leader have risen, but The
Philippines is The Philippines no matter who sits in the Malacanan; just like the
fact that all kings will fall but the lands, the legacy -the kingdom, it will stay
waiting for a leader to rise again. We will not stay here forever but our legacy will,
so we must strive to find a better world than what we have found. It is sad but the
truth is our lives are cheap, so we must make ourselves valuable, we must
contribute for the good of our country and not just for ourselves but for the future
generations. The dark days of Marcos’ Martial Law is a part of our history, like it
or not, we could no longer undo it, but what we can do is to take good care of our
country, all of us, so that we could prevent such horrible things to ever happen
again, though Mindanao is under Martial Law at least it is a lot different from The
1972, so far it only hopes for the peace and orderliness in the region, for its people
to be responsible and disciplined children of The Republic so that we could not
cause any misconduct that can worsen the state of our country.
It is an unfortunate truth that the Filipinos have been repressed too many
times in the past, and we always fight ardently for our freedom and for the
improvement of the state our lives and our country, yet again there’s always a way
for those malicious beings to repress us, and yet we fight again and again…
becoming an exhausting, and repetitive cycle that sums up The Philippine History.
And it is mortifying to know that we, Filipinos are fighting against one another
because of our differences, like Marcos against Aquino, Nationalista against
Liberal, Red versus Yellow, People from North discriminating those from the
South, yet we are all the same children of this nation. Hopefully we could end this,
and hopefully we could finally establish altogether a Philippines that we can be
proud of, that even if we had series of unfortunate events, our glory could outshine
them, and they would only just become phantoms; glum, just hiding in the
shadows. And if we seek for true freedom, we must all then understand what true
freedom is; “freedom is choosing for the good of all”, and that freedom is the only
freedom we must fight for.
 References

1986 Snap Election Violence in Guadalupe Elementary School [Video file]. Retrieved
from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gicknxs-5gk
Garcia, H. (1997) BATAS MILITAR: Martial Law Under President Ferdinand E.
Marcos [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch
?v=be3wLiPUN9A&t=1123s
Plaza Miranda Bombing. [Video file]. Retrieved from
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WVD7vy_D8jw
Marcos, F (1972, September 21) Declaration of Martial Law of President Ferdinand E.
Marcos [Video file]. Retrieved from
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14iz1eZlNuU
The Comelec Walkout of 1986 (1986, Febuary 9). Retrieved from
http://www.bantayog.org/the-comelec-walkout-of-1986/