Soliven burial on Jan. 10

The cremated remains of STAR publisher Maximo V. Soliven will be laid to rest at the Libingan ng mga Bayani in Fort Bonifacio, Taguig City on Jan. 10, the Soliven family announced yesterday.

A necrological Mass will be held prior to the funeral at the St. Ignatius Cathedral at Camp Aguinaldo in Quezon City at 9:30 a.m.

The 77-year-old Soliven was on his way back to Manila from Tokyo, Japan when he was stricken with acute pulmonary and cardiac arrest on Nov. 24, 2006. He was rushed to Narita Red Cross Hospital, but doctors’ efforts to revive him failed.

The government offered to bury Soliven at the Libingan ng mga Bayani with honors for his gallantry in the battlefield.

During World War II, Soliven joined the forces that fought against the Japanese occupation of the Philippines as a guerrilla volunteer while he was a cadet of the Ateneo de Manila Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC).

His father Benito was also a World War II veteran whose exploits during the war in the Pacific were chronicled in Soliven’s column.

At the time of his death, Soliven was the publisher and chairman of the board of The Philippine STAR, People Asia Magazine and Mabuhay, the in-flight magazine of Philippine Airlines (PAL).

One of the most widely read columnists in the Philippines, Soliven’s column, "By The Way," came out regularly in The STAR, which he co-founded with the newspaper’s late founding chairman Betty Go-Belmonte and columnists Art Borjal and Tony Roces in July 1986.

Before this, Soliven, Go-Belmonte and Eugenia Apostol put up the Philippine Daily Inquirer in December 1985.

Soliven began his career in journalism as the editor and publisher of The Evening News at the age of 27. He was the business editor of The Manila Times from 1957 to 1960 and was one of its most popular columnists until the paper was shut down after the declaration of martial law in 1972.

He also worked as a stringer for The New York Times and Newsweek magazine and was a columnist for the South China Morning Post and the Bangkok Post.

A winner of various national and international awards, Soliven was most recently made an officer of the Legion d’Honneur by the French government.

He also received the coveted Incomienda de la Orden Isabel a Catolica from His Majesty King Juan Carlos of Spain in March 2000.

Soliven was a graduate of the Ateneo de Manila University, which honored him with its highest award, the OZANAM Award.

He obtained his master’s degree in communications and political philosophy from Fordham University, New York and took up a post-graduate course at the Johns Hopkins University and Harvard’s School of International Studies.

He is survived by his wife, UNESCO Philippines Secretary General Ambassador Preciosa Soliven, children Sara and Jon, Rachelle and Bob, Marinella and John and eight grandchildren.

(For queries on the funeral Mass and burial rites, please call Gina or Olive at 722-0019 or 722-1776.)