Rallyists to greet GMA at Araw ng Kagitingan rites

CLARK FIELD, Pampanga- Hundreds of protesters will assemble at Camp O’Donnel in Capas, Tarlac and at the Dambana ng Kagitingan shrine at Mt. Samat in Pilar, Bataan to air their anti-war and anti-crisis sentiments to President Arroyo and Vice President Teofisto Guingona, who are slated to lead the Araw ng Kagitingan rites today at the two sites.

In Bataan, the militant Kilusan para sa Pambansang Demokrasya (KPD) said it had prepared a torch parade at the plazas of the province’s 13 towns from 6 to 7 p.m. last night. Millet Morante, KPD secretary general, said the parade was to manifest protest against the US-led coalition war in Iraq, as well as the government’s war in Mindanao.

"The KPD has also prepared a 2,000-strong protest rally on Araw ng Kagitingan to give visiting President Arroyo a very red welcome," she said. The President is slated to unveil this morning a marker at Camp O’Donnel, where thousands of survivors of the Death March of 1942 were imprisoned, while Guingona is scheduled to represent the President in the annual rites at the Dambana ng Kagitingan in Mt. Samat later in the afternoon.

"President Arroyo should keep (to herself) her flower tribute (to World War II heroes). What our forefathers need is (for us) to honor and value their struggle against foreign domination and not be a parrot to the dictates of the United States," Morante also said.

"It is enough that the Philippines had been a subject of foreign invasions and had been dragged into wars in the past. Such experiences of those who died and those who survived the wars should serve as a lesson for us not to support the US-led aggression in Iraq" Morante added.

The marker to be unveiled by the President at Camp O’Donnel would commemorate the infamous Death March after the Japanese occupation. The march stretched 104 kilometers from Mariveles, Bataan to San Fernando in Pampanga, where the marchers were compelled to board train boxes headed to Capas. From Capas, the marchers were asked to walk another 10 kilometers to O’Donnel where they were imprisoned.

Tourism Secretary Richard Gordon’s father Richard, who had survived the march, estimated that while some 9,300 Americans and 40,000 to 50,000 Filipinos survived the march, some 1,500 of the Americans and another 18,000 of the Filipinos were to die at O’Donnel. — Ding Cervantes