Warm welcome turns to grief

MANILA, Philippines - I learned that Ninoy Aquino was returning to the Philippines following a three-year exile in the US two months before his fateful arrival on Aug. 21, 1983. Although the actual date of his return was kept secret, the former senator, Benigno Aquino II, leader of the opposition against the Marcos dictatorship, had communicated his plan secretly to his allies and comrades in this country.

Ninoy had dispatched a letter dated June 27, 1983, from Boston, Massachusetts, to former Senator Eva Estrada Kalaw, an active leader of the opposition, disclosing that he had picked a “tentative date” for his return, and that the actual date of arrival would be “verbally” disclosed to the local opposition leaders by Salvador “Doy” Laurel, an opposition stalwart, and president of UNIDO (United Nationalist Democratic Organization).

In his letter, Ninoy explicitly instructed Eva to “share this letter with Mel Lopez, Titong Roces, Doc Martinez, Neptali G. (Gonzales), Monching Mitra and Pareng Apeng (Tarlac Governor Apeng Yap).” He added, “Pareng Mel and Doc, I need your maximum support in the pakulo (dramatic event) because it may be my last for a long time. You have only five weeks to prepare.

“I am preparing for the worst (itals, mine) and we won’t get another chance like this for a long time. However, if we can really gather a crowd this could be a repeat of the Laban noise rally five years ago (on the eve of the interim Batasang Pambansa election in 1978).” The above quotes show that Ninoy already had the grim premonition that his decision to return could lead to the “worst” scenario, possibly his death.

Upon receiving a copy of Ninoy’s letter, I immediately started preparing for the event, not expecting that it would turn into a tragedy that would change the course of our nation’s history. I contacted all my political leaders and followers in Manila to prepare for a rousing welcome for Ninoy at the Manila International Airport when he arrived.

I also sought the help of opposition leaders in neighboring cities and municipalities. Among those who responded affirmatively were Pasay Vice Mayor Calixto for Pasay City, former Commission on Elections chairman Jaime Ferrer for Parañaque, Peping del Rosario for Malabon and Navotas, Charito Planas and Gerry Esguerra for Quezon City. I also enlisted the help of movie producers Antonio and Baby Martinez, Alfonso Policarpio, Ninoy’s publicist, and Prof. Manoling Yap.

Other opposition leaders from outside Metro Manila also started organizing welcome delegations from their own bailiwicks. They included Doy Laurel, who later became vice president of the Philippines, for Batangas, Apeng Yap for Tarlac, Bren Guiao, former governor Jose Lingad and his son, Ignacio, for Pampanga, and attorney Sixto Antonio for Bulacan.

Despite attempts to keep the coming of Ninoy secret, the news quickly spread all over Metro Manila and perhaps to other parts of the country where opposition against Marcos was intense. “When is Ninoy coming?” I was continually asked by people, especially those whom I had recruited to participate in the welcome rally and demonstration. “Soon,” I replied without disclosing the actual date.

Ninoy had informed us in his letter that he was taking a Japan Air Lines plane because he did not trust the Philippine Air Lines (PAL) as “the government has full control of (its) aircraft.” He was also going to be accompanied by journalists and TV crews from the United States, Japan and possibly Australia. Eventually, he settled for a China Airlines plane embarking from Taipei.

In fact, Ninoy was traveling with a fake passenger passport in the name of “Marcial Bonifacio” because the Philippine government had refused to issue him an official passport. The surname “Bonifacio” was chosen by him because it was at Camp Bonifacio where he was incarcerated for eight years since martial law was declared in 1972 until his departure for the United States in 1980 to undergo a heart bypass. The first name “Marcial” was apparently a reference to Marcos’ martial law that had kept the Filipinos in political chains for 14 years. Aug. 21, the date of his arrival, was also the 12th anniversary of the bombing which almost decimated the opposition Liberal Party leadership during their political rally in Plaza Miranda in connection with the 1971 midterm national elections. (Running for reelection as Manila councilor, I was one of those wounded in the bombing.) Ninoy, a poet-politician, had planned his return with lots of symbolism, the better to rattle Marcos, who was also known to believe in symbols and omens.

Even though it was known that agents of the Marcos regime were meticulously tracking his homecoming from Boston to Hong Kong and finally to Taipei where he embarked on his momentous voyage home, Ninoy also made further efforts to cover his track. For his “cover,” he asked Sandra Burton, Time correspondent who later wrote a book on him, to be his traveling companion.

According to Burton, as Ninoy and his entourage of media reporters and TV crews entered gate 6 of the Taipei airport to board a China Airlines plane, a ground hostess told Ninoy, “Since nine forty-five a.m. in Manila they already know you are on board.”

At around that time, thousands of opposition followers were starting to gather in places near the Manila International Airport where Ninoy was expected to land at 1:00 o’clock in the afternoon. Hundreds more were boarding buses in provinces north and south outside Metro Manila, from as far as Bulacan, Pampanga, Tarlac and Batangas.

I and my Manila contingent of some 8,000 greeters, many of them from my council district of Tondo, gathered on the grounds of the Philippine Village Hotel, half a kilometer away from the airport. From there we marched to the MIA terminal, waving yellow flags and banners welcoming Ninoy home.

By 11 a.m., the huge parking area in front of the terminal ramp was already packed by expectant hordes of welcomers, many of them from the neighboring cities of Pasay, Parañaque, Caloocan and Makati.

Unknown to us, however, greeters and would-be opposition rally participants from the provinces like Bulacan, Batangas, Pampanga, Laguna and Tarlac had been stopped at military checkpoints before reaching Manila. Soldiers under the command of Gen. Prospero Olivas manned the checkpoints, sending the buses back or ordering their occupants to vacate the transports.

Agents of the dreaded Military Intelligence Service (MISG) under Col. Rolando Abadilla threatened those who would insist on joining the welcome with arrest and detention. The reputation of this group for brutality effectively discouraged many from making it to the airport.

Upon arrival at the MIA with my group, I joined the opposition leaders already gathered at the ramp just outside the glass-walled airport passengers’ lobby. There I met Doy Laurel, Ninoy’s sister Lupita Kashiwara and Tessie A. Oreta, opposition icon former Senator Lorenzo Tañada, Baby Lopa, brother-in-law of Cory, and other opposition leaders.

Doy invited me to join them in the arrival area to meet Ninoy as soon as he alighted from the plane. Just about then at 1:04 p.m., Lupita informed the group that the China Airlines plane carrying Ninoy had landed. I told Doy that I would wait outside the terminal building to be with my men who were prepared to give Ninoy a rousing welcome on behalf of Manila.

But at about eight to ten minutes later, a distraught Lupita rushed out of the terminal. She embraced me and sobbed, “Binaril si Ninoy!” Ninoy has been shot! “Patay.” Doy Laurel emerged from the lobby. I handed him a megaphone. Doy turned to the waiting crowd below the ramp, leaning on the rail. I and others held him by the waist to keep him from falling to the pavement below.

In his distinctive Batangueño accent, Doy shouted, “Pinatay na, pinatay na si Ninoy.” At first, the people did not understand. They thought he was announcing Ninoy’s arrival. “Nee-noy! Nee-noy!” the crowd chanted. But when finally the truth sank in, there was stunned silence from the massive crowd. I took over the microphone from Doy, denouncing the shooting of Ninoy as “cowardly” and “a murder most foul of our democracy,” as well as condemning those who might have been responsible for his assassination. I choked with emotion.

Then there was the piercing cry - “Sa Baclaran!” To Baclaran! Referring to the Baclaran Church about a kilometer away, which is the favorite place of worship of those seeking special favors. Others repeated the cry, and the heaving masses, who moments ago were flushed with excitement and bright expectation of greeting their hero who would rescue them from bondage, were now silent, grieving, and weeping, and cursing those in power whom they believed were responsible for the cowardly act.

With their yellow flags and welcome banners no longer waving gaily, but now drooping and trailing on the ground, the sorrowful throng marched slowly and solemnly to the venerated Baclaran Church where they all knelt and prayed for the soul of their departed champion.

They also prayed for the country, wondering who would save it from the bloody clutches of a dictatorship that had held the people in bondage for a decade and a half, suppressing their liberties and pocketing their wealth, and worsening the poverty and sufferings of the multitude.

They did not know then that the single shot fired by an assassin that felled Ninoy was the shot that heralded the inglorious end of the dictatorship three years later through people’s power.

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The author was member of the Batasang Pambansa or National Assembly from 1984 to 1986 representing Manila, and mayor of Manila from June 1986 to 1992.