Independence and freedom

Yesterday, June 12, was supposed to be the 116th anniversary of our independence as a sovereign nation. Being a non-working holiday it gave me time to pause and ponder on several questions about the occasion.

Immediately coming to mind is the date June 12 and the question that cropped up is: did we really gain our independence on said date 116 years ago or in 1898?

A brief review of our history shows that on said date, June 12, 1898, General Emilio Aguinaldo proclaimed our independence as a nation at his residence in Kawit, Cavite after being brought back from exile in Hong Kong by the Americans on May 19, 1898. The ceremony simply consisted of the unfurling of our National Flag made in Hong Kong by Marcela Agoncillo, Lorenza Agoncillo and Delfina Herboza during Aguinaldo’s exile there. The flag’s unfurling was accompanied by the singing of our national anthem, then called Marcha Filipina Magdalo, now known as Lupang Hinirang composed by Julian Felipe and played at that time by the San Francisco de Malabon marching band. Following the ceremony was the signing of the Act of Declaration of Independence prepared, written and read in Spanish by Ambrosio Rianzares Bautista. It was signed by 98 people including an American Colonel of the Artillery, a certain Mr. L.M. Johnson.

The said proclamation was actually the culmination of the Philippine Revolution against Spain started mainly by Andres Bonifacio in 1896 that ended in a truce between the revolutionaries and the Spanish government in December 1897 by the signing of the Pact of Biak na Bato. The said pact required Spain to pay P800,000 to the revolutionaries and for Emilio Aguinaldo to go into exile in Hong Kong.

However, certain significant events happening immediately prior to the said proclamation somehow cast a shadow of doubt on whether we indeed became independent on said date. These were the outbreak of the Spanish-American war barely two months before or in April 1898 and the quick defeat of the Spanish Fleet by the US Naval forces under Commodore George Dewey in the Battle of Manila Bay on May 1, 1898. Such defeat led to the signing of the Treaty of Paris between the US and Spain in which Spain ceded the Philippines to the US. Actually therefore, we never became an independent and sovereign nation on June 12, 1898. Our country was already a US territory at that time. In fact the Proclamation of Philippine independence promulgated by the Aguinaldo government on August 1, 1898 essentially placed the Philippines under the protection of the United States.

Thus the struggle for independence continued even thereafter. Our revolutionary government did not recognize the Treaty of Paris or the American sovereignty. So we launched war against America which also ended in our defeat when Aguinaldo was captured by the US forces and issued a statement acknowledging and accepting the sovereignty of the United States over the Philippines. Thus provincial civil governments were established in the country under the supervision and control of American Governor-Generals except in certain portions of Mindanao inhabited by the Moro tribes which continued to resist the American rule.

From 1898 to 1946 therefore our country was a US territory despite the Japanese occupation during World War II from 1941 to 1946, when we had a government in exile headed by Manuel L. Quezon later succeeded by Sergio Osmena Sr. upon his death at the height of the campaign to retake our country from the Japanese. The fight with the Japanese lasted until the official surrender of the Empire on September 2, 1945.

It can be said therefore that our country gained complete independence only on July 4, 1946 when the US relinquished its sovereignty over the Philippine Archipelago with all the islands and waters embraced therein to our own democratic and republican form of government. Initially, the grant of independence was with strings attached as the US retained several military bases and required certain economic conditions like imposing US import quotas on Philippine articles that substantially compete with US products and requiring that US citizens and corporations be granted equal access to Philippine minerals, forests and other natural resources. But now all these strings no longer exist.

Thus, from the purely political point of view we did not actually become independent on June 12, 1896 when Aguinaldo declared our independence from Spain at his residence in Kawit, Cavite. Indeed even after raising our National Flag and singing our national anthem, our country remained a territory of Spain and subsequently of the US which never recognized Aguinaldo’s declaration.

Thus, President Diosdado Macapagal seemed to have been ill advised in signing R.A. 4166 into law designating June 12 as the country’s Independence Day. It is not an occasion at all for us to be happy and to celebrate since we did not really regain our freedom and sovereignty as a nation on said day. For history’s sake, we can just continue celebrating it as the Philippine Flag Day as we used to when we can display our flags in public places and offices and even in private houses and office buildings. July 4 is the more appropriate date to celebrate our independence. Our sense of nationalism will remain intact even if such day coincides with the independence day of the USA.

Indeed the more pressing issue besetting us right now is not the date when we should celebrate our independence day. We may have actually gained our political independence but are we really free socially and economically?

History will once more prove that since Spanish times up to the present, our government has been in the hands of ruling elites and dynasties where the rich becomes richer and the poor, poorer. In fact our rulers through all these times have seen to it that the majority of our people are fully dependent on them and owe them a big debt of gratitude so that come election time, they are able to retain power personally and through their successors-in-interest by capturing the votes of this poor and uneducated electorate.

This greed for power has engendered the greed for money that has become the biggest source of corruption in government. And right now, we are witnessing the worst corruption in government through the unabated use of the Congressional pork barrel called PDAF. More sickening is that this administration has even concocted it own presidential pork barrel called the DAP. It is about time therefore that like the PDAF, these DAP and other lump sum public funds released at the discretion of the President should be abolished and declared unconstitutional. Otherwise our country and people will never be socially and economically free as the political oligarch continue to hold sway.

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