Post-Colonial National Identity in the Philippines by Greg Bankoff Kathleen Weekley

Author:Greg Bankoff,Kathleen Weekley
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Taylor & Francis (CAM)

Chorus of Protest

Despite these very different interpretations of past events and criticisms of present commemorations, there were several occasions on which these various dissenting voices coalesced into a more general chorus of protest. One early centennial project to arouse popular indignation was President Ramos’s proposal in 1995 to erect a monumental tower in Luneta, Manila’s central park and the site of Rizal’s execution. Up to 100 floors high, the tower was supposed to symbolise the unity of the country’s different regions as well as serve more practical functions as a telecommunications, office, restaurant and tourism outlet. Censured for both its execrable taste and totalitarian architecture reminiscent of the edifice complexes so much a feature of the Marcos years, the plan was opposed by 60 per cent of Filipinos who knew about it, and quietly dropped.76 On the actual day of the centennial, too, left wing groups associated with the NDF and urban people’s organisations held a number of rival parades condemning what they claimed was ‘an obscene display of extravagance and historical distortions’. One such rally involved labour and peasant organisations, feminists, professional activists, as well as a religious group (Iglesia Filipina Independiente). Meeting at the Liwasang Bonifacio, a memorial that has come to be associated with popular participation in the Revolution, speakers took turns in lambasting the lavish government-sponsored celebrations and their failure to convey the true spirit and meaning of the Revolution.77 Other initiatives included the rival independence march led by community based organisations such as the Payatas Scavengers Association, the Lupang Pangako Urban Poor Association and the Golden Age Association, student activists protesting the lack of all reference to the brutal Philippine-American War, and the anti-American demonstration whose march on the US embassy was blocked by heavily armed men of the Special Action Force of the Philippine National Police.78

Even within the program of government planned celebrations, a revealing distinction was made between the ‘official’ centennial parade of 12 June and the Pista ng Kalayaan (Fiesta of Freedom) staged the following day. Ethnic and minority groups were more fully represented among the 12,000 participants and twenty-five floats involved in this People’s Parade. Three sultans and some 100 Muslim dancers and musicians travelled to Manila from Mindanao to take part in the event, while the Federation of Filipino Chinese Chambers of Commerce sponsored five lion and two dragon dances. Among other participants were the Rotary Club, the Young Men’s Catholic Association and De La Salle University.79 Comparisons were made between the popular participation of 13 June parade and the formal, stage-managed and expensive floats of the day before, seeing mirrored in the distinction a reflection of the dissension and divisiveness so evident in the wider Philippine society.80 As one observer commented, ‘It’s as if there are separate celebrations. It would seem that the “elite” and the “people” have their separate places.’81

Apart from the nationalist and radical critiques, there were still a multiplicity of other dissenting voices in the contemporary Philippines among the Catholic clergy, feminists and the ethnic minorities.

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