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The First Quarter Storm in perspective: A Baguio boy remembers

(NORDIS is running a special section on the First Quarter Storm (FQS), or that period in the early 70’s before the declaration of Martial Law. We invite all those who have memories of the FQS or what the NORDIS staff calls the FQS vets, to write about their recollection and send it to us.)

By Ed Maranan

As I race down the length of the boulevard, away from the Embassy gates and the pursuing phalanx of anti-riot police and Metrocom soldiers, I see a number of my fleeing companions stumbling then falling hard on the road, some of them picking themselves up right away, while from behind us comes the crack of Armalite and pistol fire, like deafening claps of thunder, and at least twice or thrice I glimpse the asphalt being ripped up by bullets only a few meters away from me, and I continue running through the cloud of teargas, turning right on T. Kalaw Street to try and find the rest of my group, so that we could either regroup or seek safety from the rampaging trigger-happy storm troopers of the regime…the placards which we had so defiantly waved moments earlier are now strewn all over the boulevard, some of them lying face down, the others still proclaiming their brave slogans for the world to see…

The First Quarter Storm of 1970 was a watershed in Philippine political history. Bringing together various sectors of society in organized resistance against an incipient authoritarian regime, the FQS was the culmination of decades of social unrest in a classic setting of Third World underdevelopment, an explosion of protest whose catalyst was a student movement that began to be politicized in the early 60s by both national and international developments.

In the Philippines, there was a growing awareness of mass poverty and the widening gap between the elite and the rest of society, the entrenched corruption in the political class, the unresolved agrarian question with deep roots in the colonial past, the repression of workers who were compelled to go on strikes to fight for their basic rights. In the University of the Philippines, students were chafing against academic and religious conservatism, and resisting the anti-communist witch-hunt initiated by the Inquisition-sounding House Committee on Anti-Filipino Activities (CAFA) which was reminiscent of and definitely inspired by the McCarthyist persecution of American liberals and progressives in the United States in the 1950s. This period would see the emergence of a student movement steeped in the political theories of social revolution, and exposed to the socio-economic realities of Philippine society.

And internationally, the biggest issue and starkest political phenomenon of those times was the Vietnam War, which was not only dividing the American people in a way that would never be seen again until the Bush-Kerry political contest forty years later, but was raising – and radicalizing – the consciousness of people around the world, who saw the war not as the crusade for democracy it was being touted to be, but an aggression committed against a deeply nationalistic and patriotic people struggling to free themselves from Western colonialism and the tyranny of corrupt elite rule. To a lesser degree, although with less visible presence of foreign troops, the same conflict, engendered by similar conditions, was being replicated in the countries of Latin America and Africa, with liberation movements mobilizing whole populations, including students, intelligentsia and the middle forces, against repressive regimes.

It would have been entirely unsurprising, therefore, if all the placards of protest in countries around the world had borne only one slogan, or variations on its theme: Down with imperialism, feudalism, fascism, and bureaucrat-capitalism!

This was the state of the world and the state of the Filipino nation throughout the 1960s, the social and political gestalt, as it were, which would eventually bring about the First Quarter Storm of 1970, so-called because of the events that transpired during those fateful first three months of that revolutionary year.

But of course I never knew that this was coming. And I was not aware of the state of the nation, let alone of the world, when I was a student newly graduated from Baguio City’s Saint Louis College (later SLU) Boys’ High in 1963. I had just come back from New York City where, as a 16-year-old high school senior, I was the Philippine delegate to the New York Herald Tribune World Youth Forum, a gathering of bright-eyed youngsters from around the world talking about living in universal peace and harmony, jostling one another at the White House to get to shake the hand of President John F. Kennedy. Even the cheerful delegate from Vietnam was not saying anything much about the civil war that was picking up momentum in his country, with the introduction of American “advisers” who would soon be teaching his countrymen the virtues of strategic hamlets and tactical interrogations, much the same methods used in the 1900s by the American expeditionary force and their local constable recruits against Filipino “insurrectos”, and during the martial law period by the Marcos military.

No, we were never taught such vagaries of Philippine colonial history in high school, and when I entered UP in 1963, I was surprised to find that aside from exciting, sociable and self-affirming organizations like the UP Student Catholic Action (UPSCA) and the UP ROTC Vanguard Fraternity, both of which I joined, there were others such as the SCAUP (Student Cultural Action of UP) who were into more political and ideological matters such as radical reforms in the system. While the members of these groups, led by serious-looking, “grim and determined” intellectuals like Jose Ma. Sison, Nilo Tayag, Nur Misuari and several others, were into rallies and demonstrations against the Vietnam War, I was into teaching catechism at the UP elementary school on weekdays and commanding my company of UP ROTC cadets on Saturdays.

The history of the student movement in the Philippines that stamped its lasting legacy in our political culture and consciousness as the First Quarter Storm involved a process, for most of its participants, of soul-searching (well, ‘soul’ in the psychological sense of reflective thought) and self-transformation described by that venerable 19th century philosopher Marx as “raising themselves to the level of theoretically comprehending the historical process as a whole.”

Sa madaling sabi, ang pagiging aktibista ay resulta ng pagkakatuto sa kalagayan ng tao, sa kasaysayan ng mundo, at sa ugnayan ng dalawang ito.

One day, bothered by what was happening in the country, and after listening to what speakers on campus were saying about why such things were happening in the country, I got myself recruited into the Kabataang Makabayan (established in 1964, using symbols borrowed from the revolutionary Katipunan of Andres Bonifacio). Later, I would find myself in the company of student demonstrators outside the US embassy, railing against the napalm bombing of civilians in the countryside of Vietnam, protesting the government’s decision to send a Philcag contingent in support of the American war effort, or decrying the killing of Filipino scavengers at Clark Air Base by American soldiers who had allegedly mistaken them for “wild boar”. We were, invariably, beaten back by truncheon-wielding riot police and sent scampering for safety from the hail of bullets fired pointblank at us.

This scene was to be repeated over and over, and the generation of 1970 must have been not only the most intensely “conscienticized” students in our history, but also the most physically fit, considering the kilometers they covered during marches and protest rallies, and the speed and agility with which they had to dodge live fire from the minions of the state. But revolution, to paraphrase China’s Chairman Mao, is never a picnic, and the FQS certainly never was one. It was a life-and-death moment in our history, and for some among us who knew the risks and stayed the course of protest until they paid the ultimate price, their lives may have been snuffed out, but never their dreams.

These dreams have been passed on to a new generation of students, who continue to believe that only by identifying with the “basic masses” of Philippine society – workers, peasants, urban poor, fisherfolk, indigenous people – and mobilizing as a social force to oppose what to them are measures and policies that keep Philippine society in a state of underdevelopment, can they truly begin to find meaning and purpose in their lives.

In an interview by Rowena Carranza with one of the era’s legendary figures, playwright and cultural activist Bonifacio Ilagan who wrote landmark historical plays such as Sigaw ng Bayan (about the Katipunan) and Pagsambang Bayan (the Philippines under martial law), the noted writer stressed that “the FQS was not only about demonstrations, as many are wont to associate with the historic era.”

“More than the rallies, more than the front page stuff, the more important and long-term legacy of the FQS was the organizing. It meant studying objective conditions, transforming one’s views of society and the world, and from this change in perspective, willingly join an organization and contribute one’s efforts in the movement’s concrete political actions.”

Several years ago, together with some companions, boni was arrested and tortured by a combined police-military team in Benguet.

“We were charged with illegal possession of firearms and explosives. But the provincial prosecutor, who was an enlightened man and who knew the law as it should be, didn’t quite agree with our captors. He threw out the stupid charges.”

Boni was one of the founders of the Kabataang Makabayan in UP, and became a highly respected writer of historical plays for the stage and television. In 2001, he was elected first president of the First Quarter Storm Movement, whose aim is to keep alive the legacy of that high tide in political awareness and social involvement which led thousands of Filipinos to contribute the best part of their youth, for a cause that traces its origins to the revolutionary struggle of the Katipunan, and the earliest stirrings of anti-colonial patriotism in the Philippines.

January 1970: We form a mighty throng in front of Congress, and wait for the President to emerge after delivering his speech. A papier-mache crocodile is thrown at him, slogans are shouted, and then hell breaks loose. Once again the disciplined but deeply impassioned multitude is broken up by the flailing of truncheons and the staccato of gunfire. For several days, we launch a series of rallies protesting police brutality, without losing sight of the basic issues that brought us together against the regime in the first place. The places of protest are now forever etched in our memories: Plaza Miranda, Plaza Lawton (Liwasang Bonifacio), Congress, Embassy, Malacañang and Mendiola Bridge. By midday, thousands of us have been unloaded by a fleet of buses and jeepneys and some private cars from several campuses or have come on foot from all points in and around Manila. We gather in front of Congress where articulate, hoarse-voiced, brilliant speakers deliver well-phrased, highly informative, and sometimes expletive-laced discourses on the isms that plague our country. By this time, I am no longer a student activist but a member of the UP faculty, and I have joined my students in boycotting their classes so we could join the demonstration. From Congress, we march to the Embassy, and from there to Malacañang via Mendiola Bridge. As night falls, we find ourselves outside the gate of the Palace, thousands of us. A fire truck has been commandeered by the students and rams the gate. A street battle ensues long into the night. Exhausted, and having failed to take over the Palace (which was never the intention, in the first place), the students exfiltrate out of the warzone. The encounters rage on until March 1970, indeed for the next two years, up to the eve of September 21, 1972. With the declaration of martial law, the activists of the First Quarter Storm take various routes: many join the armed struggle, a few give up, lie low, go abroad, or join the government, and some of us are arrested and thrown into political prisons. But even in detention, we organize discussion groups, we sing protest songs, we write protest poetry, we stage political plays. The spirit of FQS lives on.

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