Kuwento

Two great Filipinos: Pepe Diokno and Boy

Morales
By Benjamin Pimentel
7:00 pm | Wednesday, March 7th, 2012
658 526

Boy Morales
SAN FRANCISCOThe last few weeks have been a time for reflection on two great Filipinos.
Pepe Diokno would have turned 90 last month. February also marked the 25
th
anniversary of his
death in 1987. Last week, Horacio Boy Morales passed away after a long illness. He was 68.
News of Moraless death reached me through a text message from my friend Joey Ochave.
Just learned of Boy Moraless death, Joey, a former activist and now a corporate executive,
said. Apektado ako. I still remember how we looked up to him during those days. He will be
remembered.
In the same way that we still remember Pepe Diokno as the most brilliant and admirable of the
opposition leaders during the fight against tyranny.
In the 1980s, Ka Pepe and BM, as Boy Morales was fondly called, were among the most
fascinating political figures in the country.
They were identified with different political forces and beliefs. But in many ways, they
symbolized an important narrative in our history: that of privileged Filipinos who chose to align
themselves with the poor and powerless in our country.
Pepe Diokno had been a bar topnotcher, a respected senator and a much-admired campaigner
against corruption before martial law, before Ferdinand Marcoss reign of terror began.

Pepe Diokno
During those dark years, to many young Filipinos like me, Ka Pepe emerged as a courageous
warrior in the fight against the Marcos terror.
He became an outspoken critic of US support for the regime, and of American military presence
at Subic and Clark. He was a tireless defender of human rights, representing Filipinos from all
walks of life in often one-sided court battles with the dictatorship.
Ka Pepe became a regular speaker at U.P. Diliman where I was a student, and at rallies
throughout Manila. We saw him as a political giant of the democracy movement, a leader who
came from the elite class who, in the long and bitter struggle against dictatorship, chose to fight
alongside ordinary Filipinos, from students like us to factory workers and farmers.
Ka Pepe won our respect for his humility. In fact, the last time I saw him, he didnt have any
teeth and he said so himself.
Wala kong ngipin ha. He was grinning as he greeted his visitors at the Diokno residence in
New Manila. We were mostly activists from the cause-oriented groups he had worked with in the
struggle for democracy. We were there to pay him an informal visit and tribute. And though he
was already ill, he was more than glad to welcome us.
I firmly believe that had historical events unfolded differently, and had he been given the
opportunity, Pepe Diokno could have been the greatest of Philippine presidents the perfect
political figure to lead the Philippines in the transition from tyranny to democracy.
He could have been our Nelson Mandela.
Young Filipinos hoping to catch a glimpse of Ka Pepes brilliance and passion should watch To
Sing Our Own Song, the 1983 British documentary that exposed the abuses of the Marcos
regime. (The film can be viewed online here. http://www.youtube.com/pinoyhistory)
The film was narrated by Ka Pepe who eloquently explained and denounced the system of
injustice Marcos and his cronies perpetrated under martial law.
Also featured in the film was Boy Morales, who was then representing the National Democratic
Front.
His death capped a long, fascinating and controversial journey. Sadly, the part of his journey that
many young Filipinos are familiar with was his stint as a government official of the ill-fated and
disastrous administration of Joseph Estrada.
But to many from my generation, as my friend Joey expressed in his text message, Boy Morales
was a hero.
Boy was the prominent young technocrat who could have pursued a promising and lucrative
career in government or the private sector during the Marcos years.
But Boy gave all that up to take on a brutal dictatorship. And he did so in dramatic fashion.
One night in 1977, BM stunned the nation.
He was one that years Ten Outstanding Young Men awardees. But instead of showing up at the
ceremony to accept the award, his mother came to speak on his behalf. She announced that Boy
had joined the underground movement.
Boy was later captured, tortured and imprisoned. After his release after the 1986 revolt, he
plunged back into social advocacy work, helping revive the Philippine Rural Reconstruction
Movement and building a new progressive force with a more open-minded and flexible
worldview.
Like other leftwing movements in Latin America and other regions, activists like Boy and his
friend Edicio de la Torre began to look beyond the rigid and violent politics of the UG
movement.
The UG movement had created a vibrant progressive activist culture which has changed
Philippine politics. But it also has been led by hard-line cadres with incredible capacity for
cruelty and dogmatism.
Boy and his allies explored other paths.
But his decision to align himself with Erap remains controversial. I still dont completely
understand what happened.
At his wake in Marikina, Ed de la Torre affirmed what he and Boy have said through the years:
Eraps supposedly pro-poor politics offered an opening for progressives to push for meaningful
social and economic reforms.
That point is still being debated today. After all, Eraps government collapsed amid charges of
corruption and images of an administration run by a Mafia-style clique. Boy and Edicio were
denounced as traitors.
But then People Power 2 did not exactly lead to the promised era of good and clean governance.
Gloria Arroyos administration turned out to be another catastrophe.
Despite the debates, one thing is clear: many Filipinos like me will never ever doubt the
sincerity, the desire to serve of people like BM and Edicio.
Finding answers to our countrys complex problems is a long and difficult process. But in the
darkest hours of the Marcos dictatorship, people like Boy Morales and Pepe Diokno
courageously took a stand despite enormous risks and led the way.
Watching Ka Pepes final comments in To Sing Our Own Song still makes me choke up.
He ends the documentary by urging the people of the developed world to prevail upon your
governments to stop supporting repressive governments like the one in my country
But whether your governments do or not, I know my people whatever your governments do,
whatever our own elites and our rulers do, and even if we have to wade through blood and fire,
we will be free. We will develop. We will build our own societies. We will sing our own songs.
http://globalnation.inquirer.net/27501/two-great-filipinos-pepe-diokno-and-boy-morales accessed
November 26, 2012