HALF AN HOUR AFTER I got home, my sisters Caren and Lillian arrived, very agitated. They had been at the rally too, together with other colegialas from the College of the Holy Spirit.
“Hay, naku!” Caren exclaimed. “A riot broke out at the rally! We had to run to get out safely.”
“What?” I asked in disbelief. The violence must have erupted soon after I left.
I turned on the radio, tuning in to “Radyo Patrol.” Dad, Mom, Caren, Lillian, Ryan, Jun, and Susan huddled close by. On-the-spot reporter Orly Mercado was excitedly giving a blow-by-blow account of what was happening in front of Congress. According to Orly, as Marcos and his wife, Imelda, stepped out of the legislative building to board their car, student demonstrators chanting “Marcos, papet!” pushed forward a cardboard coffin symbolizing the death of democracy, and threw toward them a burning papier-mâché crocodile, symbolizing greed.
The demonstrators surged forward, and as the Marcoses fled in the presidential car, their cordon of police and soldiers of Metrocom (the Philippine Constabulary’s Metropolitan Command) pushed the demonstrators back, swinging rattan truncheons. In response, the demonstrators threw stones, soda bottles, and the sticks from their placard frames. Riot! The police chased and beat demonstrators, who fought back shouting, “Makibaka, huwag matakot! (Fight on, take courage!)” Several times the cops charged; the demonstrators, regrouping, countercharged.
It was an uneven battle—the police and Metrocom with crash helmets and wicker shields, swinging truncheons, while the demonstrators fought with whatever they could lay their hands on. From Congress, the clashes spread to as far as Luneta Park, City Hall, and Intramuros. The battle raged for over two hours. Dozens of demonstrators, innocent bystanders, and policemen were hurt; fortunately, no one was killed. Many demonstrators were arrested.
We all felt anxious about my brother Jan, who we all presumed had also gone to the rally. Jan, one and a half years younger than I, was staying at his school dormitory. The year before, he had joined the Malayang Katipunan ng Kabataan (MKK) at his high school, which for two years had been a breeding ground for young militants.
Student leader Portia Ilagan addresses a rally for a peaceful Constitutional Convention outside Congress (January 26, 1970). (Photo from the Lopez Memorial Museum Collection)
Later that night, after making a number of calls from the house of neighbors who kindly let us use their phone, we found, much to our relief, that Jan had arrived at the dorm safely. Dropping by the house the following day, he admitted having gone to the rally. He told Dad and Mom that he left when the violence started. He confided to me, however, that he stayed on and joined the crowd throwing stones. With a foreboding that a period of disorder and turbulence had just begun, I urged him to take care.
Scenes of the rioting and the beating of demonstrators were splashed all over the newspapers and aired over and over on TV; radio commentators talked about virtually nothing else. Congress ordered an immediate investigation. Public sympathy was overwhelmingly on the side of the demonstrators. The violence was blamed on provocateurs and on the Metrocom and the police. Prominent personalities criticized their use of excessive force. Student leaders decried police brutality.
Several marches to protest the violent suppression of the January 26 rally were quickly organized for January 30. The main converging points were Congress and Malacañang. Student and youth organizations all over Metro Manila girded for action. The whole city was tense, fearful of another violent confrontation between the police and the demonstrators.
Should I join? Deep inside me, I was angry about the treatment of demonstrators. And I had lost my fear of rallies. I thought I could always keep away from the frontlines and leave at the first sign of a disturbance, but Dad and Mom stood in the way. “No, you may not go,” they said. “You’re too young for such things.” There could be no argument. At home, as long as we were minors, under 21, Dad and Mom were fully responsible for us, our food, health, and education, but we had to follow their rules. I was a good kid who obeyed their rules and did well in school. So I stayed home. I did not have to go to San Beda as classes had been called off.
In the early afternoon of January 30, the scheduled day for the new protest, a large group of demonstrators passed our apartment building on Concepción Aguila Street. I rushed out and watched them pass. I felt the urge to join but restrained myself. I wondered about Jan who was probably out there somewhere. Dad and Mom hadn’t had the opportunity to visit him at his dorm to expressly forbid him from participating. Through the rest of the day, I stayed glued to the radio.
The rallies at Congress and Malacañang stretched on for several hours with no untoward incidents. A delegation of moderate leaders headed by NUSP president Edjop Jopson entered Malacañang in mid-afternoon for a dialogue with President Marcos, while the NUSP demonstrators and other moderate groups continued to rally outside. As dusk fell, the rallyists at Congress, from KM, SDK, and other militant youth organizations proceeded to Malacañang and joined the moderate demonstrators. The crowd grew restless. When the Malacañang lamps were turned on, a number of demonstrators stoned and smashed them despite appeals from the rally marshals. Suddenly, fire trucks arrived at the scene. Firemen blasted the demonstrators with water from the trucks but were unable to disperse them. Demonstrators swarmed onto a fire truck, took it over, and rammed through the Mendiola gate of Malacañang. Once inside, they stormed some small buildings near the gate, lobbing not just stones and bottles but also crude explosive devices that I had not heard of before—Molotov cocktails and pillboxes. Apparently, the demonstrators had come better prepared this time.
Gunshots! The presidential guard emerged and started firing in the air. Then teargas. The demonstrators retreated. Police reinforcements and units from the Metrocom, the army, navy, marines, and Special Forces advanced from many directions. A seesaw battle ensued, with each side alternately charging and retreating. The rallyists gradually lost ground and were eventually pushed back, out of Malacañang, down Mendiola, some toward Concepción Aguila Street but many in the other direction, across Mendiola Bridge2 to Recto Avenue and Legarda Street, the center of the University Belt with its dense concentration of colleges and universities. Fleeing from truncheon-wielding police, scores of demonstrators clambered over walls and gates and into the yards of houses and school compounds. Over two hundred demonstrators sought refuge in San Beda College.
But the demonstrators still had some fight left. Hundreds regrouped and marched to retake Mendiola Bridge. As they approached, the soldiers on the bridge fired their Thompson submachine guns into the ground. The demonstrators scattered, several hit by ricocheting bullets or fragments. The soldiers charged as the demonstrators retreated back to the University Belt. Doors opened; some of the rallyists scrambled into student dormitories and boarding houses. The more daring remained on the streets and in the alleys to carry on the fight. As the night wore on, demonstrators ripped out the iron railings on the traffic islands along Recto and set up barricades along the avenue, piling up old car tires and trash and setting them on fire. The police tear-gassed the whole area and barged into student dormitories, arresting and beating up demonstrators who had taken refuge there.
The Battle of Mendiola Bridge lasted for seven hours. It was the most violent demonstration in the country’s history, until then. The next day’s newspapers reported that four students had been killed—the number was later revised to six—and scores of others had been wounded. Some of those killed or wounded were innocent bystanders. Over three hundred were detained. Marcos, appearing on TV, denounced the militant demonstrators as “insurrectionary elements,” claiming that they had conducted “a premeditated attack on the government, an act of rebellion and subversion” that was communist-inspired.
THE WHOLE COUNTRY was in a state of shock. Never had Filipinos seen or heard anything like what they had witnessed on January 26 and 30. Student leaders intensified their charges of police brutality,