Saguisag-isms

Rene A.V. Saguisag, human rights lawyer, former senator, writer, public servant, staunch advocate for social welfare and responsible governance who took a clear and consistent stand on important national issues, passed away on April 24, 2024. He was 84.

On a personal note, he, along with several Mabini human rights lawyers, argued in my defense in court during the dark years of the Marcos dictatorship. He defended many others, especially the freedom advocates who were tortured, arbitrarily arrested, and detained.

Saguisag’s last public appearance was two weeks ago when he and 12 others received honors as “Haligi ng Bantayog” from the Bantayog ng mga Bayani Foundation. He braved all obstacles to his frail health to be with comrades and admirers.

Fresh from Harvard University, Saguisag put up his law office in the heart of Quiapo to be with the proletariat, the so-called Great Unwashed, the hoi polloi. He was scrupulously upright to a fault and he loved his wife Dulce to the farthest galaxy and back.

For Saguisag, many are already posting their tributes and remembrances on social media. In this space, I would like Saguisag’s voice to be heard. When he turned 60 more than two decades ago, his wife Dulce and kids gave away booklets (“Never Cease to Dream”) with Saguisag’s words uttered or quoted in many different times and circumstances. I picked some to share. You might recall the where and when.

“Block voting encourages or ensures election of the good candidates for the good constituents, the mediocre for the mediocre, the corrupt for the corrupt … For us, bloc voting is for blockheads.”

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“Many features of martial law are in fact consistent not with a new-fangled ‘constitutional authoritarianism’ (whatever that may mean) but with an old-fashioned despotic monarchy, without any accountability to the people …”

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“More important than physical infrastructure is moral infrastructure.”

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“Let us not twist history for 30 pieces of silver. The Marcoses were established to be world-class human rights violators.”

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“How can people who have been detained and deprived of their right to earn a living pay attorneys’ fees? And even if they could, we couldn’t accept.”

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On his wife Dulce: “As a board topnotcher with a master’s degree and VP at Mondragon, she earns far more than I do. We married knowing what time it was, or which way was south, so to speak … Law is a jealous mistress.”

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“Along the way I became a lawyer, a human rights advocate, a pamphleteer, an agitator, a kulitero, a public servant, including being an ethicist, a nuclear freak, Military Bases Agreement terminator, and while at the Guest House (where President Cory Aquino held office), being appointed to the Supreme Court, an honor I declined in favor of my bettors.”

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“It is a tough life. I keep going deep down asking if it’s worth the trouble of traversing the God-forsaken back roads of Ilagan, Isabela, but in the countryside, you think, too, of your suffering Motherland, and as you have known all along, the answer you come up with is yes, as always, it is worth at all.”

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“I plan to remain onion-skinned when my personal integrity is at stake. Some wonder whether I am LP or PDP Laban … What is clear is I am the Famous Founder, Charming Chairman, and Lone Member of the Lapiang Balat Sibuyas.”

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“Money isn’t my high. I am weird, aren’t I? One gets rich by reducing one’s needs. What does it profit a man to gain the whole world but suffer the loss of his own soul? A president of a famous university once said that a university’s role or function is to make poverty respectable.”

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“As possibly the poorest Harvard man in captivity or otherwise, I can never see myself getting wealthy by conventional standards, doing what I do, saying what I say.”

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“I think I should get credit for it was I that stopped the imposition of the death penalty by filibustering it to death.”

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“I do not mind being accused of siding with those linked to lost or unpopular causes of political incorrect and inconvenient positions. That has been the story of my life. I believe in doing a few things for the outcasts whom the rest of society may revile and despise. Maybe I am just made that way.”

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“Years from now, many lawyers, if asked what they did in their trying times, can perhaps merely echo Abbe Sieyes who said of his role in the French Revolution: ‘I survived.’”

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From his “Decalogue”: “Do the right thing. Do not be afraid to be unpopular. Learn to say ‘No.’ March to the beat of a different drummer. And a foolish consistency could be the hobgoblins of little minds.”

“In case of doubt on a difficult issue where men can honestly differ, resolve it in favor of life, hope, and compassion.”

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On bribes and donations: “The destruction of individuals and nations begins with the smallest compromises.” (Hear ye, on this one.)

Rest in God, Rene.

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