The persistent past

“He who does not forgive does not forget, but he who does not forget often forgives.”

—Madres de Plaza de Mayo

HERE IS what the autopsy report said: Six wounds shot at close range. Final shot aimed at the head. Cause of death: craniocerebral injury.

That was how my granduncle, Dr. Juan “Johnny” Escandor, died.

It was 1983, 11 years since the declaration of martial law. Dr. Johnny, aka Ka Mapalad, was in Manila, the belly of the beast, and doing his best to move undetected. His mission was to secure crucial provisions for the men and women of the Cagayan Valley Command, at that time one of the best performing guerrilla forces at war, not just against the dictatorship of Ferdinand Marcos, but also over timber, minerals, lakes, land and rivers. Over the very soul of the country.

Dr. Johnny’s missions were becoming increasingly dangerous as the military swelled from 60,000 in 1972 to more than 200,000 by 1983. But the people’s resistance continued as details of Marcos’ plunder began to emerge: first, from foreign economic assistance; second, from the funds for Philcag (Philippine Civic Action Group, assigned to Vietnam) and other discretionary funds; and third, from kickbacks from public works contracts.

While Marcos’ offshore accounts grew, the Philippine economy deteriorated under the weight of $26 billion in debts. Refusing to relinquish power, he increasingly relied on the police and military to keep his position secure.

And so, people continued to die, disappear and be detained. By 1983, impunity—the enduring hallmark of martial law—had reigned from the city center to the outskirts with a force approaching madness.

Dr. Johnny, rebel doctor, would not make it back to Cagayan Valley on the night of March 30. He was sought, spotted and seized. Viciously—an eye gouged, bones broken, guts emptied, skull smashed, then stuffed with plastic scraps. The price to pay for waging a war for the soul of the country.

It was a war that did not stop with 34,000 tortured, 2,520 salvaged, and 737 disappeared.

Memory and justice

A generation has passed, but there has been no show of remorse from the Marcoses. On the contrary, they are firmly back in power. And not all the victims of human rights violations during martial law have received compensation, such as it is, despite a US court’s order.

President-elect Rodrigo Duterte has said, “It’s just a matter of distributing the award. So anong problema?” He wrongly assumes two things: first, that the enormity of the work that went into rebuilding lives out of the ravages of martial law can truly be compensated; and second, that the victims and families are lusting over monetary compensation, when actually it is the symbolic victory that we are after. A victory that is as much ours as it is the country’s. A victory that, until now, wanes more than it waxes.

Not long after the toppling of the Marcos dictatorship, the calls were, first, “Never forget,” and, second, “Never again.” That is, to draw on the power of memory (“Never forget”) so that history will not repeat itself (“Never again”). The two calls have always been connected, with the first serving the second. Remembrance was in service of justice, and was not a goal on its own.

The urgent task for countries emerging from a violent past was to cultivate a “memoria fertile,”  a fecund memory, to borrow a phrase from the Madres de Plaza de Mayo, the mothers of desaparecidos in Argentina. Memoria fertile is a kind of memory that feeds the thirst and hunger for justice.

To forget, therefore, is another variety of impunity. To forget is to abandon justice.

Still at war

Our failure as a people to cultivate that memoria fertile is the reason we see so much of our history being repeated. We have failed to “never forget.” And by that failing, we have not accomplished “never again.” This is why, decades after martial law, we are still dealing with the consequences of the past.

The past persists in the murder of labor leader Rolando “Ka Lando” Olalia, in the murder of activist Lean Alejandro. Ironic that the underground movement’s leaders—the backbone of the resistance to martial law—became targets of assassination under then President Cory Aquino.

The past persists in the disappearance of Karen Empeño, Sherlyn Cadapan and Jonas Burgos, in the regular occurrence of extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, and torture.

The past persists in the abuse of foreign economic assistance, the plunder of discretionary funds, and kickbacks from public works contracts.

The past persists in the displacement of the lumad of Mindanao; the hunger in the bellies of farmers; the continuing war over timber, minerals, lakes, lands and rivers, the activists who pay with their lives for waging a war for the soul of the country. In the impunity that still reigns.

Indeed, the war that Dr. Johnny fought is still with us today.

The task at hand

It is alarming to me that the rhetoric of forgetting is everywhere. Recently, Duterte said he would allow the burial of Marcos at the Libingan ng mga Bayani “because he was a great president.” And then, Sen. Bongbong Marcos, the dictator’s son, said of the planned burial: “I think it will bring closure not only to my family but to the rest of the country.”

To sustain the position of remembering can be a painstaking task, especially when the powers-that-be peddle forgetting as a solution to our national woes. And yet, we cannot leave the task of remembering to the victims and their families alone, not only because it is untenable, but also because it rests upon the mistaken notion that martial law ravaged only a limited section of society, when in fact it was the entire country that suffered.

On the eve of the inauguration of this new administration, we must decide now, as a people, whether we will continue with our forgetting, or we will, at long last, foster and fortify a memoria fertile.

My grandmother, who turns 85 this year, sometimes muses on how long the wait has been for victory. Waiting comes with the expectation of a new future. But in this country where the past is not past, there can be no new future. Do we continue to wait for a future that cannot come?

The idea that we can “move on,” that we can secure our future, by simply forgetting is an absurd illusion. A premature verdict on a war that still rages. A hasty conclusion on a past that still unfolds.

Alaysa Tagumpay E. Escandor, 29, graduates this month from Ateneo de Manila University with an MA in journalism.