‘Wakwak’ of Mt. Diwata

Some time last week a friend asked me if I was attending the wake of “someone from Collegian” who had been killed.

The Philippine Collegian is UP Diliman’s student newspaper, often referred to simply as “Kule.”  I was momentarily shocked, wondering if one of the students had been killed.  Kule, after all, is known for its militancy, with very strong antigovernment positions.

I was able to clarify matters. The person killed was Wendell Mollenido Gumban, who did write for Kule as a student, but had long graduated with a degree in tourism. UP’s tourism graduates are snapped up quickly by the hotel and hospitality industry for high-paying positions, but Wendell chose a totally different “career” pathway. He went into trade union work, where he put to good use the writing skills he had acquired as a student—with Kule.

In 2011, he chose to go “cs”—that means the countryside—a way of saying the person had joined the New People’s Army (NPA). He was assigned to Mindanao, where he worked with farmers and with the lumad, indigenous communities.

On July 23, just two days before Duterte’s State of the Nation Address where he announced a ceasefire, there was an encounter between the NPA and the government’s military forces in New Bataan, Compostela Valley.  Wendell and another NPA were killed.

Going ‘ug’

When I was a student at UP in the 1970s, it was not uncommon to hear of students and, occasionally, even of a faculty member, going “ug” or underground, which itself had several levels—from being active in organizing students to working full time as an organizer, or to taking to the “cs” to join the NPA.

University radicalism began in the 1960s and reached its height during martial law, with many people involved in one way or another opposing the dictatorship. On the internet, I found an article about a special memorial held at the Bantayog ng mga Bayani in 2008, when UP turned 100 years old. The memorial service was organized to honor UP alumni and former students who had fought the dictatorship. There were 72 names on the list, of which 52 were described as having been “killed,” “executed,” “assassinated,” or “tortured to death.”  Most chilling were the descriptions like “body never found.”

In the 21st century, it is rare to hear of UP students or graduates joining the NPA. But it does happen, and when I do get news of someone from UP being killed in an encounter, I pause and reflect, wondering why they UP students join the NPA; or, for that matter, why we continue to have an armed insurgency described as the longest in Asia, 47 years to be exact if we reckon this from the NPA’s establishment in 1969.

Reflect I did at Wendell’s wake at UP’s Church of the Risen Lord.  I had declined when asked to say a few words. We teachers tend to talk too much, especially the older UP faculty. For a change, I just wanted to sit and listen to the eulogies, the stories about Wendell, who I had never met, hoping to understand why he had joined the NPA.

The stories were told, many of which had to be read out in behalf of those who were still in the underground, referring to Wendell as “Ka Joaquin,” his nom de guerre and, occasionally, as “Wanda.”  His friends talked of how simply he lived, with only one weakness, if we could call it that: “ridiculously long baths.”  One of his fellow activists explained as well, with theatrical flair, that Ka Joaquin liked to proclaim himself as “Ka Wakin, ang Wakwak ng Bundok Diwata.”

“Wakwak” is a mythological creature, sometimes compared to the “aswang,” a fearsome creature that takes many forms.  Bundok Diwata is also known as Mt. Diwalwal in Compostela Valley, where Ka Joaquin was assigned.

Yes, Ka Joaquin was openly gay but, someone whispered to me at the wake, “not flamboyant.”  (I thought, but that would have been fine, too.)  His Wanda and wakwak proclamations seemed almost whimsical, providing some relief from the difficult and tense life up in the hills.

It was clear Ka Joaquin was not your stereotyped grim and determined activist. At the same time, he was serious about what he did. One of his former teachers showed me a text she had gotten from him some time back, asking for the author of a certain passage about social life.  The writer was Pierre Bourdieu, a French social scientist known mainly in sociology and anthropology.  I marveled at how, on Mt. Diwata, this wakwak was still trying to remember Bourdieu.

Asking why

I could understand how he was radicalized, starting at UP, not so much in classrooms than from life in UP. He had graduated high school from a private institution, Lourdes, so UP, a public university, would have exposed him to classmates struggling with finances.

Even today, in a time when the Philippines seems so much more developed than in the 1970s, 65 percent of UP Diliman students still apply for tuition discounts, where full tuition ranges from P20,000 to P30,000 a semester, compared to more than P100,000 in several of the best private universities.  As chancellor, I also have to approve hundreds of requests for late payment each semester, reminding me of a terribly fragile middle class, whose fortunes can change all too quickly.

Ka Joaquin probably saw all that, and more when he went out into the world of workers and peasants. His parents were said to have visited him in Mindanao just recently, and had come to accept his decision to stay on.  I can imagine him arguing he could not turn his back on what he had seen, the sheer poverty of people amid the rich resources that have made Mindanao the Promised Land.  Mt. Diwata is a prime example—it is rich in gold and silver deposits.

However we might disagree with armed struggle and the NPA, it is difficult not to admire, or at least respect, Ka Joaquin in the way he was so driven by what comes close to, but surpasses, religious vocation.

One thing I will admit about UP: We do educate our students to think, to ask questions, to speak their minds and, most importantly, to defend their convictions by living out their values.

Ka Joaquin took one bullet and probably could have been saved. His hands were caked with mud, which suggest he had crawled some distance. A physician activist told me he probably bled to death.

Ka Joaquin was 30 years old.  I would still have preferred Ka Joaquin living a less dangerous life, but I do not consider his life wasted; on the contrary, his was a life well examined, well lived.

I wish his family and friends more courage for more battles ahead, some of which will be shared causes. The toughest battle will be one for a just peace, for a time when young people like Ka Joaquin need not take to the hills, only to be brought down for loved ones to mourn.

We mourn for Ka Joaquin’s death, but celebrate his life, continuously reflecting on, and mindful of Psalm 121, a song of pilgrims: “I lift up my eyes to the mountains—where does my help come from?”

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