By CECILIA GUIDOTE-ALVAREZ
Director, Earthsavers UNESCO Artist for Peace,
Magsaysay Outstanding Asian Artist Laureate
2022 LaMaMa Global Artist Awardee, NYC
The celebration of Peace and Freedom Week begins on Aug. 21 with commemoration of the martyrdom of Ninoy Aquino and culminating with the observance of National Heroes Day on the last Monday of August.
In this time of uncertainty, at home and disarray abroad as we are buffeted by the quadruple challenge of survival: climate catastrophe, armed conflict, covid resurgence with a new mpox -possible pandemic and collapsing economy, we must remind ourselves of who we are and what we stand for to overcome the existential challenges we face.
The Peace and Freedom Week is meant to remind ourselves of our heroes’ sacrifices — from Lapu-Lapu, Sultan Kudarat, and all our freedom fighters against colonialism from Spanish dominion, American rule, Japanese occupation, or any incursion of foreign power even local tyranny, and now the need to confront aggression in the West Philippine Sea. It is only proper to express appreciation to the gallantry of our heroes who stood up for our independence and defending our sovereignty while sustaining our self-reliance, care for Mother Earth and deference to the rule of law.
Confronted with existential crisis, rather than be condemned to relieve the errors of the past, we must draw lessons to chart wisely, the proper course of action and destiny of our people. Our national hero, Dr. Jose P. Rizal had admonished more than a century ago, "Awaken your consciousness of the past, already effected from your memory - rectify what has been falsified and slandered. Then we shall be able to study the future."
Our recorded past is sometimes seen as nothing more than narratives of conquest by foreign aggressors, of poor governance and betrayal by our own leaders, of human pain and suffering. But the chronicles of our past also reveal noble and glorious moments, replete with examples of grace and goodness, of sacrifice and heroic struggles, of moments when we can stand proudly and proclaim "I am a Filipino and the Filipino is worth dying for."
It is essential to recall the sacrifice of Ninoy whose brutal assassination, paved the road to EDSA where our birthright as a free people was redeemed. It was a shining moment applauded by the International Community of nations serving as an inspiration in the breakdown of the Berlin Wall. The glorious scenario in EDSA is inscribed in the UNESCO Memory of the World program. This unique heritage is defended by the task of the National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP) from any fake revisionist news that will assault the integrity of history that can cause irreparable damage to our nation’s psyche leading to a confused even schizophrenic perspective of right and wrong.
When my late husband, Senator Heherson T. Alvarez initiated the Peace & Freedom Week observance, he stressed: “We must highlight the vital importance of knowing our heroes that provide a vision that Filipinos are a tough, resilient, brave, enduring, peace-loving people. Ninoy gave us such a moment. Ninoy returned from exile at a time of national crisis with mortal danger to himself with a mission for peace and a conviction that a non-violent strategy like the ways of Mahatma Ghandi, Martin Luther King, and Nelson Mandela can prevail in the Philippines.”
In the undelivered statement at the airport, Ninoy reiterated his call that "National reconciliation and unity can be achieved but only with justice for our Muslim and Ifugao brothers. In a revolution, there can really be no victors, only victims. We do not have to destroy in order to build."
Auspiciously, at long last, we applaud the passage of the Bangsamoro Organic Law as a most significant potential for fulfilling peace in Mindanao. Peace accord was also praised by the United Nations and the European Union. Peace is a continuing saga of political will, compassion, and a sense of kinship and fairness. There are still the peace talks to be revived with the NPA rebels and the response to the cry for equity from our brothers in the Cordillera region as we re-echo the global cry for ceasefire and climate justice to ensure survival on earth. The task for peace continues. All those engaged in this process including our soldiers that liberated Marawi from the Maute assault comprise our modern-day heroes.
On Peace and Freedom Week, we underscore pride in our history with the urgent need to break the barrier of political, ethnic, religious, and social difference in a spirit of cooperation and the union in diversity to peacefully seek freedom from poverty and pollution, drugs and disease, ignorance and injustice, terrorism, tyranny, we must accomplish our country commitment to fulfill the SDGs.
We in NAM-SERVE with our partners, coordinated through the National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP) continue the tradition of remembering August 21st, inaugurated at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport more than three decades ago. We invited Coretta Scott King, the widow of civil rights champion, Martin Luther King to join then President Corazon Aquino unveil the following inscription on the marker written by National Artist for Literature, a patriot himself, Dr. Alejandro R. Roces: “On this spot Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino was assassinated on 21st August 1983. It is eternally enshrined: “For wherever a martyr has shed his blood for truth, justice, peace, and freedom there is sacred ground. The sun cannot bleach, the wind cannot blow, the rain cannot wash that sanctity away. From ground like this springs that which forever makes the Filipino great” to inaugurate the tarmac marker at the renamed Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA).
We must not forget; we must mitigate any evolving effort to inflict amnesia on our nation.
As holocaust survivor and Noble laureate Elie Wiesel stated, "Without memory, there is no culture. Without memory, there would be no civilization, no society no future."