The night of the military

Sept. 21, 1972 was like no other nights. It was the night of the military. There was something unwelcomed in the air, something that instinctively I knew was going to happen eversince I returned to Manila from Europe. I was a member of the Philippine delegation consisting of foreign service officers to the prestigious EROPA Public Administration/Foreign Service Course to Tehran, Iran and West Germany in 1971. When I came home to Manila after a two-month study tour of some European capitals, the writ of habeas corpus was suspended and I learned that many friends went underground. Student leaders, university professors, labour leaders and student activists became the target of an intensive surveillance.

I got a note from Satur C. Ocampo - then Assistant Business Editor at the Manila Times, that he went into hiding and that our two children Jose Sarni, aged 8 and Maria Sonora, aged 7 were left in 51 Tirona St, BF Homes in the care of my sister Daisy. Our house was newly-built in the prime Banco Filipino-developed housing subdivision. We lived before this in Avocado Street, United Paranaque.

On that fateful night of Sept. 21, 1972 - I stayed awake, stared into the darkness and listened to any noise from anything moving. It was dead still until I heard the alarm from Metrocom jeeps coming to a stop infront of 51 Tirona Street. I saw from the glass window some uniformed men coming out of the two military jeeps. And the knocking on the door followed. I opened the door and in came three men. The leader introduced himself as the captain. They were polite.
He asked: "Does Satur Ocampo live here?"
I replied: " No, he doesn't".
Next question: "Do you know where he is?"
I replied: " No, I don't".
He continued: "We are going to search this place".
I asked: "What are you looking for? He is not hiding anywhere here."
He said: " Subversive materials!"
The team of three - several were waiting outside, went through all the rooms, opened all the cabinets, went through all the books and things everywhere. The children who were sleeping then woke up and cowered in the dark, unable to ask anything. My sister was paralyzed from fear in her room. After some hours of turning the place up and down, the military men left. They didn't find any books that mentioned anything about Communism, Marxism, Leninism, Mao Tse Tung and all those political thinkers we were studying in my Political Economy Graduate course at Lyceum University.

As I was saying, when I returned to Manila I felt an eerie atmosphere, the feeling of a tempest wrapped in heavy rain clouds. With the lifting of the writ of habeas corpus, the dissappearing act of known activists, it was not too difficult to guess that the military would sooner or later make a general appearance. Our house has been a favourite meeting place of top leaders of the anti-Marcos opposition. In the house were dozens of copies of the newly-published book of Amado Guerrero. I took half to a friend's place and buried them in the backyard, and did the same with the other half in my own backyard. All my textbooks in my political economy class, as well as the books of Mao Tse Tung, my brother hid in the ceiling of the house. So, by the time the raiding military came on the night of Sept. 21, 1972, only some harmless books remained on the shelves.

When the television came to life the next day, it was the face of Francisco F.Tatad that greeted us - boyish bespectacled Kit was reading the proclamation of martial law in the country. He became the spokesperson of Ferdinand Marcos, the man who seized power unconstitutionally through the military and crushed all opposition to his dictatorship.

On the night of Sept. 21, 1972 we learned that no less than 5,000 top opposition leaders and politicians were arrested and thrown to jail. No, I was spared that night. The arrest came six months later, at midday of March 31st, 1973. Three Metrocom jeeps arrived and out came several men headed by a certain Capt. Napoleon Cruz. They showed me an ASSO document where my name was written along with Dr. Sotero Laurel and Mrs Laurel, President of  Lyceum University. They said they were taking me to a military camp in Laguna. In that camp which was three hours from Manila, I was the 13th female detainee held in the clubhouse. I was not listed as a detainee which was dangerous because I could have been salvaged without any records of having been arrested and detained. But I had a guardian angel who saw to it that my name was included officially as a detainee. I was there for a month.

The interrogation periods took place at midnight in what they termed "sugar and vinegar". It was plenty of questions asked each time, all coming from what they called the "blue book", a record of intelligence reports by paid spies roaming the universities and press club. My main interrogator was Jose Feria, then a Colonel but before this, a humble and friendly member of my editorial staff at The Lyceum. He was infact my bodyguard because he was built like one. So, when he kept on asking me about the Kabataang Makabayan, I told him that he should answer it himself because he overstayed both in Lyceum and in the KM movement. ( Feria died some years later in an encounter in Mindanao with the New People's Army, NPA. Capt Napoleon Cruz who led the arresting team that fateful morning in 51 Tirona Street, died in a car collision.)

When I was released after a month's detention, I knew I would never be at peace and that 51 Tirona will always be under surveillance. I packed my children and placed them to my mother's care in Camalig, Albay. The martial law regime was going to last a long time and my life, as well as that of their father- who was eventually captured and heavily tortured to near death, had changed beyond forever. If that detention was not enough, I woke up one day and read on Manila Times that I was among subversives working in the government. Some 5,000 people lost jobs that day.
The Marcos regime got rid of me and I got rid of the regime and begun a new journey into the challenging world of media. I became a journalist!
( This is just a summary of  a much longer story waiting to be told properly.)