By Publio Briones III
I WOULD like to think the reason only a few people—and by a few, I mean several hundreds—showed up for the mock funeral and burial of the effigy of the late dictator Ferdinand Edralin Marcos Sr. last Tuesday afternoon was because it was very hot.
I mean, temperatures in recent days have hovered somewhere in El Niño levels and the other day was no exception. (Okay, so it rained in some parts of the metro but it was extremely humid.)
That automatically ruled out people with high blood pressure, who have been advised by their doctors to avoid exposure to the sun, and those who are taking glutathione.
Also, the activity should not have been organized during office and school hours.
I'm sure many workers would have wanted to attend, but I didn't think their employees would have thought kindly of giving them time off to participate in a peaceful protest.
As for the students, I don't know what motivates them to cut classes these days but apparently joining a cause to express dismay at a Supreme Court decision that allows a ruler who was ousted by a People Power Revolution to be buried in the Libingan ng mga Bayani, or Heroes' Cemetery, is not one of them.
That, or they love school so much they wouldn't dream of missing a class.
Anyway, I don't want to think the poor attendance was because Cebuanos have forgotten the dark days of Martial Law, or that Cebu stood alone for almost two decades as the bastion of the opposition.
And I don't want to entertain the thought that, God forbid, the public has stopped caring.
So, I'd like to doff my hat off to those who did show up last Tuesday, especially members of cause-oriented groups like Sanlakas Cebu, Partido ng Manggagawa, Akbayan and Pagtambayayong, to name a few.
Not only did they brave the afternoon heat, but I presumed they also endured the stench at the Inayawan Sanitary Landfill, where they ceremoniously laid to rest Marcos's dummy.
And I cannot not mention the Cebu Citizens' Assembly Against the Burial of Marcos at the Libingan ng mga Bayani for spearheading the activity.
One of the participants, former Cebu City administrator Bimbo Fernandez, said the mock funeral and burial should serve as a reminder to all Filipinos that Marcos was not a hero.
Fernandez should know, considering that he had first-hand experience. He said he was arrested right after the declaration of Martial Law in 1972 for organizing workers at a sugar plantation in Negros and imprisoned for six months.
Retired Regional Trial Court judge Meinrado Paredes, too, was jailed for a year for joining movements against the Marcos dictatorship. He used that time to study and when he was released, he took the bar examination and passed it.
Since then, Paredes has been a staunch defender of human rights. So his presence last Tuesday was a no-brainer either.
Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña earlier said he would support the protest. And he was there. Without fanfare.
I WOULD like to think the reason only a few people—and by a few, I mean several hundreds—showed up for the mock funeral and burial of the effigy of the late dictator Ferdinand Edralin Marcos Sr. last Tuesday afternoon was because it was very hot.
I mean, temperatures in recent days have hovered somewhere in El Niño levels and the other day was no exception. (Okay, so it rained in some parts of the metro but it was extremely humid.)
That automatically ruled out people with high blood pressure, who have been advised by their doctors to avoid exposure to the sun, and those who are taking glutathione.
Also, the activity should not have been organized during office and school hours.
I'm sure many workers would have wanted to attend, but I didn't think their employees would have thought kindly of giving them time off to participate in a peaceful protest.
As for the students, I don't know what motivates them to cut classes these days but apparently joining a cause to express dismay at a Supreme Court decision that allows a ruler who was ousted by a People Power Revolution to be buried in the Libingan ng mga Bayani, or Heroes' Cemetery, is not one of them.
That, or they love school so much they wouldn't dream of missing a class.
Anyway, I don't want to think the poor attendance was because Cebuanos have forgotten the dark days of Martial Law, or that Cebu stood alone for almost two decades as the bastion of the opposition.
And I don't want to entertain the thought that, God forbid, the public has stopped caring.
So, I'd like to doff my hat off to those who did show up last Tuesday, especially members of cause-oriented groups like Sanlakas Cebu, Partido ng Manggagawa, Akbayan and Pagtambayayong, to name a few.
Not only did they brave the afternoon heat, but I presumed they also endured the stench at the Inayawan Sanitary Landfill, where they ceremoniously laid to rest Marcos's dummy.
And I cannot not mention the Cebu Citizens' Assembly Against the Burial of Marcos at the Libingan ng mga Bayani for spearheading the activity.
One of the participants, former Cebu City administrator Bimbo Fernandez, said the mock funeral and burial should serve as a reminder to all Filipinos that Marcos was not a hero.
Fernandez should know, considering that he had first-hand experience. He said he was arrested right after the declaration of Martial Law in 1972 for organizing workers at a sugar plantation in Negros and imprisoned for six months.
Retired Regional Trial Court judge Meinrado Paredes, too, was jailed for a year for joining movements against the Marcos dictatorship. He used that time to study and when he was released, he took the bar examination and passed it.
Since then, Paredes has been a staunch defender of human rights. So his presence last Tuesday was a no-brainer either.
Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña earlier said he would support the protest. And he was there. Without fanfare.
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