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THE OTHER VIEW
The Manila Times
http://www.manilatimes.net/national/2008/july/26/yehey/opinion/20080726opi2.html
By Elmer A. Ordoñez
“The youth will not fail us”
Saturday, July 26, 2008
This was the message of Satur Ocampo in a memorable paper, “U.P. will
forge through risk-filled neoliberal terrain; so will militant activism
persists: An Outsider’s View of University of the Philippines,” one of
the U.P. Centennial Lectures series in Diliman. The Bayan Muna
congressman spoke about the historic role of the militant youth in the
self-renewal of the national democratic movement—which today “is very
much alive.”
Ocampo, who studied at the Philippine College of Commerce (“the
quintessential college for the poor”) and Lyceum (with “ the influence
of UP intellectuals” like Sotero Laurel and Jose Lansang), recalls his
encounters with U.P. students in conferences—“most of whom [he] held in
high regard for their intellectual keenness and boldness in taking the
initiative.” He also met “some who annoyed others by their intellectual
arrogance and hubris, and, yes, frivolousness.”
He remembers fruitful meetings with Pete Daroy, Jose Maria Sison, Luis
Teodoro, Jun Tera, Vivencio Jose, Ferdinand Tinio, Reynato Puno in
discussions of the Student Cultural Association of the U.P.—the
precursor of Kabataang Makabayan.
He paid the “highest tribute to those who gave their best efforts and
sacrificed their lives—most of them in the prime of their youth—to the
revolutionary cause.” He said, “while many of these heroes had studied
in U.P. there were others, more numerous in fact, from other schools and
from all walks of life, who contributed to the national democratic
revolutionary movement since the mid-1960s and the early 1970s.”
“Similarly,” Satur Ocampo said, “let me salute the thousands of
activists today, the older and the young, from U.P. and elsewhere who
with commitment, enthusiasm, and hope, carry on the revolutionary
struggle shoulder-to-shoulder with the masses.”
He said the movement seeks to establish a genuine state of the people
from its basic units in the countryside communities; that it “has had
its ups and downs, its ebbs and flows” and “has suffered setbacks from
serious errors, the most serious of which took place in the 1980s.”
Thus, Satur pointed out, “A painful campaign was launched to rectify the
errors, which has been largely successful, although some manifestations
do appear now and then indicating that lessons from the past have yet to
be completely comprehended and assiduously applied.”
Having been part of the legal mass movement (since his release in the
early 1990s), Satur said he has found today “rich meaning in my own work
in the parliamentary arena despite its numerous pitfalls and limitations.”
To questions about his stand on armed struggle, he quotes from Angel
Baking, Philippine Collegian editor in 1940, twice jailed for political
offenses—who spoke in U.P. in 1970:
“Not all those who desire revolutionary change in the existing order
subscribe to armed struggle, and the majority perhaps to this day,
believe they are contributing their share to the overall revolutionary
struggle through peaceful and legal means. But this does not negate the
reality of armed struggle going on in our midst, and whatever
settlements might be arrived at resolutions to the basic conflicts in
our society can no longer be said to have been resolved independent of
the armed struggle. This is an important aspect of our concrete
historical situation which renders theoretical discussion of means
academic.”
I am reminded of Ka Roger’s answer to a public forum host who asked if
armed struggle (“what the NPA is doing”) is still fashionable (“uso pa
ba?”). He said, “Hindi ito question kung anong uso o hinde, kundi ano
ang pangangailangan.” (It’s not a question of what is fashionable or
not, but one of necessity).
Satur put it this way, ”Sometimes indeed it has been necessary to set
aside the consideration and discussion of theoretical or academic issues
due to the urgency of continually defending one’s life and fundamental
rights against vicious, murderous attacks.” This is the reality of armed
struggle as Baking noted—which Satur shared with his audience.
On the new U.P. charter, Satur thinks the “reorientation and expanded
roles of the U.P. will surely align it to serve the requirements of
global capital via neo-liberalism or globalization with its three
prescriptions: liberalization, privatization, and deregulation.” He
noted the destructive impact of unbridled globalization over the last 18
years in every part of the world. “What then is the sense in proceeding
along this perilous path?”
On U.P.’s role in turning out revolutionaries, Satur said the
generations that succeeded Baking’s group have produced “a bountiful
harvest of capable, intensely motivated patriots who have taken up the
challenge to carry on.” He is proud to have walked along the same road
with Angel Baking, and would tell him, “Tumula ka, Abe. Be glad,
comrade, because the youth will not fail us.”
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