SEVENTY years after over 420 years of rule by colonial masters—Spain and the United States—that shaped the alipin mentality among the free natives, this state of mind restrains the freedom of some Filipinos to self-respect, dignity and progress, young historian Ose Martija observes.
Martija, 24, said the alipin (slave) mentality was thriving among Filipinos when plunder convict and former President Joseph E. Estrada was elected into office as mayor of Manila in 2013. Estrada was reelected mayor of the same city during the 2016 national and local elections.
As a historian, Martija knew well that Estrada, a former actor, was found by the Sandiganbayan on September 12, 2007, guilty of plunder involving $80 million in bribes and anomalies, and was sentenced to life imprisonment.
But he was granted pardon by former President and now Pampanga Second District Rep. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo on October 25, 2007, only over a month after his conviction by the Sandiganbayan.
Arroyo herself was charged (November 2011) of rigging the 2004 presidential election and plunder (July 2012) for the misuse of a P366-million intelligence fund from the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office. Martija was still a student at the Philippine Normal University (PNU) when Arroyo was placed under hospital arrest at the Veterans Memorial Medical Center until her release this year. The Supreme Court (SC) dismissed her plunder case in an 11-4 vote on July 19, barely a month after Rodrigo Duterte took office as the 16th president of the Republic of the Philippines.
Martija said he again witnessed the existence of the alipin mentality among Filipinos when Arroyo was reelected to Congress in a landslide vote against three contenders in 2013. She was again elected into the same office unopposed during the 2016 local elections. Arroyo was first elected Pampanga representative in 2010, after she stepped down and prior to her electoral sabotage and plunder cases.
For Martija, a society with a sense for self-respect, decency and justice would in no way risk to elect or appoint politicians whose reputation is tainted with corruption back to any public office.
Especially evident
ACCORDING to him, the alipin mentality was especially evident when some Filipinos wished to dignify former dictator Ferdinand E. Marcos as hero, despite being accused of bringing thousands of lives to ruination.
“A segment of the society, however, is firm with its conviction that the late strongman does not deserve last rites at the Libingan ng mga Bayani, much more the respect reserved for heroes,” Martija told the BusinessMirror. “These people include the recipients of the roughly $2-billion class suit won by human right victims in a US federal court in Hawaii in June 2012.” Martija cited the Amnesty International (AI) as placing the number of people killed during Marcos’s military rule at 3,240. According to AI, some 34,000 were tortured and about 70,000 imprisoned.
Martija cited that in 1997, the Swiss Federal Supreme Court ruled that millions of dollars stashed in Marcos’s five dummy Swiss accounts (Azio-Verso-Vibur; Xandy-Winthrop; Charis-Scolari-Valamo-Spinus-Avertina; Trinidad-Rayby-Palmy; Rosalys-Aguamina; and Maler) are owned by the Philippine government.
The SC of the Philippines, in 2003, ordered the money, about $356 million, forfeited in favor of the government.
A total of P167.5 billion (about $4 billion) from Marcos’s and his cronies’ ill-gotten wealth was already recovered by the Presidential Commission on Good Government (PCGG) from 1986 to 2014, according to Martija.
Passion required
THE alipin mentality is being encouraged and reared to live forever on social media, where disinformation campaigns are storming the gullible people today, Martija said.
“Many are well-informed, but only a few are taking actions to help others understand issues,” he told the BusinessMirror.
And some of the well-informed who try to help enlighten others, he added, are doing it the wrong way.
“You cannot liberate others from ignorance by telling them ‘bobo ka!’ [You are stupid],” Martija said.
For him, “educating others requires passion, hard work, patience and the ability to make them understand at the level of [what] their [minds can] grasp.”
He is saddened at the unfortunate reality that some people make a firm stand based on conviction shaped by false information.
“It’s ironic that we call our time the ‘Information Age,’ yet many are misinformed,” he said.
Fake news
THE World Wide Web is an immense pool of free and accessible information, according to Martija.
“Some people, however, do not research to validate things and, instead, easily and unsuspectingly accept memes and fake news as true.”
Sadly, the misinformed, trying to defend their belief and pride, engage in discourses by bashing and arguing in ad hominem (an argument assailing the character of the person rather than the substance of the argument itself) because they argue without basis, he explained.
Martija said he tries to help people keep track and understand issues not only through lectures, discussions and social media posts.
Punk Magalona
MARTIJA composes the songs his band Punk Magalona performs at several watering holes in Manila.
His pieces include “Utak,” “Lason ng TV” and “Sobrang Bobo.” His “Utak” piece speaks of the absence of critical thinking among many people on social media.
His love for music unfolded during high school at about the same time his love for history did in the third year.
Moving on without setting things right is not the right way to start over again, Martija said.
“This ‘Moving on’ [gimmick]— forgetting the lessons and without learning from them—is one reason the country does not really move on.”
The alipin mentality hates the tyrants for the present, but later embraces them after presuming the services and favors made have overridden the abuses, he explained.
“The events in history are kept repeated, because we do not learn,” Martija told the BusinessMirror. “History does not repeat itself. The people do.”
Emancipation song
THE emancipation of people from alipin mentality may not only help achieve national progress, but also the personal progress of individual Filipinos, he said.
Currently mastering Philippine Studies at the De La Salle University, he approaches completion of his thesis: “Kasaysayan ng Kilusang Punkista ng Kamaynilaan” (History of the Punk Movement in Manila).
These people “are not only musicians,” Martija said. “Their music has social criticism and relevance. And being so, they are part of politics.”
Martija taught at PNU, where he took BSE in History, for some time prior to taking his masteral degree. He said he would continue to teach and use his own music to help others understand issues and history.
For Martija, who is a teacher inside and outside school, as well as online and offline, no society with sense for justice and self-respect would dignify or elect again to public office individuals smeared with fraud, especially those involved in massive corruptions.
Image credits: Oliver Samson