UP president on appearance at Marcos event: 'Tao lang po!'

MANILA, Philippines — “Tao lang po!”

University of the Philippines president Danilo Concepcion invoked human frailty to explain his attendance at the Kabataang Barangay reunion—a gathering among supporters of the Marcoses—at the UP Diliman last weekend.

Concepcion, in a statement, said that he “deeply [regrets] the pain” his appearance at the event brought to the UP community. “I intended no offense, most especially to the UP community that I serve,” he added.

Last August 25, hundreds of members of the now defunct-Kabataang Barangay filled the Bahay ng Alumni at the UP—home to the many activists who led protests against the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr.

No less than Ilocos Norte Gov. Imee Marcos, daughter of the late dictator, was the guest of honor. She was appointed by her father as KB national chair in 1975.

Student activist Archimedes Trajano questioned Imee’s appointment to the post in an open forum in 1977.

Witnesses said that Imee’s guards forcibly took the 21-year-old student out of the venue. Trajano’s lifeless body, bearing signs of severe torture, was found days later in Manila.

Concepcion served as the president of the KB Federation in Metro Manila from 1976 to 1978.

Concepcion added that he merely wanted to be with “old-time friends” that he had not seen in decades. His desire to reunite with them made him “overlook the sentiments of the UP community,” said Concepcion.

A photo from the event last weekend showed the UP president in a group photo, presumably with his fellow KB members, sporting the V sign—the sign associated with the Marcoses.

The Marcoses and the UP community

Concepcion also assured the UP community that the university “will never forget the dark period of our country during the martial law years.”

He added that the UP will continue to “hold in high esteem the University’s best and brightest who made the ultimate sacrifice fighting for freedom and democracy.”

The KB’s event drew strong condemnation from UP students, faculty and alumni. UPD Student Council chair Yael Toribio called the event as an “insult.”

UP faculty and alumni aired their “urgent concern” over the university’s “accommodationist disposition” to the “political rehabilitation” of the Marcoses.

They also recalled how the many members of the UP community fought and died in resistance of the Marcos dictatorship, while the late UP president Salvador Lopez stood his ground to resist the military from the university campus.

Imee is gunning for a seat at the Senate, while the dictator’s namesake, Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr., is contesting the electoral win of Vice President Leni Robredo.

Bongbong also hinted at his move to return to Malacañang.

Both Marcos siblings refuse to acknowledge the human rights atrocities carried out under their father’s regime, and instead, called for people to just “move on.”

READ: Youth groups to Marcos: We haven't moved on

The Marcoses' call to "move on" come amid a Congress' move to abolish the agency tasked to go after the family's ill-gotten wealth and martial law victims still fighting for their compensation from the government. The Presidential Commission on Good Government is also fighting a battle at Philippine courts to recover the ill-gotten wealth of the Marcoses and their cronies.