What’s in a uniform?

What is it in a uniform? Well, for one, it’s an official identification of what organization the wearer of the uniform belongs to. Part of the students’ discipline we learned was to wear proper uniform in schools. At work, some government and private offices require their employees to wear uniform.

And the biggest uniformed personnel in government come from the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) and the Philippine National Police (PNP). In fact, the AFP and the PNP have different uniforms to indicate specific service commands for the men and women in the military and police institutions.

So we cannot begrudge the Philippine Army for taking offense when social media activist Mae Paner, a.k.a. Juana Change, sashayed wearing their uniform in the middle of the stage set up by anti-government protesters last Monday.

Paner joined the rally that was taking place at Commonwealth Avenue in Quezon City while President Rodrigo Duterte delivered his state of the nation address (SONA) at the Batasang Pambansa.

At the stage, Paner pitched about the extra-judicial killing (EJK) allegations against the Duterte administration while she wore the camouflage uniform used by soldiers and policemen from Special Action Forces (SAF) in combat operations.

Paner, who is certainly not a fashion model, invoked her being an artist who like the rest of the Filipinos has constitutionally protected rights to freedom of expression.

Since Paner, aka Juana Change, was on stage acting out a role of a woman combat soldier, she got away with it.

But a civilian or non-soldier like her wearing an official combat uniform in public, as a matter of fact, is covered by existing laws against poseurs.

The police will prosecute seven people who were arrested last week for trying to enter Marawi City wearing police and Army uniforms. According to Chief Supt. Reuben Theodore Sindac, police director for the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), all the suspects are now detained after being charged for violating Article 117 of the Revised Penal Code on usurpation of authority and official functions.

The suspects were on board a private vehicle when intercepted by soldiers and policemen who were guarding a checkpoint along the stretch of the Iligan-Marawi Highway. The suspects were immediately arrested when checkpoint sentries noticed the police and Army uniforms they wore have different unit insignias.

The suspects also had in their vehicle luggage-full of other military uniforms and patches purporting they belong to non-existent military Interpol unit of the United Nations. One of the uniforms recovered from their possession was for a 17-star general. Initially, the suspects were regarded as “crackpots.”

But ARMM police authorities were not amused with their stunt. The seven suspects are now being probed for possible links with the Maute terror group that laid siege in Marawi since May 22. The Maute siege prompted President Duterte to place the entire Mindanao under 60-day martial law which Congress allowed to extend until the end of this year.

Police authorities understandably are seriously looking into this angle especially after an incident involving use of soldiers’ uniform when some members of President Duterte’s close-in security were nearly wiped out in the ambush of their two-vehicle convoy in Arakan, Cotabato last July 19. Five of the ten members of the Presidential Security Group (PSG) were wounded in the attack at a police checkpoint that turned out to be manned by the New People’s Army (NPA) rebels wearing government-issued military uniforms.

The ambush was the latest NPA attack that angered President Duterte the most and led him to suspend peace talks with the Communist Party of the Philippines-National Democratic Front. For the Commander-in-chief, the NPA attack against the PSG was an attack directed at him as President.

Fortunately for Paner, the AFP leadership finds her Juana Change act neither a national security risk nor was she considered an enemy of the state. AFP chief of staff Gen. Eduardo Año is in a forgiving mood even after more than 100 uniformed men from both the military and police have been killed in action since the Marawi siege erupted.

Incidentally, Sen. Manny Pacquiao flew to Marawi City last Saturday wearing full military uniform when he visited Camp Ranao, the command base of the Army’s 103rd Brigade. Pacquiao, a reserve-Lt. Colonel in the Philippine Army, wore the regular brown-shaded camouflage uniform and Special Forces beret to boost the morale of soldiers fighting the Islamic States-influenced Maute and Abu Sayyaf terrorists.

Pacquiao earned the AFP Reservist rank by virtue of his several world boxing victories. Pacquiao’s visit at Camp Ranao came after President Duterte himself in full military uniform as Commander-in-chief flew near to the battle site in Marawi City two weeks ago.

The AFP leadership is also inviting Paner to join the military as a reservist so she can wear the uniform without any problem. Paner, in a post on her Facebook account, explained what she did was performance art and thanked the people who supported her amid the bashing she got in social media. In her Twitter on July 28, Paner posted: “I have family in the service. I have love for good soldiers. I ridicule only those who deserve it.”

During an interview with dzBB after she learned the AFP won’t press charges against her, Paner announced she has an upcoming stage play about EJK in September to be held at the Cultural Center of the Philippines in Roxas Boulevard, Pasay City.

For the men and women in uniform of the AFP and PNP, their lives and limbs are at stake every time they wear them on duty. Soldiers and cops either get wounded, or worse, killed in action. They die with their boots on, so to speak dramatically.

However, this is not the reality for artists wearing the uniform while playing the role of soldiers or cops. The role-playing artists may fall on acoustic shooting and false blood ooze out and they die. But they get to live as soon as the director yells “Cut!” to mean the scene is done and over with. 

The uniform of the men and women of the AFP and PNP is like a “sacred” national costume that sets them apart and different from the rest of us. They are the ones ready to lay down their lives to protect and defend the Filipino nation.

As I asked at the outset: What is it in a uniform? It means more than piece of clothes.