MANILA, Philippines - Twenty-five years. A quarter of a century. One generation. A long time ago perhaps, but for those of us who were a part of that history, even with senior moments creeping in, the memories are vivid.
The People Power Revolution of 1986 is not something one forgets. On a large scale, it changed not just our country, but also the world and the way revolutions are waged. As we mark the 25th anniversary of our People Power, a nation far away changed its leadership in much the same way – without violence, with the people crying out for and achieving change.
This whole week, as the nation celebrates People Power, the stories of those four days in February 1986 will be retold, some details perhaps fuzzy now, but the feeling of pride, of nationhood, of heroism even just on a small scale, of making a stand, of fighting for something we were sure was worthy and noble... will come flooding back.
Before gathering at EDSA we had sustained a long and difficult protest, waged a difficult campaign, went through a difficult electoral exercise. We rallied behind a simple housewife, a woman dressed in sunshine, a reluctant candidate who admitted she knew nothing – of corruption, of stealing – and following her lead we achieved the impossible.
The world marveled – we marveled, wondering how it all happened. In 1986 there was no precedent, nothing like this had ever been done before anywhere in the world. People went to EDSA on the eveningof Feb. 22 on sheer instinct and perhaps impulse – not thinking of the consequences or the possible scenarios, because if they did probably very few would have gone. They probably had no idea of what they hoped to achieve there at EDSA, on the road in between two military camps, answering the call of a cardinal to protect a soldier and a minister, both of whom had been part of the dictator’s machinery.
Historians may eschew as superstition the claims that a divine hand had guided the people and choreographed the events of those four days. But when thousands upon thousands move as one, acting on little more than faith and that Pinoy sense of
pakikisama, when newspapers spread out on the pavement is a welcome bed for the night and the pan de sal that an itinerant vendor offers for free is the best breakfast you’d ever had, you cannot but believe that is is not a purely human endeavor.
In the next few days, whether or not you were there 25 years ago, and whether or not you join the present-day celebrations at EDSA and elsewhere, do share in the euphoria of those four days, and try to remember what it meant – and means – to be Filipino, to have fought for and won our freedom and regained our dignity. And after February, to keep that spirit alive, and live like people powered, and empowered.