[Newsstand] The true date of Martial Law

To remember September 21 as the date of the anniversary is to continue to see Martial Law through the dictator’s ever-lying eyes September 21 is remembered as the anniversary of Martial Law in the Philippines, despite it being backdated by Ferdinand Marcos to align with his obsession with numerology. The actual imposition of Martial Law occurred on September 22-23, 1972, with significant events including protests, arrests, and media shutdowns that marked the transition to military rule. There is a debate about the true date of the proclamation's signing, but the narrative shaped by Marcos has led to a cultural memory that needs to be reclaimed, emphasizing the importance of recognizing the actual events of September 22-23. This is AI-generated. Read the article for full context. Report any errors. It is a little distressing to read a historian I admire like Joseph Scalice shrug, avert his eyes, and reluctantly embrace September 21 as the anniversary of Martial Law. “Today marks the 54th anniversary of Ferdinand Marcos’ declaration of martial law,” he wrote on Monday. “While his military dictatorship was actually imposed over the course of September 22-23, the declaration was backdated to the 21st, and it is on the 21st that we remember Marcos’ crime against Philippine democracy.” No. We remember September 21 because that’s the date Marcos wanted us to remember, and because we’ve had decades of practice at remembering it. It was not the day he placed the entire country under military rule; it was not the day he appeared on TV to announce the new order; it was not the day the press was shut down, the chambers of Congress padlocked, the leaders of the opposition arrested. But his obsession with numerology, an open secret during the dictatorship, made him choose the 21st; it was a multiple of his so-called number of destiny, 7. I’ve written on this before, following Manolo Quezon’s lead. The facts are clear; the sources good and various. Quezon’s brainchild, The Philippine Diary Project, contains “A Timeline of Martial Law,” the comprehensive chronology prepared by the Presidential Communications Development and Strategic Planning Office between 2012 and 2015 under his direction. It readily shows (among many other details): That on Thursday, September 21, 1972, a protest rally with an estimated 30,000 demonstrators takes to the streets in Manila, and that on that same day Senator Ninoy Aquino, the first-term senator who had become Marcos’ chief rival, delivers a privilege speech – the last of his life, and the last recorded in the old Senate – warning against martial law being imposed in 48 hours. That on September 22, at 6 pm, Defense Secretary Juan Ponce Enrile receives “three large sealed brown envelopes” containing the orders for martial law; that at 7 pm, Enrile meets military commanders and conveys the orders for martial law; that at around 8 pm, a fake assassination attempt on Enrile is staged to provide cover for the coming declaration; that at approximately 9 pm Marcos issues a raft of orders that includes authorization to arrest some 8,000 personalities, shut down news organizations, and effect the military takeover of public utilities; and that starting at 10 pm, soldiers begin to be deployed against civilian targets That on September 23, minutes past midnight, Aquino is arrested, radio transmissions abruptly cease, ABS-CBN is shuttered; that at 6 am, hundreds of personalities are placed in stockade in Camp Crame, the total eventually reaching around 8,000; that at 7.15 pm, Marcos appears on TV, announcing that he had placed the Philippines under martial law since 9 pm the night before; and that starting at 7.30 pm and for well over an hour, Press Secretary Francisco Tatad reads the entirety of Proclamation 1081, in what a Constitutional Convention delegate called a “sinister monotone.” Backdated? There is a genuine mystery about the actual date Marcos signed Proclamation 1081, the ur-document that created the Martial Law regime. In The Conjugal Dictatorship of Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos, Primitivo Mijares recalls the time Marcos told an assembly of historians that he had actually signed the proclamation on September 17. If true, then the Martial Law edict was in fact post-dated. But it is hard to credit this Marcosian assertion, because there were others. I quote Quezon: “In his own diary, [Marcos] wrote that he finished preparing Proclamation No. 1081 in the evening of Sept. 21 (but he’d also mentioned finishing the paperwork in prior entries). Marcos would tell a gathering of historians he signed the proclamation on Sept. 17. David Rosenberg, in a 1973 article, said Marcos signed it around 3 am on Sept. 23, and journalist Raymond Bonner, based on an interview with Juan Ponce Enrile, said the defense secretary witnessed Marcos sign the proclamation in the morning of Sept. 23.” It is possible that, since the planning and preparation for perpetuating himself in power through military rule took years, from at least 1969, Marcos may have forgotten the actual date he signed the proclamation; it is also possible that he wanted to vouchsafe different dates, in confidence, with different confidants. (Because he could.) But there is no mystery about the date he wanted the country to remember. September 21. On August 30, 1973, in the full flush of unlimited power, Marcos issued Proclamation 1180, recognizing September 21 every year as National Thanksgiving Day. (George Orwell, who?) And that was how the Philippines began decades of indoctrination in the supposed larger meaning of September 21. Marcos’ dictatorial regime lasted only about 13 and a half years (about a year longer than the Third Reich)—but even after the Edsa People Power Revolution ousted the Marcoses, the pull of practiced habit remained strong. Millions of people who had lived through the tumultuous last days of pre-martial law democracy took to Marcos’ propaganda on their own, and forgot their own experience. And the generations that came after, who did not suffer the fear and disorientation of that black Saturday in September in 1972, naturally accepted September 21 as received wisdom. Up until the 1980s, it was the day we gave thanks for the beneficence of the Marcos dictatorship; today, it is the date “we remember Marcos’ crime against Philippine democracy.” Reclaim An accomplished scholar like Scalice must know all of this, and yet he and others like him seem resigned—to what, exactly? The authority of the text? Yes, the official copies of Proclamation 1081 are dated September 21, but surely nothing prevents us from recognizing the dating of this document as a lie, or as part of an elaborate fiction. In the exact same way many people then saw through the lifting of Martial Law on January 17, 1981, identifying it as a cosmetic cover-up deliberately timed for Pope John Paul II’s first visit to the Philippines, it is possible for ordinary citizens to read between the lines, to read through the text, to discern the lie within. The impossibility of changing a whole culture of memory and forgetting? The Never Again, Never Forget campaign must be judged to be either an incomplete success or an unfinished failure. Social Weather Stations surveys over the years have consistently shown robust public support for democracy, but this does not necessarily translate into electoral support for democracy-defending candidates. And the election of Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to the presidency puts into question the continuing relevance of the campaign—and yet year in and year out activists and advocates continue to show up, take to the streets, spread the word. Surely scholars can do no less. There is reason to consider September 22 as the anniversary of the imposition of martial rule, but the better choice is September 23. That’s when the public woke up to find everything changed: The media closed, the main utilities including the airlines seized, the opposition leaders arrested, the soldiers in charge—and the man in Malacañang announcing hell on earth on TV at night. Marcos bent history’s will and a nation’s memory to force the fake anniversary of September 21. Fighting back against Marcos’ influence in the story we tell about ourselves must include reclaiming the true date when the gates of hell were flung wide open. – Rappler.com Veteran journalist John Nery is a Rappler columnist. He anchors Rappler’s special coverage of the Duterte impeachment trial and hosts “In the Public Square with John Nery” every Wednesday. How does this make you feel? Loading