Subversive Lives. Susan F. Quimpo
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Some names are not given in full to protect the true identity of those concerned. In some instances, an alias is used because the chapter author never learned of, or wishes to protect, the person’s true identity.
A Radical Activist at an Elite University
8
NATHAN GILBERT QUIMPO
AFTER GRADUATING FROM San Beda High School, I set twin goals for myself: to continue my education and to pursue social justice. I won a scholarship from Insular Life that allowed me to choose my college. I chose Ateneo de Manila, reputed to be a university of the elite, over UP, the activist-infested state university. Though my elder brother, Norman, had graduated from Ateneo and was now teaching there, my choice had more to do with balancing studies and extracurricular activities, which I felt would be difficult among the radical militants running loose in UP. I was confident that I would avoid being seduced by the elitist and burgis (bourgeois) ways of Ateneo. In the event, pursuing both goals together was complicated.
Ateneo had two dormitories on campus, Cervini and Eliazo Halls. With an additional “dormitory scholarship” from Ateneo, I stayed at Cervini. Though not air conditioned like Eliazo, it had comfortable rooms and adequate facilities, not luxurious but a vast improvement over the cramped conditions at home. Residents of the dorms even had exclusive use of an outdoor swimming pool. All freshmen students and most “dormitory scholars” stayed at Cervini, whereas upperclassmen who were sons of big businessmen, sugar hacienderos, logging concessionaires and cattle ranchers stayed at Eliazo.
I shared a room with Bogs Bonifacio, my schoolmate from San Beda, and two other students, Kiko Villanueva and Pedro de Guzman, who both hailed from the rice-growing province of Nueva Ecija.
It didn’t take me long to adjust to life in the dorm and the academic routine. Ateneo was conducive to study. The sprawling campus was perched on top of a hill overlooking Marikina Valley, quiet and peaceful, far from the hustle and bustle, the traffic snarls, and polluted air of Manila. Whether on a bench, on the grass, or under a tree, I never had any problem focusing on my studies. At Cervini, resident Jesuits or lay teachers maintained a quiet atmosphere. In the evenings, if I didn’t want to be disturbed by the light conversation of my roommates, I could walk to the air conditioned library, which was open until 10 p.m.
Mom signs the contract for a four-year college scholarship for Nathan, which he won in a citywide competition. Percy Roa, of the Insular Life Assurance Co., which funded the scholarship, looks on.
The calm on campus was reflected, less benignly in my view, in the extracurricular scene. I had high expectations, given the prominent role that Edgar (Edjop) Jopson, the previous student council president, had played earlier in the year in the national student movement. My first few weeks were disappointing. After the protests and tumult in front of San Beda, the university atop Loyola Heights appeared insulated from the outside world.
The student council was not into political activism. The first issue that school year of the student newspaper, the Guidon, had some feature articles by left-wing writers and by the apparently radical Ligang Demokratiko ng Ateneo (LDA) or Democratic League of Ateneo, but overall, the paper was tame compared to UP’s Philippine Collegian. The student clubs looked uninteresting, though I grudgingly signed up for a few. Some moderate activist groups were involved in Operasyon Bantay, a series of protest actions over the burning of two barrios in Bantay, Ilocos Sur, whose residents had voted against a local political warlord in the last election. A few radical activists, mostly members of LDA, were focusing on “mass work” off campus—propaganda, political education, and mobilization among factory workers and the urban poor. Perhaps work on campus was futile; the bulk of the Ateneo studentry may have been too burgis to be politicized.
The closest thing to political activism that seemed to have broad appeal among Ateneans was a “Filipinization” movement promoted by the student council and other student organizations. They demanded that American Jesuits turn over policymaking posts they still held to Filipino Jesuits and lay personnel. Filipinization sounded parochial and out of date to me, harking back to the 1870s when Filipino nationalists were demanding autonomy, not yet full independence, from Spanish rule.
Politically awakened by the First Quarter Storm, I wanted to deepen my politicization. I also wanted to help promote political consciousness and social involvement, particularly among my fellow students, to expose them to the different currents of the movement for social change—moderate, radical, revolutionary, etc. Unlike the few radicals on campus, I still entertained the hope of politicizing an appreciable number of Ateneans, especially among the scholarship students like myself, who were from poor or lower-middle-income families.
The best vehicle for politicization still seemed to be the student council. If it did not seem as activist as I had expected, perhaps I could help change that. I decided to run for one of the three council seats for freshman representative.
UNLIKE THE ELECTIONS for most positions on the council, which were held in the last few weeks of the school year, elections for freshman representatives were held at the start of the school year. Running on a platform of promoting social and political involvement and students’ rights, I had my first taste of Ateneo campus elections. I campaigned hard, with only a vague idea of my chances of winning. Some candidates came from Ateneo High School and had the advantage of being known to most freshmen. What I had going for me was that I had helped start a campaign against “initiation rites” (a euphemism for bullying) which freshmen had been subjected to. With the help of my dorm mates and former schoolmates from San Beda, I barely made it, winning the third and last seat.
On the student council, I soon found out that, like me, many of those elected the previous school year had run on a platform of working for greater social and political awareness among Ateneans. The difference was that their advocacy for political involvement had come under the banner of Filipinization. In discussions with them and other politically involved upperclassmen, I learned that the Filipinization movement had a longer history and broader goals than I had earlier thought.
The opening salvo had been fired in 1968 when five Ateneo student leaders published a manifesto titled “Down from the Hill” in the Guidon, in which they called attention to the “revolutionary” situation in the Philippines and the need to radically restructure the unjust social, political, and economic order. They criticized Ateneo and the Jesuits for serving the oppressive power elite and for providing a Westernized education irrelevant to the country. They called for Filipinization, which to them was simply “making things relevant to the Philippine situation.” They urged not only that university policy be determined entirely by Filipino Jesuits and laymen but also that the university curriculum be drastically reoriented to encourage identification with the masses and greater responsiveness to the country’s needs.
Since the 1968 manifesto, important gains in Filipinization had been made: replacing American with Filipino Jesuits in key positions, such as the rector-president and the dean of arts and sciences; instituting a philosophy course in Filipino; establishing a Philippine Studies Program; and shifting the Guidon from English to Filipino. At the end of the previous school year, newly elected student council president Roger (Brick) Reyes submitted a new manifesto to the Academic Council, the college’s highest policymaking body, recommending changes in the curriculum and administration, such as a required course in Filipino, encouragement for social action projects, the hiring of nationalist professors, and procurement by the library of leftist books. The manifesto had the support not only of the student council but also of the Guidon, virtually all the traditional student organizations, and all the activist groups.
Had I been too hasty in thinking that Ateneo was detached from the nationalist ferment sweeping the country? The Filipinization initiatives attracted me, but within a few weeks of being on the council, I felt frustrated again. The council and other groups launched a Linggo ng Himagsikan (Week of the Revolution), with an exhibition and lectures by noted nationalist writers. Few Ateneans attended. Some activist groups agitated for a boycott of classes on the final day of the Linggo, but the dean of students, Rafael