Abad Santos demeaned

 IT’S STILL a long way to May 7, but last Friday the City of San Fernando already went through its customary rites of honoring its greatest contribution to the pantheon of national heroes, Chief Justice Jose Abad Santos.

May 7 officially designated JAS Day, a special holiday in the province of Pampanga, even as the exact date of his martyrdom has not been determined, with May 2 as another probability.

It is precisely on that unsettled death date issue that 3^rd District Rep. Oscar S. Rodriguez filed a bill in the House changing the date of commemoration to February 19, JAS’s date of birth.

“The day is not so important and what is important is we recognize the heroism. Pero para lalong mapatingkad at hindi magulo, mas maigi na sigurado tayo sa araw na hindi pwedeng palitan at iyun ay ang araw ng kanyang kapanganakan,” said Cong Oca. “Kaya ang napagdesisyunan ng National Historical Commission and yours truly na ang birthdate niya ang araw ng pagdiriwang ng kanyang kabayanihan.”

Thus, last Friday’s celebration of Abad Santos’ 130^th birth anniversary which Rodriguez hoped would be replicated in other areas touched by the life and death of the Filipino hero. Even as he clarified that May 7 will remain a special holiday until the new law designating February 19 as JAS Day is enacted.

As things go during these city commemoration rites for heroes, Mayor Edwin Santiago cannot be contained in his panegyrics of Abad Santos’ “act of sacrifice” that knocked at the very gates of heaven, then come back to earth thus: "This is now a standing challenge for every leader to stop those self-gain acts and become role models, not only this election season."

And then some more: “It is not just about dying for the country. Modern heroes are those who live their life in service for others."  

Reminding one and all of the innateness of greatness in our race: “Likas sa ating mga Fernandino ang pagmamahal sa bayan, at ang kabayanihan ay naipapakita sa pagpapahalaga sa edukasyon, kalikasan, at sa kapwa.”

Citing as imperative then for the “current generation to learn from the lessons that can be derived from the story of local heroes.”

Hollowed meaning

Inspiring words there from Santiago truly befitting the hallowed occasion. But sadly hollowed of meaning. Pure lip service to vainly gloss over the worst insult inflicted upon Abad Santos by the city government Santiago heads, the natural consequence of which is the worst disservice to the people of Pampanga, if not the whole nation.

That is excising Abad Santos from the History of San Fernando, in the city government-sponsored and -funded Kasalesayan ning San Fernando launched only last February 9, exactly 10 days before Santiago’s paeans at the foot of the hero’s monument.

In a hasty review of Kasalesayan here on February 12, I noted that the book “is no place for heroes,” lamenting how its Chapter 8 – Great Fernandinos: Expressions of Excellence did not include Abad Santos and his equally great, if not even greater, brother Pedro. The books idea of greatness and excellence exclusive only to artists and performers, beauty queens and social celebrities which it celebrated with profiles and photographs.

The Abad Santos brothers mentioned only on the occasion of President Manuel L. Quezon’s visit to the capital in the chapter dealing with pre-war San Fernando. Their single pictures in the whole book: a minute faded cameo of Pedro, a   postage stamp-size picture of Jose’s oath-taking.

Seriously, what history can one make of San Fernando absent Don Pepe and Don Perico? So we asked then.

The answer: That Kasalesayan, indeed a non-history, that is now being pushed by Santiago for “the current generation to learn from.” Especially as his administration press released that the “initial 300 copies will be distributed to private and public institutions which will serve as reference especially to teachers.” 

In 1942, the Japanese Imperial Army executed Abad Santos, birthing the greatest Filipino martyr of WWII. As Jose Rizal is to the Spanish Colonization, as Antonio Luna is to the Philippine-American War.   

In 2016, the city government of his very hometown did the Japanese invaders even worse, by expunging Abad Santos from its own history.

No surprise

Come to think of it, why should we even be surprised?

Then as now, the remembrance of Abad Santos, much less memorializing his heroism, has not gone beyond the perfunctory wreath-laying and rhetoric on his official death date at the foot of his monuments – only three in the whole of Pampanga: at the Provincial Capitol grounds, at Heroes Hall, and fronting the Museo ning Angeles.

So what school, public or private, elementary or secondary, vocational or college, in San Fernando, in the whole Pampanga for that matter, has been named in honor of Abad Santos?

Ah yes, there was but one: Jose Abad Santos High School in 1966 per act of Congress via a measure sponsored by 1^st District Rep. Juanita L. Nepomuceno at the time when the province had only two congressional districts. Which in 1991 reverted to its old Pampanga High School, courtesy of 3^rd District Rep. Oscar S. Rodriguez, a PHS alumnus.     

Why, at the very demolition of the Abad Santos ancestral home just off the old public market in the late 1980s (early 1990s?), not even a whispered whimper of a protest was heard from the town officials or from local heritage advocates, despite the site proudly sporting the marker of the National Historical Institute as the birthplace of the hero.

Why, but for an afterthought of civic and business groups was the Gapan-San Fernando-Olongapo Road was also named Jose Abad Santos Avenue, albeit limited in usage to the San Fernando stretch, and the Department of Public Works and Highways still referencing to it in its maintenance contracts as GSO.

This, even as nationwide, Jose Abad Santos has not been short of memorials – from the P1,000 bill to halls of justices bearing his name.

Alas, like the prophet of old, Abad Santos is not without honor, save in his own hometown.

And you have the historical nonsensicality, aye, the intellectual infirmity, of the city government to damn for it.