My EDSA I story (Part 2)

Corazon Cojuangco Aquino didn’t win the snap election of February 1986. It was won by strongman Ferdi-nand Marcos by a margin of 800,000 votes. In the Comelec-sanctioned official count, the legal and official winner was Marcos, by a margin of two million votes.

It was thought Marcos had cheated because his Solid North votes were transmitted very late to the tabulation center at the PICC. Two Namfrel volunteers were hanged in Ilocos. The Ilocano votes were enough to overwhelm Cory’s lead in Metro Manila and other places. The canvassers claimed Marcos was cheating and so, led by the wife of a RAM major, walked out, as if on cue. The day before the celebrated incident, we, foreign correspondents, had been alerted about the planned walkout and to be there to cover it.

Initially, Cory Aquino didn’t have any participation in the four-day People Power revolt of February 22-25, 1986 or EDSA 1. EDSA 1 was triggered by greed because a henchman of the dreaded armed forces boss, Gen. Fabian C. Ver, had violated a gentleman’s agreement not to speculate on the peso-dollar rate being managed daily by the Binondo Central Bank under then Trade Minister Roberto V. Ongpin.

RVO had the Chinese trader arrested who unhappily died while under the custody of his 22 security men.

At dawn of February 22, a Saturday, Ver had the 22 military men arrested. The 22 belonged to RAM (Reform the Armed Forces Movement) of army Lt. Col. Gregorio “Gringo” Honasan.

Gringo and Enrile were plotting to overthrow Marcos. Enrile thought that with the arrest of the 22 Ongpin boys, Ver had uncovered their plot.

Enrile and RAM decided to make their last stand that noon, February 22, 1986, at Camp Aguinaldo. At 2 p.m., Enrile invited the armed forces vice chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Fidel V. Ramos, to join the rebellion. In the evening, Cory called Enrile asking what help she could provide. “Nothing, just pray for us,” the defense chief blurted.

Enrile wanted to take over as president. But the RAM wanted a more acceptable political figure, Cory.

Sunday morning, February 23, Cory flew by private plane to Manila from Cebu where she had spent the night (I didn’t say “hide”) at the Carmelite convent. At the airport, she was fetched by her car. On the Expressway going to Manila, she saw a column of tanks. Cory hid behind the driver’s seat. “I wasn’t sure
whether the tanks were friendly or enemy,” she explained to me later.

Sunday evening, the rebels had holed themselves up at Camp Crame. The place is more compact and easier to defend. Also, it had a bomb-proofed bunker that could take in only about 50 people. Enrile told me to go home because I couldn’t be accommodated in the bunker where enrolment was done by rank—from general to colonel to major to captain—you get the drift.

At past 9 p.m., General Ramos walked into the commotion, in tennis shirt, white shorts and jogging shoes and chomping an unlit cigar. “Who wants to join me for a walk in the camp?” he hollered.

Nobody volunteered. I did. Before we left, a aide showed him two telephone numbers, each starting with “6”—“Sir, these are the only clear lines,” he said. Those were clean lines to the Radyo Bandido of June Keithley. They were operating from the Jacinto Building near Malacañang.

General Ramos and I, with a handful of battle-ready security men, toured the Crame parade grounds. The troops were agitated because they were expecting a ground and aerial invasion by Ver’s men.

Underpowered and undermanned, the rebel troops were expecting casualties to be high, except among those inside the bunker. Ramos’s relaxed composure and casual getup somehow released tension. The master psy-war expert was in his elemental best. But the best was yet to come.

The following morning, February 24, Monday, I came to know why the “clean” landlines were important. Somebody gave Keithley a note to announce that “the Marcoses had left the country!” It was a lie.

But there was wild jubilation, nationwide. Hundreds of thousands spilled into EDSA to celebrate—not to rebel. The pictures of this throng came to be known as EDSA 1 People Power.

Tuesday morning, February 25, 1986, Cory was sworn in as President, pledging to enforce “just” laws.

Marcos was also sworn in too, becoming the only president to be reelected twice. In the evening, about 9 p.m., the Marcoses were kidnapped, according to him, by the Americans. He was brought to Hawaii, not to Paoay, his favorite hiding place.

By 10 p.m., Malacañang, the riverside presidential palace was ransacked—by the NPA for its armory, by some socialites for its jewelry, and by some foreign correspondents for its memory (Marcos’s diaries were stolen).

To be continued

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