(Delivered at the forum on “Tradition of Courage: Human Rights and the Living Spirit of EDSA” at the Ateneo de Davao University on 21 February 2026)
Assalamu alaykum, fiyo temegen, maayong hapon. On behalf of Konsyensya Dabaw, I commend University Community Engagement and Advocacy Council (UCEAC), Ateneo Public Interest and Legal Advocacy (APILA), and Kabataan Partylist Southern Mindanao, for convening this Human Rights Forum 2026.
The importance of the theme “Tradition of Courage: Human Rights and the Living Spirit of EDSA” cannot be overstated, and it is on this theme that I will anchor my assigned topic “The History of Struggle in Davao City during the People Power Revolution.”
I was assigned three questions, the first being “What must we do to remember and not forget the events that transpired in Davao City during the 1986 Revolution since most of the time the EDSA People Power Revolution is usually viewed through a ‘Manila-centric’ lens?”
And my immediate answer will be that we should precisely stop referring to the events that transpired in February 1986 as the EDSA People Power Revolution because it equates and limits the struggle to the location that we know as the Epifanio delos Santos Avenue or EDSA in Metro Manila.
We in Konsyensya Dabaw are among those who advocate that the Philippine milestone marked every February 25 should be conscientiously and more accurately referred to as the People Power Revolution of 1986. This call is not intended to dismiss the heroism of those who were actually at EDSA on those crucial days forty years ago but it will hopefully enable people across the country to meaningfully connect to the People Power Revolution.
Political and protest actions took place not just at EDSA but in different places like Davao, Cebu, and Baguio around the country.
Here in Davao City forty years ago, activists like myself gathered days before February 25 to monitor the developments in Metro Manila and to encourage people to rise up against the Marcos Dictatorship. My team of young activists was specifically assigned to Buhangin to distribute political statements and engage communities in that area. People massed up in San Pedro on February 25 to celebrate the ouster of the Marcoses.
The history of struggle in Davao City against dictatorship were marked by key actions. Such as the mobilization in 1984 which took place at Jones Circle just a few hundred meters from ADDU Jacinto Campus, at the intersection of CM Recto, Ramon Magsaysay, and JP Laurel (or Claveria, Uyanguren, Bajada, and Acacia, if you prefer).
So the next time you cross to go to Jollibee or Uniqlo, remember that people gathered to defy an authoritarian government right at that very spot. The first Welgang Bayan that took place in 1984 in Davao City could be considered part of People Power. It mobilized workers, the transport sector, urban poor, women, youth and students, and professionals, and brought the entire city to a standstill. It inspired other Welgang Bayans in other places, which landed strong political blows against the Marcos administration that by then had been in power for 19 years.
Davaoeños were enraged by the assassination of former Sen. Ninoy Aquino and took to the streets en masse on his first death anniversary. Davao joined in the noise barrage, confetti-throwing, and motorcades events that became known as the Yellow Friday Movement in the mid-1980s after the death of Ninoy.
These protest actions were directed against the Marcos Dictatorship, his cabal of cronies, and the foreign governments that supported them, particularly the United States. By the way, China was also friendly with the Marcoses following the establishment of diplomatic ties in 1975. However, it needs to be emphasized that the protests were rooted on a strong concern for human rights.
Davaoeños stood against and condemned human rights violations. Many of you are aware of the first pastoral letter to be issued against human rights abuses under Marcos rule was from Davao Archbishop Antonio Lloren Mabutas in 1978. He was at one point the first bishop of Diocese of Laoag and the President of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines from 1981 to 1985.
Titled “Reign of Terror in the Countryside,” the pastoral letter condemned human rights violations and more specifically the harassment and killings of church workers, triggered by incidents in Catalunan Grande. That same year in June, Davaoeños broke through the years of silence imposed by Martial Law and mobilized for the ”prusisyon ng patay,” the first action in Davao after the declaration of Martial Law protesting the series of bombings in the city and honoring the sacrifice of social worker and community organizer, Karen Guantero.
Davaoeños stood not only for civil and political rights, such as when about 30,000 mourners joined the funeral march for lawyer, journalist, and barangay captain Alex Orcullo who was ambushed and murdered in Barangay Mandug. We also did not tolerate infractions against collective economic, social, and cultural rights as shown, for instance, in the support of civil society to indigenous communities from Davao’s second district who were displaced from their ancestral lands.
Human rights may have been disparaged in more recent years with the boisterous talk and stance of Davao leaders, but the commitment to human rights was a strong enough motivation for the people of Davao to take to the streets during the time of Marcos Senior’s reign and beyond. Women and men of different ages and from various orientations, social standing, sectors, and groups gave of themselves and put their lives on the line
The aspirations of the heroes and martyrs of Davao contributed to the end of the Marcos Dictatorship and the succeeding slides will include those who were born, lived, or died in Davao City and Davao Region before 1986 and after.
Going back to the first question, to ensure that those of your generation and the coming generations of Davaoeños do not forget, it needs to be part of our stories that the people of Davao participated in and supported the various struggles that culminated in the People Power Revolution of 1986 and that we did so because we did not then and will not now and in the coming days let human rights violations and injustices go unaddressed. We also need to fight back against simplistic but systematic efforts to distort Davao’s history by equating and reducing it to the interests of political clans.
The second question is on lessons that the youth must pick up from the people who paved the way for the present that young people are currently enjoying. My first response will be to pick up from a speech delivered by Fr. Karel San Juan, SJ last February 14 for the Special Convocation for the Traditional University Awards and Conferment of Honorary Degrees for 2025–2026. Fr. Karel spoke of three Cs which he said described the six awardees and honorees: choice, creativity, and courage. I think the same attributes are among the lessons that could be drawn by today’s youth from the stories of the martyrs and heroes of Davao. To make a choice for justice, human rights, peace, and democracy and to renew that choice every day. To be creative despite limitations and constraints and to maximize opportunities. To be courageous in the face of threats and violence.
But I also want to add two more Cs to the three Cs of Fr. Karel: collective and critical.
In a societal context that celebrates hyper-individualism, it is important to have a regard for the collective, which is why the call is for those of us who are Ateneans to be persons for and with others. This sense of others obviously includes different sectors and peoples such as the Muslims and Indigenous Peoples of Mindanao. Too, I think it also means recognizing that the sense of being part of a collective and advancing the interests and welfare of a collective mean tempering the tendency to aggrandize our being taga-Davao and avoiding unhealthy regionalism.
Being critical means fully and regularly employing our faculties and abilities so that, in a manner of speaking, we don’t get intoxicated from drinking our own Kool-Aid and that we don’t get led to ruin by the music of contemporary pied pipers. Being critical thus means applying a mindful mindset to what we have come to accept as normal and acceptable.
And here I bring back the words of Dr. Jose Tiongco who vividly described the country’s experience of Marcosian martial law in his article titled “The Hands of War” from the book Turning Rage into Courage: Mindanao under Martial Law Vol. 1. Dr. Ting co-organized the country’s first health cooperative and is a Drs. Jess and Trining de la Paz awardee of ADDU for 2008.
“A great part of the people were willing to give up their freedoms for the discipline, order and seeming security of early Martial Law. It was a pleasure to walk the streets at night and not be afraid of being held up, maimed or killed just for the fun of it. The early days of Martial Law showed the people what could be done with the crime and anarchy that dominated the country before it was declared.
And the people were grateful. They were also willing to believe halfway, the promise of the economic improvement that usually redounds to countries, such as Singapore and Taiwan, that are able to strictly implement policies, laws and regulations that are flagrantly violated by politicians, and people with connections in high places in third world countries.
But as the months piled into years, the shine of Martial Law’s order and discipline began to fade with the growing boldness and assertion of the supremacy of the military over the civilian population. It did not take long for the soldier, long despised and reviled by the civilian population, to take advantage of his favored position by indulging in abuses and corruption.
Power does corrupt and it corrupts the man who holds the gun fastest. All it takes to solve a personally unpleasant situation is to point his gun.”
These are cautionary words that could very well apply to a Davao City that mistakenly believes that brutality and othering are the only response to the social and public health problem that is addiction to illegal drugs and that giving up our rights and freedoms in a vain attempt to identify with political masters are a small price to pay to gain validation and bare minimum services.
The third and final question that I will address is on the uniqueness of the Yellow Friday Movement of Davao City and the lessons that we can apply in today’s political field of fighting against corruption and human rights violations.
I surmise that this question is related to the involvement of Soledad Duterte in the Yellow Friday Movement. I think by now we can safely regard as hyperbole if not historical revisionism the claim of her son, former President Rodrigo Duterte, that “Ang nanay ko was one of the three or four or five marching down the streets of Davao during martial law.”
As we have already established, there were many protest actions that were supported by a significant number of people beginning 1978 in Davao City.
In the spirit of critical scholarship, there is reason to appreciate Nanay Soling for her own aspirations and not merely because she was the wife of the second to the last governor of the undivided province of Davao and the mother of the first president from Mindanao.
Nanay Soling was active in many civic organizations, such as the Citizens League for Good Governance (CCLG) which was described in the biographical book of Earl Parreño as a movement “against bossism and corruption in government” and the Coordinating Council of Organizations in Davao or CCOD. CCLG became aligned with the party of former Senator Raul Manglapuz in 1967. Nanay Soling filed for vice-mayor in the elections that time but eventually withdrew her candidacy because of complications with the congressional aspirations of her husband. She later became a convenor of Katawhan, the anti-Marcos organization that spearheaded the Yellow Friday Movement in Davao City.
Nanay Soling is also acknowledged as one of the leading figures of Pulso sa Katawhan launched in 1990 and described as a spin-off of Katawhan. She called for the resignation of President Cory Aquino to give way to Vice President Salvador “Doy” Laurel citing the need for a stronger leader to address the country’s economic problems.
Parreño’s book Beyond Will and Power quotes Nanay Soling as saying in response to the question of whether her vice-mayoralty candidacy would jeopardize her husband’s candidacy, “In the schools, in the civic and religious organizations to which I belong, I have always preached for involvement in our community affairs. I am now practicing what I have been preaching.”
Nanay Soling is obviously not a one-dimensional figure. Regardless of how we view her various political stance, there is wisdom in her assertion of preaching and practicing involvement in community affairs.
On a closing note, these days mark the 40th anniversary of the People Power Revolution.
The Fathers of Mercy says that “In Sacred Scripture, the number ’40’ signifies new life, new growth, transformation, a change from one great task to another great task…” Online sources indicate that 40 as a number in Islam signifies “maturity, wisdom and a critical turning point for spiritual reflection” and in Buddhism, it can mean “a period of intense transformation or the completion of a preparatory phase.”
Taking all of these together, I urge that we claim the 40th celebration of the People Power Revolution as a critical turning point for the transformation that we continue to desire for our people and the Philippines: A transformation based on the promotion of, respect for, and fulfillment of human rights. And may we continue the tradition of courage established by those who came before us.
Daghang salamat. Padayon. Amping.
