Trample thy sacred shores

Lucio Dimaano will not let his nagging foot injury deter him from joining the protest action at the People’s Republic of China Consulate in San Francisco on Friday, July 8, at noon. When Japan threatened to invade the Philippines, Lucio answered the call of his country on June 14, 1941 and enlisted in the Philippine Army and, after basic training, was dispatched to defend Bataan in January of 1942 after Japan invaded the Philippines.

Ravaged by malaria, beriberi and dysentery from three months of constant battle and equipped with meager rations and bullets, Lucio and his comrades finally succumbed to the superior Japanese Imperial Forces on April 9, 1942 and were among the 65,000 soldiers in the Death March.

Somehow Lucio survived the march and the war and now, a few weeks before his 91st birthday, plans to answer the call of his country once again, this time to protest China’s installation of a giant $925 million oil rig on the Kalayaan Islands of the Spratlys which he sees as another invasion of his country.

“When I was young, we used to sing the Philippine National Anthem in English,” Lucio recalls, “and I remember the lines ‘Ne’er shall invaders trample thy sacred shores’ and that was a solemn promise I made as a child and one I intend to keep until I die.”

Lucio will be joined at the China Consulate protest action by other Filipino WW II veterans organized by Bataan Post Commander Rudy Asercion, whose father, Dick Asercion, graduated from the University of San Francisco in 1941 and then returned to the Philippines to enlist in the Philippine Army. Dick Asercion fought in Bataan but, unlike Lucio, did not survive the Death March.

When the China protest action was discussed at a Filipino community meeting in Rio Vista, California last Sunday, Rudy asked if the message of the July 8 event was simply “Our Soil, Our Oil!” Others responded “Is that not enough?” The US estimates that there are 125 billion barrels of oil in those waters and China wants to extract all that oil for itself to fuel its own massive energy needs. China expects to extract about $50 billion worth of oil annually.

“If a big part of this wealth goes to its rightful owners, the Filipino people,” Ted Laguatan explained, “mass poverty can be eliminated. New industries and enterprises will proliferate from the infusion of so much national capital providing well paying jobs for our people. No longer will we be a nation of slaves where millions of our people have to work in lonely far away foreign lands separated from their families. The superior education, nutrition, health care and housing these discovered riches will provide to millions of Filipino children will enable them to flower to their fullest potential.”

At the Rio Vista community meeting that was attended by noted Philippine political satirist Mae Paner (“Juana Change”), the folks agreed that both oil and national honor were involved in the Spratlys issue.

On July 8, at 12 noon, mass protest actions of Filipino Americans will take place in front of China’s consular offices throughout the US. Originally set for only the China Embassy in Washington DC and the China consulates in New York and San Francisco, the protest actions expanded to cover all the China consular offices in the US after Filipino community leaders in Chicago  (led by Yoly Tubalinal), Los Angeles (led by Rocio Nuyda), and Texas (led by Gus Mercado) mobilized their network of contacts to organize consular actions in their cities.

Dallas community leader Gus Mercado confirmed in an email that “a convoy of FilAms from North and East Texas (led by Myrna Carreon and Chito de la Cruz) will converge at noon in Houston where they will be met by Marie Mercado and officers of the Filipino American Community of South Texas (FACOST) and joined by FilAms from South Texas led by Joey Golez and Flor Tolentino.”

“This will be the first time for the vast majority of Texas FilAms to participate in a demonstration rally,” Gus wrote, “But everybody is fired up by the issue and very eager to participate, and will inform all friends and relatives across the US to do the same.”

Filipino Canadians are also organizing protest actions in front of the China consulates in Vancouver and Toronto led by Mila Magno and Dick deTablan.

While Filipinos across the United States and Canada are organizing “to stand up against the China bully”, the Migrant Heritage Commission (MHC) sent out an open letter to Daisy Tucay, one of the organizers of the New York protest action, recommending a “more diplomatic… less confrontational” approach to China “without engaging into China bashing or using the words “bully etc.” and to be “in line with the Philippine government’s position on this matter.”

The protest actions of Filipinos in America can only enhance the Philippine government’s position on this matter and you don’t kowtow to a bully, it was explained to the MHC.

MHC was reminded that there were also Filipinos in February 1986 who counseled against calling Marcos a bully dictator because it might provoke his wrath and he may unleash his military dogs on the Filipino people. If Filipinos had listened to similar advice against Marcos “bashing”, there would not have been a People Power revolution and the Marcos dynasty would still reign supreme.

People power worked in 1986 and it is that power that Filipinos in the diaspora will harness to expose China’s invasion of Philippine territory and its plans to extract Philippine oil from Philippine soil to fuel China’s growth while the Philippines remains mired in abject poverty.

Log on to epeoplepower.ph to locate and join the protest action against China nearest you.

(Please send your comments to [email protected] or mail them to the Law Offices of Rodel Rodis at 2429 Ocean Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94127 or call 415.334.7800).