Last September 21, the 51st anniversary of the declaration of martial law in the Philippines and the International Day of Peace, the Davao Historical Society (DHS) gathered young leaders for Throwback Thursday to listen to the stories of women who were part of the Yellow Friday Movement in Davao City during the 1980s.
The new generation of Davaoeños, mostly born during the 2000s, have not heard about Yellow Friday in Davao nor read anything about it in the history books because popular stories about the anti-martial law protest movement are centered around the national capital region, with the People Power-backed military coup at EDSA as the highlight.
Not only that, most of the stories also revolved around powerful men — Marcos, Enrile, Ramos, Honasan and the Reform the Armed Forces Movement (RAM), Cardinal Sin. Except for Cory Aquino, our country’s first female president, women’s stories and their leadership and contribution to the struggle to restore freedom, justice, and peace during one of the darkest periods in our history, are rarely heard or read about.
The goal of “Before there was EDSA, there was Claveria” was to tell the stories of the Yellow Friday Movement in Davao City during the 1980s from the perspective of two of the women leaders who were part of it and who were inspired by the courage and leadership of Soledad Roa Duterte, fondly known as Nanay Soling.
Yes, before there was Digong, there was Soling.
The main storytellers of “Before there was EDSA, there was Claveria” are two Datu Bago Awardees — Dr. Rizalina Mitra Pangan, an obstetrician-gynecologist and a member of the board of Davao Doctors Hospital, and Ms. Luzviminda Calolot Ilagan, a retired English professor of the Ateneo de Davao University and a three-term Representative of the Gabriela Women’s Party in Congress.
Doc Riz and Ma’am Luz are considered icons in the women’s movement in Davao. But their journey to becoming the fierce social and political activists that they are known now did not happen in a snap. Like most women, their transformation was gradual and deeply personal.
Doc Riz, who delivered Sara, Paolo, and Sebastian Duterte — the grandchildren of Nanay Soling and children of Digong — had her political awakening while working in the hospital.
“Davao in the 1980s was known as the killing fields. We would hear of people getting killed from news on the radio but that only became real to me when more and more people were brought to the emergency room at the hospital with gunshot wounds,” Doc Riz shared.
Violence was so normalized during martial law in Davao both from “the left” and “the right.” Abuses of the military and police were well-documented during that time that people were more afraid of the government than the rebels.
Assassination of military and police officers happened even in broad daylight in our city’s downtown areas. Davao was the laboratory of the urban guerrilla warfare of the New People’s Army (NPA). The armed struggle was not confined to the countryside, it was brought to the urban center.
Then there was the rise of citizens’ vigilante groups like the Alsa Masa who fashioned themselves as “freedom fighters” but turned more like “death squads” — another armed group that people got scared of.
During those times, doctors like Doc Riz would say that the leading cause of death in Davao City was “lead poisoning.” That was code for death from gunshots because bullets are made of lead, a toxic substance.
It became personal for Doc Riz when one day, a friend of her son was brought to the emergency room for “lead poisoning.” She knew the young man and it hit close to home. That was the turning point when she realized that more had to be done as a doctor than just treating patients in the hospital. She needed to also help treat the ills of society that caused people to die violently. So she had to go out of the hospital and into the streets with other concerned citizens to stand up and speak out.
Doc Riz and Nanay Soling were very close friends so her evolution from doctor to activist was influenced by that friendship.
During those times, Nanay Soling was already very active in coordinating the work of various cause-oriented groups and socio-civic organizations for community projects so there would be no duplication, resources would be utilized more efficiently, and the impact would be greater. The transition from collaborating on community projects to mobilizing a citizen-led protest movement that was known as Yellow Friday came naturally.
Ma’am Luz said that the “yellow” in Friday came from the “Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree” song, which was inspired by a story of a soldier headed home from the American Civil War who wrote his beloved that if he was still welcome, she should tie a handkerchief around a certain tree. The songwriters, L. Russell Brown and Irwin Levine, changed the handkerchief into ribbon.
The story of the yellow ribbon has been passed around by oral tradition in American culture symbolizing a warm welcome for an absent loved one, either in the military or in jail. So when then opposition leader Ninoy Aquino decided to come home to the Philippines from his exile in the United States and was gunned down at the airport upon arrival, the color yellow became a symbol of the people’s opposition against Marcos and the government’s abuses under martial law.
But in Davao, known then as an “opposition country,” protests against martial law had been happening long before Ninoy’s assassination and before yellow was considered a color of defiance.
The city was famous for its “Welgang Bayan” or general strikes protesting high prices of basic commodities and public utilities and demanding for higher living wages for workers. The people of Davao, who called themselves “concerned citizens,” supported the workers, the drivers, the farmers and fisherfolk, and the teachers.
Yes, the teachers like Ma’am Luz first got involved in the protest movement because of economic hardships. Under martial law, basic commodities were rationed and people had to line up for sugar, milk, rice, and soap.
“Our chants during marches were ‘Presyo Ibaba, Sweldo Itaas!’ and those sentiments were shared by all the sectors, not just the teachers,” Ma’am Luz recalled.
As the opposition gained popularity among the middle class, military operatives were planted in schools to monitor the lectures and activities of teachers and students for any criticism against the government. Anything said that was remotely against Marcos and his administration was considered “subversive.”
One by one, Ma’am Luz’s students would disappear from her class. They were either in jail, missing, or killed.
So the chants in protest marches would later include “Justice for ____and Free ____!” Fill in the blanks with names of people jailed for opposing martial law.
Ma’am Luz’s own husband, the late human rights lawyer Larry Ilagan, became one of the political prisoners during that time. So from merely one of the teachers in the crowd protesting high prices of commodities, she became a major speaker at rallies standing up and speaking on behalf of her husband and other political prisoners.
“Students of this generation need to know that the Marcos dictatorship was real. It happened. Any attempt to erase that from our history books is wrong. It must be taught in schools so that it should never happen again,” Ma’am Luz stressed.
If our young Davaoeños ever doubted that the violent abuses happened during that time in our history, they only need to ask their grandmothers who were there with Nanay Soling, Doc Riz, and Ma’am Luz. They will tell it like it is with thoughtful reflection, quiet courage, and even humor — the way many women’s stories are shared.
Doc Riz told us that Nanay Soling would always position them at the tail end of all the protest marches. The legendary Duterte matriarch would say: “We stay behind so we can monitor better the safety of everyone, so no one will fall from the ranks and be dragged away because we are here watching.”
At the end of the forum, one young participant said to me: “Thank you for inviting me. I learned a lot of new things today about Davao’s history, but what really surprised me was the important role of women in ending violence and building peace in our city.”
Yes, like Nanay Soling during the Yellow Friday movement marches in the 1980s, the women of Davao always got our back so we can boldly move forward to a safer and better future for our children and grandchildren.
