Memories of Mendiola

It wasn’t just the Aquino-era massacre that bloodied this small street leading to Malacañang.

2025-01-30T11:31:50.598Z

Mendiola Street is a relatively short road located in the City of Manila but the distance between its two ends can be vast.

In the northwest, on the side of the street familiar to most people, Mendiola meets up with Legarda Street and Claro M. Recto Avenue: two roads ever congested by a busy capitalist public toiling regularly to either make ends meet or be in a position to do so. In the southeast, meanwhile, is the side privy only to a few. It flows into Jose Laurel Street, that sleepy, tree-lined thoroughfare leading to an office heavily funded by the public: a nearly 10,000 square meter property known to all as Malacañang Palace, the seat of presidential power in the Philippines.

This is a common trait in Manila. In a city so populated, space can be scares and extremes tend to mingle so closely to each other. But, sometimes, that which separates them is so effective that it can actually end lives. And Mendiola knows this all too well.

Because of the fact that it is one of the largest open spaces close to Malacañang, Mendiola has been the informal stage for numerous protests directed at the Office of the President. And on a number of occasions, such protests have reached a level of aggression that proved fatal.

The most brutal of which happened on January 22, 1987. Farmers and activists marched to Malacañang demanding genuine agrarian reform following the cronyism that tormented farmers during the administration of the dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr. Their cries that day was directed at the rule of then-President Corazon Aquino, she who was put in power by the bloodless revolution that forced out her predecessor.

Their frustrations were reflected on “Sa Mendiola,” a song from the 1997 musical Lean which narrated how the Filipino people sought to bring Aquino to power only for her government to betray them. In the song, the height of that betrayal came on January 22 when—according to reports—riot personnel disguised as civilians opened fire at unarmed protesters. 12 died and 51 protestors were injured upon the initial count. The following day, the death toll rose to 18 while the number of those injured rose to about a hundred people.

According to General Ramon Montano, then the Director General of the Integrated National Police, the rallyists were to blame for the shooting because they supposedly tried to break the barricade set up by the armed forces. He admitted, however, that the military may have “overreacted.”

As a response, leaders from the Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas led by Jaime Tadeo said that they will be staging a countrywide protest against the killings. They also demanded the resignation of various military personnel including Montano, eventual Philippine president and (then-defense secretary Fidel V. Ramos,) and eventual Manila mayor (then-Western Police District superintendent) Alfredo Lim.

The situation was such that Marcos Sr. even saw it as an opportunity to take jabs at the Aquino administration, releasing a statement from Honolulu, Hawaii lamenting the turn of events.

Marcos Sr. however, had his own history with Mendiola and even more so with violent oppression.

Mention Mendiola today and among the immediate associations is the term “massacre,” which is what the Aquino administration was guilty of. So shocking was the incident that it was repeatedly used by the army of social media accounts that campaigned for the Dutertes and the Marcoses who were, on several occasions, running against bets with ties to the Aquino family.

But the Aquinos weren’t the only ones who drew blood in Mendiola. The first to do so was none other than Marcos’ allies themselves.

It happened during the early days of the First Quarter Storm, the series of months filled with protests against the Marcos administration. On January 26, 1970, then-Philippine President Marcos Sr. gave his 5th State of the Nation Address (SONA) before the Congress and was met with protestors.

He was on his second term as president and the rallyists—mostly students—were unhappy with the amount of money he spent during his campaign. They also had protested because of the foreign loans he took out to pursue infrastructure projects used for his campaign and the rising prices of basic goods.

The Philippines was the second-largest economy in Asia before the Marcos presidency. His run as head of the state, however, was marked with cronyism and policies that saw the nation fall into debt.

This caused the people to meet him as he was leaving his SONA. They booed at him and threw various paraphernalia at him and his entourage. After he left, the police violently dispersed the rallyists leading to the injury of about 300 youth protestors.

In response to this, student activists upped the ante.

On January 30, 1970, around 10,000 students massed before the old Congress of the Philippines in Manila to protest the then-unprecedented violence of state forces. The program was officially ended by sundown but somewhere within the crowd, the chant of “Malacañang” rose and slowly—much to the alarm of the more moderate members of the crowd—the mass began moving towards the palace.

Nelson A. Navarro who was part of that rally told his side of the story through the Philippine Star. And according to him, the march was a surprise.

“I found myself swept up by this irresistible tide of humanity,” he wrote. “Morale was high. We sang and chanted protest songs. We were out to confront Marcos. It was not enough that we had vented our anger before the Congress building. We felt our voices had to be heard in Malacañang and in Plaza Miranda, the nation’s Hyde Park. Nothing less.”

“Makibaka; huwag matakot” was the long-held chant of the Filipino activist. In English this means “fight; don’t fear” and there were apparently reasons to be afraid because behind the steel fence erected to keep the rallyists away were armed state forces. According to the protestors, it was the guards of Malacañang who started the violence when they threw pellets at them. This urged some of them to take over a fire truck intended to disperse them with water cannons and smash it through the palace’s Gate 4. Members of the rally then charged into the grounds of the palace and reportedly started throwing rocks, pillboxes, and Molotov cocktails. The palace guards then retaliated with guns drawing the protestors back.

At Mendiola, a barricade was built to stop the riot police and soldiers from advancing. The numbers of the protestors also swelled when students from nearby dormitories joined in fighting the state forces with sticks and pillboxes. Eventually, the state forces managed to cause a dispersal through superior firepower.

This apparently sent Marcos into a panic, according to Navarro. His wife Imelda and his three children (including the current president Ferdinand Marcos Jr) were reportedly whisked away to a nearby navy ship just outside Manila Bay for safety. According to Juan Ponce Enrile, then his Defense Minister, Marcos wanted to declare Martial Law right then and there but while he didn’t, state forces nevertheless retaliated with live bullets.

Navarro said that four students died that night. “They were the movement’s first martyrs,” he wrote. But as he noted, many more would be killed in the coming years.

True enough, that happened. About two years since that incident, Marcos Sr., whose administration continued to be hounded by protestors, placed the Philippines under martial law. This rule would last for around 14 years and while it was in place, 3,240 were killed, 34,000 were tortured, and 70,000 were imprisoned. It also led to the unprecedented extension of Marcos’ reign.

Eventually, people grew tired of his authoritarian rule; various incidents furthered discontent. These include the killing of his political rival Benigno Aquino II, husband of the eventual president Aquino, a death also attributed to the Marcos administration. Soon enough, the people grew bold and the events to follow would lead to the public forming a critical mass that successfully marched to Malacañang and oust him.

Aquino who faced Marcos in a snap presidential election which the protesters believed was rigged was put into power and the mood following her ascent was hopeful. A new leader was installed after more than a decade and with her was the promise of change.

But as the “Sa Mendiola” song went “sa Mendiola, inilibing ang pangako nila. [In Mendiola, they buried their promise.]” It only took about a year until Mendiola was bloodied again.

These days, an arch hovers over the side of Mendiola close to the Legarda-Recto intersection. It is a lopsided figure with the higher bar bearing the words “Mendiola Peace Arch.” Inaugurated in 2010, in the presence of the same Alfredo Lim implicated in the Mendiola massacre, the arch was supposedly erected to encourage peaceful protests in this street flanked by schools.

That year, the president was another Aquino: Benigno III, son of the former president. And an administration after him, the palace went to Marcos’ son, a man placed in power by years and years of effort from the family’s supporters replaying the shortcomings of the Aquino family. The massacre in Mendiola was one of their weapons of choice—conveniently leaving out the fact that the calls for agrarian reform (which led to it) was caused by the inequalities during the Marcos regime.

As for Mendiola, it remains a street close to the office of the President, occasionally barred by state forces when there are protests nearby.

Memories of Mendiola

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