Yesterday, May 5, 2024, the National Press Club (NPC) held its elections. I am a lifetime member of the club and I voted on May 3, along with advance voters, newsmen who had other important things to do on Sunday. Just missed Attorney Ric and Ka Celo Lagman, former NPC president and press undersecretary of President FVR. So said Madz Dominguez of the Bulletin.
I would have missed the memory and significance of the date—May 5, 1985, the NPC elections 39 years ago—if not for fellow journalist Jaime Pilapil of the Manila Times who posted in his Facebook page a picture of him and Satur Ocampo, after they voted last Sunday. Pilapil said Satur is his idol. I barely recognized Satur.
Bok, is it really that long ago?
My recollection took me days before May 5, 1985. The New People’s Army (NPA) had just made a beachhead in Metro Manila with the assassination of Northern Police District chief Gen. Tomas Karingal in Mother Ignacia, QC. The operatives in that operation called themselves the Alex Boncayao Brigade.
A new NPA unit under N-2 (intelligence) answering directly to NPA chief of staff, Rolly Kintanar had just been formed, and I happened to be a member of the three-man team. We were told that something will happen in the vicinity of Magallanes Drive in Manila. I did not know—and did not care to know—what it was. Compartmentalization was a rigid policy in the people’s army.
The assignment was to make a map of the NPC building’s vicinity, inside and out, and to take pictures of the facility. Being a newsman (I was then a top gossip columnist and entertainment editor of People’s Journal) it was my task to do it. My colleagues in the press club did not suspect that I was taking pictures of the building for the NPA. I was so engrossed in my newfound assignment that my other work—writing the screenplay of the movie “Iyo Ang Tundo, Kanya Ang Cavite” starring Fernando Poe Jr. and Ramon Revilla—suffered lengthy delays that angered its producer, Ben Hernandez. It was a rare opportunity for Joseph Estrada's scriptwriter to work with FPJ and Ramon, and I was sorry for the delays. No matter, I was making history then, not writing it.
I made the surveillance, drew the maps and took the photos. Excited to do my tiny contribution to the Revolution, I forgot that the Press Club bar was full of mirrors, and my camera shots likely bounced and revealed who was holding the camera. I turned over the undeveloped roll of film to a top aide of Kintanar, our political officer, and forgot about it. I didn't even see my shots.
Until May 5, 1985 when newsman-detainee Satur Ocampo voted in the press club elections and escaped through the spiral staircase at the back of the building. Outside the NPC, in the street beside the Pasig River, Kintanar himself and a group of heavily armed NPA operatives were waiting for Satur, ready for a firefight with the soldiers if need be. They took him to freedom—only to be arrested anew a couple of years later.
I would later know that I was not the only newsman involved in helping Satur escape. Then NPC president Tony Nieva wrote Defense Secretary Juan Ponce Enrile several times to let Satur vote in that election, until JPE relented and agreed.
Satur Ocampo’s successful escape from his jail guards from Bicutan was one of Rolly Kintanar’s unforgettable exploits, and he told me then that Satur’s wife Bobby Malay, also a journalist and prof at the UP College of Mass Communications, was very happy to be reunited with her husband.
Every one in our unit was ecstatic. We did our part and it turned out well. Or so, we thought. Until MISG chief Col. Rolando Abadilla stumbled on the press club photos I took with my camera.
But that merits another column tomorrow.
For feedback: cagahastiandiego@gmail.com
READ MORE:
Comments