September 16, 1991: The Day the Senate said No!

to Uncle
Sam
By Roland G. Simbulan

The author is a professor in Development Studies and Public

Management in the University of the Philippines. He was Senior
Political Consultant to former Senator Wigberto E. Taada who led
the Magnificent 12 Senators in ending the presence of U.S. military
bases on Philippine soil.)

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(From left): Senators Victor Ziga, Aquilino Pimentel Jr. and Wigberto
Taada join rally outside the Senate after the chamber rejects the
proposed bases treaty on Sept. 16, 1991.

Everyone remembers it as a rainy day. In front of the old Senate

building at the Executive House in Manila, marchers were assembled
the whole day. Wet banners and streamers surrounded the building
as anti-base advocates laid vigil the night before and stayed on the
following day. Yet it was to be a jubilant day for Philippine
nationalism. Twelve senators rejected the proposed treaty that
would have extended the presence of the U.S. military bases in the
country.

The day before, the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations had

already sealed the fate of the proposed treaty. It voted to approve
Sen. Wigberto Taadas Resolution No. 1259 of Non-Concurrence to
A Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Security the
sugarcoated title of the proposed agreement that would have
allowed the US military bases to stay in the Philippines for another 10
years. The 12 who introduced and supported this Resolution of Non-
Concurrence were: Senate President Jovito Salonga and Senators
Agapito Butz Aquino, Juan Ponce Enrile, Joseph Estrada, Teofisto
Guingona Jr., Sotero Laurel, Ernesto Maceda, Orlando Mercado,
Aquilino Pimentel Jr., Rene Saguisag, Victor Ziga and Taada.

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Sen. Wigberto Taada explaining why the Senate should reject the
proposed treaty.

That votation assured the death of the bases treaty that needed
only eight no votes to be rejected by the Senate. A two-thirds vote
by the chamber was needed to concur with the treaty. It thus paved
the way for the approval of Senate Foreign Relations Committee
Report No. 1422, recommending before the Senate plenary its non-
concurrence with what was in fact a 10-year bases treaty.

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Sen. Wigberto Taada giving the traditional mano to his father,
former Sen. Lorenzo Taada, right after casting his no vote on the
treaty.

Daily deliberations

From Sept. 2 to 6, 1991, the Senate had conducted daily public

hearings both in the mornings and afternoons. Resource persons
from the Philippine negotiating panel, Cabinet members, defense
officials, academicians and experts on PhilippineUS relations were
invited to give their opinions. Representatives from labor unions,
NGOs and peoples organizations and churches were likewise
invited for their inputs. Then from Sept. 7 to 10, the Senate

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Committee on Foreign Relations under Sen. Leticia Shahani sat down
to discuss the treaty; the plenary debates were from Sept. 11-15.

In the last phases of the Senate committee meetings, then President

Corazon Aquino had even tried to lobby with the Senate to approve
the bases treaty. She became the first president of an independent
republic to march and lead a rally to the Senate to call for the
restoration of foreign military bases and troops. It was an act that her
own cabinet member in the Philippine negotiating panel, Alfredo
Bengzon, considered so shameful that at that moment, he wanted
to dissociate himself from the Aquino government!

Despite the signs of an impending rejection, the US government

thought that the Philippine senators were bluffing and merely asking
for more crumbs in the form of aid and political patronage.
Especially after the victory of US-led forces in the Gulf War against
Iraq in 1991 and the eruption of Mt. Pinatubo which brought untold
sufferings to many Filipinos, no one could believe that what
happened on Sept. 16, 1991, was possible. So, confident was the US
that just about a month before the Senate made its crucial decision,
the US changed its ambassador to the Philippines. But the Senate did
not blink and it held out.

But just how was it possible for a traditionally conservative and pro-US
institution like the Philippine Senate, which is regarded as the training
ground for future Presidents, brave American displeasure by
rejecting a bases treaty of extension? In Philippine politics, the
Senate is the turf of pro-US conservatives among Filipino politicians
vying for the highest position in the land. How, many skeptics had
asked, could a handful of traposthe popular acronym for
traditional opportunistic politicians but which in the Philippine
vernacular also derisively means rags turnaround from an age-old

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stance of compromise and subservience to the United States, and
instead, in a decisive moment, re-make history? How could a
country so economically deprived and politically unstable hold its
ground (or in the words of an American senator, tweak our noses)
before the only remaining superpower in the world?

Paying for supporting dictatorship

My explanation is this. The United States was unquestionably looked

up to as the standard-bearer of the free world and democracy. This
view was shattered when Marcos declared martial law on Sept. 21,
1972, and dismantled the same democratic political institutions that
the US had introduced to the country since the pre-war
Commonwealth period.

Many Filipinos, including most of the senators elected in the post-

Marcos era (1987), could not understand how and why the US could
support a dictatorship that imprisoned, tortured and murdered all
who stood in Marcos way, closed all mass media except his
mouthpieces, abolished Congress, scrapped the Constitution, and
banned freedom of speech and assembly. The US not only
maintained its support for Marcos; it doubled and tripled its military
aid for his martial law government, thus, enabling Marcos to expand
his military forces from 60,000 in 1972 to 250,000 by 1985.

It became very clear to Filipinos and their future senators that the US
was not truly interested in democracy in the Philippines. If it were a
choice between US strategic interests such as nuclear bases versus
human rights and democracy in the Philippines, the US showed it
would not hesitate to choose the former. Thus, the martial law

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experience under Marcos had made more Filipinos more critical of
US intentions, motives and interests in its former colony.

When the time came to decide, Filipino national interests had to

prevail over narrow US strategic interests. The United States support
for the Marcos dictatorship had developed animosity and anger
among the Filipino people who were its victims. (Note: many of the
senators who served between 1987-1992 were human rights lawyers
or former detainees during the Marcos dictatorship.)

Consistent move

It was, however, on Feb. 2, 1987, when the Philippines made a

breakthrough in its pro-peace and anti-nuclear weapons position.
On that day, Filipinos ratified a new constitution that banned the
entry of such weapons and the presence of foreign military forces in
the country.

The senators who rejected the treaty had argued that the Philippines
could not pay mere lip service to nuclear disarmament both in our
municipal law and international agreements. As a member of the
Association of Southeast Asian Nations, the country had signed the
declaration for a Zone of Peace, Freedom and Neutrality. It had also
signed the Treaty Banning Nuclear Weapons Tests in the
Atmosphere, in Outer Space, and Under Water.

In addition, the Philippines even signed an international treaty

banning the deployment of nuclear weapons in the moon and other
celestial bodies! How then could it allow such weapons in its own
territory?

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During the 42nd General Assembly of the United Nations, the
Philippines voted Yes to 39 of the 40 nuclear disarmament
resolutions. In consonance with these constitutional and international
initiatives, the Senate, by a bipartisan vote of 19 affirmative votes, 3
negative votes and 1 abstention, approved on June 6, 1988, the
Freedom from Nuclear Weapons Act.

This measure effectively served to implement and enforce the

constitutional mandate and now, the national policy banning
nuclear weapons from Philippine territory. That was the last nail on
the US bases coffin since everyone knew that the bases stored and
transited nuclear weapons. All these events reinforced one another
as the day of reckoning neared.

Time warp

It is now 11 years since that historic day and ten years since the
completion of the US military pullout from the former Subic Naval
Base. Yet, we now seem to be passing through a time warp, where
the Philippines no thanks to the Visiting Forces Agreement,
Balikatan and the proposed Mutual Logistics Support Agreement
has become one whole US military base. Even the remote island of
Batanes is now being used as a staging area for the US so-called
war on terrorism.

Looking back, Sept. 16, 1991 was a day of triumph for the Filipino
people as the Magnificent 12 senators defied US attempts to bully
and bamboozle the Senate into accepting an onerous bases treaty.
Many of the senators who rejected the proposed bases treaty
believed that terminating the agreement was a fitting way of
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commemorating the coming 1998 centennial of Philippine
independence by having no foreign troops or bases on Philippine
soil.

The US negotiating panel was led by Richard Armitage who, per

then Health Secretary Bengzon who was vice chair of the Philippine
negotiating panel and who later wrote a book on the negotiations
titled A Matter of Honor, seemed more used to bullying than
negotiating with Third World allies.

Armitage, who was just after all looking after his own countrys
strategic and military interests, antagonized the senators with his
brazen and brusque behavior. In doing so, he became the unwitting
ally of the anti-bases senators and the anti-bases movement and
helped ensure the defeat of the proposed treaty.

Armitages arrogance

In the year-long negotiations between the Philippine and US panels,

Armitages hardline position produced a treaty so one-sidedly in
favor of the US that even Philippine negotiators like Bengzon
became ashamed of it. The lopsided treaty sealed the unexpected
alliance between the senators who were pro-bases but anti-treaty
and the core group of anti-bases senators led by Taada.

In his book, Bengzon said that Armitage was so high-handed that the
US official even tried to tell the Philippine government to remove
Bengzon from the Philippine panel. The US thus had a very distorted
view of the situation: it underestimated the capacity of the Filipino
officials to think and act per their own interests.

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The negotiations for the treaty clearly showed that that US operates
on the assumption that what is good for Uncle Sam must be good for
all freedom-loving peoples in the worldand that it would not
hesitate to resort to bullying the latter to achieve this.

The US negotiating panel thought it got what it wanted: a 10-year

extension plus the option of renewal after every 10 years. It would
not even commit to put into the agreement any definite
compensation or rental for the use of the US bases.

In fact, the draft submitted to the Senate did not even provide for
reciprocal rights and obligations for the two countries: the treaty was
mainly about the rights of the United States over base lands and the
obligations of the Philippines to respect and enforce those US rights.
But by being too greedy, the US lost precisely what it sought to gain:
the retention of its military bases. The loss was suffered at the hands
of a struggling, sovereign people and their Senate.

Surprise

The US underestimated the post-EDSA Senate by thinking that, like

the Philippine negotiating panel, the legislators were merely
grandstanding (as, in fact, a few were). It thought that those who
were resisting US pressure were merely opportunistic and vacillating
Filipino politicians who would ultimately give way to its wishes. In the
end, the Americans had the greatest shock of their lives.

The dismantling of the US bases proved the doomsayers wrong. Far

from leading to the collapse of the countrys economy, Subic, Clark

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and other areas uncovered a vast economic and commercial
potential which would benefit some of the most avid supporters of
the bases retention, like former Olongapo Mayor Richard Gordon.
Gordon would become administrator of the Subic Bay Metropolitan
Authority.

Thus, on that rainy day and night of Sept. 16, 1991, the 23 senators
(excluding Raul Manglapus who had been appointed foreign affairs
secretary) cast their final votes and delivered speeches to explain
these. The proceedings began at 9 a.m. and ended at exactly 8:13
p.m. Senate President Salonga, who presided over the marathon
proceedings, was the last to give his vote and explanation that
evening. He said:

September 16, 1991, may well be the day when we in this Senate
found the soul, the true spirit of this nation because we mustered the
courage and the will to declare the end of foreign military presence
in the Philippines. I vote NO to this Treaty and vote Yes to the
Resolution of Non-Concurrence.

Lessons in sovereignty

The real moving spirit behind the 12 senators was the broad and
unified peoples movement outside the Senate. In the end, it was
the power of the people that ended the most visible symbols of our
colonial legacy and the Cold War in the Philippines.

The Anti-Treaty Movement was forged with the broadest unity

possible among organized forces and individuals. Sept. 16 was a
great political victory for the Philippine nationalist movement in an

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arena that is traditionally not its own. The Americans and their
statehood advocates were beaten in their own turf.

There will, however, always be Filipino officials who will act as

lobbyists for the United States. In this case, there were senators and
officials in the Aquino government who initiated back-channeling
talks with the US. In doing so, they were ready to violate the 1986
Constitution, particularly its prohibition against nuclear weapons,
and even proposed strategies that would undermine this.

There are those who now ask: cant US ships and troops come here
on our terms and abide by our rules and laws as befits a truly
sovereign nation? Can we still be masters of our fate when a foreign
country uses our territory for its military exercises and as a launching
pad against other sovereign nations?

Sept. 16, 1991, is a challenge for all Filipinos, especially those aspiring
to become leaders who will be counted upon to uphold the
national dignity and sovereignty. On that day, former senator
Lorenzo Taada, then a sickly 90-year-old on a wheelchair, arrived in
the Senate to witness his son Wigberto, finally succeed in the lofty
cause the elder Taada had fought so hard to attain since the
1950s. On that day, too, outside the Senate halls, more than 150,000
people waited under a heavy rain for the senators decision.
Optimism and hope were the order of the day.

As Sen. Wigberto Taada said in his sponsorship speech to the

Senate Resolution of Non-Concurrence to the proposed bases
treaty:

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A historic and economic opportunity awaits the Philippines as the
Filipino people, reinforced by the mandate of their Constitution, now
seek to remove the last most visible vestiges of colonialism in this
country, the US military bases. Upon the powers vested in us by the
will of our people, through the Constitution, let us be a beacon of
the long-shackled hopes of our martyrs and nation.

On that historic day, the Philippine Senate became the beacon of

Philippine sovereignty. By its action, it gave substance to the
countrys independence and taught Filipinos how to live out the spirit
of sovereignty.

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