21/09/2026
COLUMN: The press remembers what the nation forgot
On September 21, 1972, President Ferdinand Marcos Sr. declared war against the truth, and journalists nationwide paid the price. Proclamation No. 1081—"Martial Law"—is not the rise of a new society but rather a deceit made possible by incarcerating over 700 journalists, with up to 35 never coming home. Over 14 years of silencing and propaganda, Marcos battled his biggest enemy: the free press. Without it, Marcos ruled through propaganda and fear.
Nevertheless, the press fought back. In April 1973, student journalist Liliosa Hilao published 'Democracy is Dead in the Philippines under Martial Law'—an article describing the suffocating political climate under martial law. Weeks later, state agents arrested her without a warrant and brought her to Camp Crame, where she died in military custody. The message was clear: tell the truth and pay with your life.
But Liliosa’s death didn’t stop the press—it catalyzed it. Journalists went underground, operating in secret by distributing uncensored information through clandestine photocopies, radio broadcasts, and smuggled magazines. Marcos called them the "mosquito press," deeming them too small to matter. Yet these journalists exposed the biggest scandals under his rule: the torture, economic disparities, and lies the regime wanted buried. But the truth was already out. The lie had cracked.
After 14 long years, through the People Power Revolution in 1986, Marcos finally fell. The press won. Democracy was restored, and the voice of the people returned. We told ourselves: never again.
But history moved in such vicious circles.
The same nation that once marched against dictatorship would, decades later, elect the dictator's son, Ferdinand Marcos Jr., to the presidency. In disservice to years of hard-fought freedom, we now find ourselves dragging that same freedom back to square one. The restoration of democracy was supposed to preserve the lessons of Martial Law. Instead, many seem willing to gamble those lessons away. As today's injustices mount, we must ask whether authoritarianism was defeated—or merely changed face.
Those in power have figured out that not letting the truth spread through secrecy and confidentiality is easier than silencing the masses. Silence didn’t merely vanish; it just became a heavily guarded secret. It did not disappear but simply evolved into something harder to identify. What was once enforced through carnage and misery now often survives through systems of mutual protection. Accountability no longer confronts a single strongman but a web of interests shielding one another from scrutiny.
One of the clearest examples is the country's flood control controversy. A scandal that has not received the justice it demands for the wrath it caused and the lives it cost. Billions of pesos intended to protect communities from disaster have been linked to allegations of waste, poor construction, and corruption. The consequences of these failures demand accountability, yet the full measure of truth and justice remains elusive under a different face but the same dictator's surname, Marcos Jr.
The heroism of the journalists who challenged the Marcos regime became instrumental in reclaiming the people's freedom. Those in power should remember that collective action begins with collective awareness. The grievances that compelled Filipinos to resist decades ago are not fundamentally different from the grievances many confront today. Injustice remains injustice regardless of the era in which it occurs. History has repeatedly shown that meaningful change does not begin in the halls of power but in the streets, with ordinary people willing to challenge it.
To write, then, is to do more than remember. It is to resist. Every truth exposed and abuse documented carries forward the same struggle fought by journalists under Martial Law: the struggle to ensure that power answers to the people, not the other way around.
Words by John Thomas Pantuan, Andrei Phillip Capul // TWH
Layout by Carl Emannuel Manzo // TWH
