It was June 12, 1898, that Emilio Aguinaldo finally declared the Philippines’ independence from Spain. The nation shortly celebrated the feeling of kalayaan, or freedom.
But, kalayaan is fickle. The Americans succeeded the old Spanish masters, and the rest of Philippine history was shaped to be the same. As our colonial legacies continue to cast a long shadow, there are doubts: Do the Filipino people really have a grasp on what it is like to be free?
Kalayaan in its earliest
“Throughout our history, we haven’t actually tasted what we would call ‘freedom,’” Department of History Full Professor Dr. Jose Victor Torres suggests. From the Spanish and American occupations to the Commonwealth period, he argues that the country has remained under foreign influence, and this stays true even today.
He notes that while the concept of kalayaan has changed over time, its pursuit is consistently rooted in oppression.
“No matter how much you look at it through the centuries…ang pag-iisip [sa] kalayaan ay parating magkakaroon ka ng laya to do things [within or as allowed] by laws.” Torres explains.
(Freedom is always taught as being free to do things within or as allowed by laws.)
And this desire indeed sparked a revolution. Economic oppression, which characterized Spain’s colonial rule, compelled villages to engage in spurts of revolts, a spirit that later became a core value of the Katipunan. Membership in the group grew because of what historian Renato Constantino described in The Philippines: A Past Revisited as “[the] common grievance of all social strata against a common enemy.”
But the revolution was soon co-opted by the powerful. During its early days, Cavite’s elites wrestled control from Andres Bonifacio and his allies during the Tejeros Convention, eventually executing him to consolidate their power. By Constantino’s analysis, “[the] Tejeros [Convention] was the defeat of the revolution of the masses; it was the victory of a clique intent on taking advantage.”
Aguinaldo then halted the revolution through the Pact of Biak-na-Bato, accepting 1.7 million Mexican dollars in exchange for self-exile to Hong Kong, a move Constantino called “a shameful repudiation of all that the revolution has stood for.”
And then, the United States blamed Spanish mines for the sinking of their USS Maine, declaring war against Spain on April 25, 1898. As Spanish authority crumbled, Aguinaldo returned not only to declare Philippine independence but also to put the social elites once again in charge of the mass revolution.
Regardless of Aguinaldo’s intentions, Torres claims it is the most pivotal event for kalayaan as it signified the recognition of Filipino nationhood and paved the way for self-governance.
“Kalayaan before was being free from foreign domination. [Today], kalayaan is establishing our national identity…being able to answer what [it means to be] Filipino.”
Kalayaan at the grip of tyranny
Samuel Rosales, assistant professorial lecturer from the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, reveals that he teaches at the University for two reasons: its proximity to his home and to repay an “utang na loob,” or a sense of obligation. Also, the founding chairman of the League of Filipino Students (LFS), he holds this debt because of the help he received from alumni Jose “Ka Pepe” Diokno and Lorenzo “Ka Tanny” Tañada, who secured his release from prison during Martial Law.
Rosales grew up with an intelligence officer for a father, privy to the abuses of dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr. Hearing his parents’ conversations led him to be aware of the injustices happening around him.
“Because of that background and the things I know, [it] led me to protest against these injustices. I was exposed to readings at first…[then] I was a student leader,” he narrates.
In 1976, the Alyansa ng mga Mag-aaral Laban sa Pagtaas ng Matrikula (Alyansa) was founded. Rosales became one of its seven leaders and actively engaged in mass protests. By September 1977, at the “groundswell” of the student movement, Alyansa held a national convention. This led to him being chosen to lead the ratification of the LFS’ constitution and elected as its founding chairman.
Around the same time, Martial Law in the 1970s saw relentless waves of arrests. Rosales evaded capture until 1979.
“Ni-raid ‘yung bahay namin sa Quezon City. Talagang kinaladkad ako, ‘yung mukha [ko] sa sahig at may nakaapak na boots…eventually nalaman namin na MISG (Metrocom Intelligence and Security Group) [sila],” he recounts. MISG was the intelligence branch of the Philippine Constabulary, the former local military police force from 1901 to 1991.
(They raided our house in Quezon City [and] they really dragged me, my face on the floor and stepped on me with boots…eventually we learned they were from MISG.)
Student activists such as Rosales were commonly subjected to abuse and harassment from the military. This galvanized hundreds of thousands of students to rally against militarization in universities in June 1977.
When asked about what motivated him to continue fighting during those years, Rosales points to the spur of his youth, his deep-seated nature of fighting injustice, and the belief that he, along with others, were fighting for a cause worth dying for. On the latter, he compared their cause with the Vietnamese in the Vietnam War.
“Kapag mayro’n kang ipinaglalaban, talagang iko-consume ka no’n, eh.”
(When you have something to fight for, it will really consume you.)
The struggle for kalayaan today
Today, the fight for justice and freedom that activists like Rosales and revolutionists like Bonifacio fought for continues with a new generation; the passion and purpose remain the same, though the forms of action have evolved.
As a current student activist, Kabataan Partylist Vito Cruz Spokesperson Josh Baylon shares that he wants to see both the values he learns in his educational journey and skills as a musician as instruments in the fight for the masses.
He believes that “We all have to make certain sacrifices” to attain the “greater good,” drawing inspiration from the culture of indie music and the “counterculture” from which it emerged. As music broadened his worldview, he learned the essence of activism and what it means to raise the people’s grievances while “doing the thing that you love.”
For Baylon, resistance is necessary to amplify the voices of ordinary people experiencing oppression from their struggles, highlighting its significance as a “form of feedback” from the people whom public servants serve. “We must not really rely our rights and freedoms sa mga leaders lang kasi ang kapangyarihan naman [ay] nanggagaling sa masa,” he asserts.
(We must not really rely our rights and freedoms on the leaders alone because the power really comes from the masses.)
But he recognizes the associated risk in the effort: “Just [by] living in the Philippines, your life is at stake.” This is especially a predicament for marginalized communities. Still, Baylon finds worth in standing for a cause while staying conscious of the existing social issues that affect people’s lives. Even with efforts to stifle dissent, he emphasizes that “it’s a struggle [in] claiming our freedom.”
He believes that every event in Philippine history reflects the efforts of those who fought for our freedom and, like Torres, he says Filipinos should recognize that “‘yung mga freedom na mayro’n tayo [ay] pinaghirapan natin.” As such, they should also remember and reclaim the kalayaan we have always hoped for, “to somehow finish what they’ve started before.”
(The freedoms we have today came from the hard work of the people.)
“People died for it (kalayaan). Our ancestors died fighting for it,” Torres furthers. “Binayaran din natin ‘to sa pagbubuwis ng buhay, at hindi dapat ito makalimutan.”
(We paid for this with death, and that should not be forgotten.)
This article was published in The LaSallian‘s June 2025 issue. To read more, visit bit.ly/TLSJune2025.
