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As a
young man growing up in Cagayan de Oro in the ’50s and
the ’60s, I hardly knew Crispin Beltran. I did read of
him now and then in a Manila daily that we got in
Cagayan de Oro, which, at the time, was at least three
hours by propeller planes and at least three days by
boat from
Manila.
Troublemaker
By the
standards of a community that did not want its comfort
zone disturbed, Ka Bel was made to look like a born
troublemaker who the capitalists in Manila would have
wanted eliminated.
I was,
even then, amazed that such a man could keep on doing
what he believed was the right thing to do, and that was
to fight for the rights of the underprivileged no matter
what the cost.
Paths
crossing
In the
early ’70s, when I was doing my duties as a delegate to
the Constitutional Convention representing my province
of Misamis Oriental, now and then our paths would cross
in forums and in demonstrations against the inequalities
of Philippine society. But even then I hardly knew Ka
Bel. He was already a veteran of street marches and I
was a neophyte trudging along with marchers now and
then, without knowing fully what it was we were marching
for.
Then, in
1972, Marcos declared martial law. I did not know what
happened to Ka Bel. I learned later that a few years
after the declaration, he was arrested upon a complaint
of big business whose cozy relationship with Marcos was
being upset by his labor activism. Apparently, he
escaped a year or two after his arrest and continued the
fight against the Marcos dictatorship underground.
I had my
own troubles with the martial-law regime and bouts with
illegal arrests and detentions. Thus, I lost track of
the whereabouts of Ka Bel.
In
limelight again
But
after we finally succeeded in ousting Marcos in 1986 in
the wake of People Power 1 that Cory Aquino and Cardinal
Sin led, Ka Bel was again in the limelight of the
struggle against the oppression of the laboring masses,
and sometimes he tangled physically with the police and
military officers who, more often than not, sided with
the capitalists who invariably wanted to suppress even
their peaceful demonstrations for the redress of their
grievances.
Bayan
Muna
Then,
when the party-list system was finally implemented, Ka
Bel was one of those who ran for and got elected in 2001
to the House of Representatives, representing Bayan Muna.
At the
House, Ka Bel fiercely demonstrated his independence by
espousing causes like antiglobalization positions that
were not exactly to the liking of the coalition of
traditional parties that governed the House.
Anak
Pawis
In the
next elections Ka Bel ran again as a party-list
representative, but this time under the banner of the
party-list group Anakpawis. Once more, the people voted
him to the House.
As an
Anakpawis representative, Ka Bel was a source of
embarrassment to those who trudged the easy path to
power, pelf and fame. For instance, it was he who
exposed bribery attempts by administration partisans to
abort the impeachment resolutions against Gloria
Macapagal Arroyo.
It was
in this capacity as a no-nonsense leader of Anakpawis in
the House that fate decreed that Ka Bel would now leave
us and go to his everlasting rest.
Deserved
rest
He
deserves that rest. In his life, Ka Bel had apparently
never been at rest.
In his
youth he had to scrap the bottom of the barrel, as it
were, to keep alive. He worked as janitor, a messenger,
a taxi driver and many other odds jobs.
In his
manhood, he had to fight for his rights and the rights
of his fellow workers to keep his dignity. He is
credited with having organized the Confederation of
Labor of the
Philippines
and helped found the Philippine Workers Congress. During
the martial- law years, he was among the pillars of
Kilusang Mayo Uno, a militant labor organization.
Transition
And in
the twilight of his life, he made that smooth transition
from being a firebrand—who, in the minds of the
conservators of the status quo, meant being an arsonist
who would burn anything which stood on the way to
liberating his fellow workers; to a torchbearer who, in
the minds of all well-meaning citizens, meant
illuminating the path of those who search for the better
life in a democratic and peaceful manner.
That is
a most difficult thing to do. Not too many men could do
it, but Ka Bel certainly did it.
Not only
that. He did it with finesse and with verve and vigor
unmatchable by ordinary mortals. And he kept his nose
clean even as he fought his parliamentary battles in the
putrid environment of transactional politics.
‘Sui
generis’
Ka Bel
could have been bought by the interests of the rich and
the establishment. He could have succumbed to threats of
the mighty and the powerful.
But he
resisted all that. And that, by itself, is sufficient to
say that Ka Bel was a sui generis kind of man. A man
alone. A man in the mold of heroes.
His life
puts to shame many of our brethren in politics and in
religion who claim to love and serve the poor.
His
word, his bond
Even his
widow, with whom he had 11 children, says that Ka Bel
was a man worthy of his word as a married man and as a
father. Not too many politicians deserve that accolade
from their spouses.
Of Ka
Bel, it can truly be said that he was of the poor, stood
by the poor and was for the poor.
I can
say a thousand more words about Ka Bel, but they won’t
add anything substantial to our tribute to him. Let me,
then, just address these few last lines to Ka Bel: You
are a martyr to the cause of the poor. You belong to
them, and only they can rightfully claim you as their
very own.
God
speed, Ka Bel, and may you enjoy the rest that you never
had in this world; but may the example of your life now
as torchbearer give faith to our people that all is not
lost in this country, and that there is hope for the
better as your life has shown. |
