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Women Against Marcos: Stories of Filipino and Filipino American Women Who Fought a Dictator
Women Against Marcos: Stories of Filipino and Filipino American Women Who Fought A Dictator highlights the first person stories of six women (Mila Aguilar, Geline Avila, Aurora "Oyie" De Dios, Cindy Domingo, Sister Mary John Mananzan and Aida Santos), who joined the historic struggle against Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos. The author includes short recollections of her own journey towards activism and letters from the underground from her sister Violeta, who helped inspire her to join the U.S. movement against the dictatorship.
199 pages, Paperback
First published February 12, 2016
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April 2, 2017
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When I was an activist against the Marcos dictatorship in my twenties, women were my leaders. Mila de Guzman’s new book, “Women Against Marcos: Stories of Filipino and Filipino American Women Who Fought a Dictator,” documents the lives of eight women who put aside concern for their physical and material well-being to fight injustice. I am fortunate to be friends with three of them, including Mila, having been comrades in the U.S.-based socialist organization, Katipunan ng mga Demokratikong Pilipino (KDP), in the 1980s. Mila’s book highlights the leading role women played in opposing the Philippine dictator during the 1970s and 80s.
Of course, there were men in the movement who I looked up to – like Boy Morales, Ten Outstanding Young Men awardee-turned-communist-rebel, who was able to bring together a left-liberal alliance against the dictatorship in the early eighties. My activist schoolmates from De La Salle University signed up to be members of his staff in the underground. There was Ka Rexie, whose real identity was Luisito Balgos de la Cruz, executive committee member of the eastern central Luzon regional organization of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP). I served as his aide when I was with the region’s communication and logistics support branch, and followed his lead during my early days in the underground after college. There’s Rene Ciria-Cruz, leader of the KDP, and Bruce Occena, KDP founder and Marxist theoretician. KDP activists hung upon their every word and political wisdom.
But at the very beginning for me, there was kasamang Maita Gomez. I had just graduated in 1979 with my degree in Industrial Management Engineering, and had begun working for a multinational computer firm, Burroughs Corporation, in Makati, when a close activist friend asked me to serve as a driver in Manila for an underground figure, who turned out to be Maita, the former Miss Philippines-World who mysteriously disappeared from the country’s elite social scene a few years earlier, rumored to have joined the leftist New People’s Army in the countryside. I was starting a corporate career and was leaving my anti-Marcos, student activist days behind me, but in those weeks that I served as her driver in the city, Maita turned me around back to the struggle for national democracy. We talked morning until night about the unjust situation in the country, and about dedicating ourselves to fighting tyranny and oppression, in behalf of workers, peasants and other marginalized sectors of society. She took me on my first trip to a guerilla zone in Nueva Ecija province, where the New People’s Army was empowering poor peasants to fight feudal exploitation and military abuses. Maita opened my eyes to my calling, and before long, I was introduced by her to my new political work collective. I began shuttling back and forth between Metro Manila, Nueva Ecija and Bulacan provinces, carrying out tasks full-time for the movement and the revolution.
And when I later came to the U.S., and continued my activism through the KDP, there was my next leader, Geline Avila, who was high up in the KDP’s senior executive leadership, as well as the National Coordinator of the Coalition Against the Marcos Dictatorship. Geline’s is one of the stories in Mila’s book. She was a strong leader, able to command the confidence and following of her fellow activists, and skilled and insightful at leading nationwide political campaigns, such as the massive opposition that erupted against Ferdinand Marcos in every U.S. city the dictator landed during his state visit in 1982. In the book, Geline chronicles this successful campaign that she led.
Geline had a strong personal influence on me. We lived together for a time in a housing collective of KDP activists – a rented apartment, in Oakland, California, in which all of us shared expenses and household duties. Geline was principled and consistent in pointing out to me back then the many instances in my political and personal life when I was exercising my male and class-origin privileges. To this day, I admire her uncompromising integrity to her values.
“Women Against Marcos” is a treasure trove of stories of valor, such as those of my leaders, Maita’s and Geline’s. The stories have commonalities, such as the stirrings of questioning and discontent that started early in youth, for most even before the declaration of martial law. During her senior year in high school, Geline, as the student council president, organized a protest against the “English-only” rule imposed at her Catholic school run by Irish nuns. Aurora “Oyie” De Dios took an exposure trip to poor peasant areas in her hometown, organized by her university discussion group on problems in Philippine society. Aida Santos got drawn as a student to the demonstrations and teach-ins at the University of the Philippines when nationalist ferment was brewing in the campuses in the late 1960s. Mila Aguilar, as a young journalist with Graphic magazine, covered the student movement and started associating with activists, including with those in the underground. Cindy Domingo insisted on joining her first demonstration in Seattle, Washington, on the second anniversary of the declaration of martial law, despite the objections and concern of his activist brother, Silme, because a recent trip to the Philippines convinced her to oppose martial law in her parents’ homeland.
The women in Mila’s book dedicated themselves fully to their political work, led by the justness of their cause. Activism was their life. They were hard-working cadres and leaders of activist groups, such as the Kabataang Makabayan, Samahan ng Demokratikong Kabataan and KDP. Oyie stepped up to be the spokesperson for the Movement for a Democratic Philippines, a coalition of national democratic groups, when the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus in 1971 caused the arrest of first line movement leaders. Aida organized in the labor front and lived with workers, describing herself in those days as a “grim and determined” activist. When martial law was declared, Viol De Guzman, Mila’s sister, left her life as a Filipino immigrant in New York City to return to the Philippines to organize against the dictatorship in the underground. The Philippine consulate office in New York refused to renew Mila de Guzman’s Philippine passport because of the extent of her anti-Marcos organizing activities in the U.S. Mila Aguilar rose to become a member of the executive committee of the Mindanao regional organization of the CPP, and of the CPP’s Central Committee. She also later led the CPP’s National United Front Commission.
There was inner strength that braved adversity. When martial law was declared in the Philippines, Oyie, Mila Aguilar and Aida did not skip a beat and continued their political work in the underground. They married and raised children while in the underground. Most of the women became known and hunted by Marcos’s repressive military and police apparatus, and experienced arrest, interrogation and abuse in detention. They showed courage through the ordeal. Sister Mary John Mananzan’s “baptism of fire” came when she and other nuns supported striking workers at the La Tondena and Solid Mills factories, putting themselves in harm’s way while protecting workers from being arrested and beaten by the police who were breaking up the strikes made illegal under martial law. Cindy Domingo carried on to organize the Committee for Justice for Domingo and Viernes in the aftermath of the assassinations in Seattle of her brother, Silme Domingo, and Gene Viernes, both KDP activists, by local gangsters acting upon orders of the dictatorship, which was trying to silence the U.S.-based Filipino-American opposition.
A number of the women also involved themselves in advocating on women’s issues, and in women’s organizations, such as Kalayaan and GABRIELA. Mila Aguilar saw sexism within the CPP, and wrote articles critiquing the official line of the CPP that the women’s liberation issue was secondary to the principal issue of national liberation.
The stories of these women who fought Marcos remind us of the greatness of a generation of activists who gave it all for the people. At a time when there was tyranny, suppression of civil liberties and violation of human rights - meant to sow fear and compel submission - there were women who stood up to a brutal dictator. This book showcases the best of what is Filipino and Filipino-American during a time of despotism. With the dictator’s son, Bongbong Marcos, running for vice-president in the recent May 2016 Philippine elections, and brazenly recasting his father’s image in a good light, “Women Against Marcos” tells inspiring stories that move us to swear, “Never again to dictatorship.”
When I was an activist against the Marcos dictatorship in my twenties, women were my leaders. Mila de Guzman’s new book, “Women Against Marcos: Stories of Filipino and Filipino American Women Who Fought a Dictator,” documents the lives of eight women who put aside concern for their physical and material well-being to fight injustice. I am fortunate to be friends with three of them, including Mila, having been comrades in the U.S.-based socialist organization, Katipunan ng mga Demokratikong Pilipino (KDP), in the 1980s. Mila’s book highlights the leading role women played in opposing the Philippine dictator during the 1970s and 80s.
Of course, there were men in the movement who I looked up to – like Boy Morales, Ten Outstanding Young Men awardee-turned-communist-rebel, who was able to bring together a left-liberal alliance against the dictatorship in the early eighties. My activist schoolmates from De La Salle University signed up to be members of his staff in the underground. There was Ka Rexie, whose real identity was Luisito Balgos de la Cruz, executive committee member of the eastern central Luzon regional organization of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP). I served as his aide when I was with the region’s communication and logistics support branch, and followed his lead during my early days in the underground after college. There’s Rene Ciria-Cruz, leader of the KDP, and Bruce Occena, KDP founder and Marxist theoretician. KDP activists hung upon their every word and political wisdom.
But at the very beginning for me, there was kasamang Maita Gomez. I had just graduated in 1979 with my degree in Industrial Management Engineering, and had begun working for a multinational computer firm, Burroughs Corporation, in Makati, when a close activist friend asked me to serve as a driver in Manila for an underground figure, who turned out to be Maita, the former Miss Philippines-World who mysteriously disappeared from the country’s elite social scene a few years earlier, rumored to have joined the leftist New People’s Army in the countryside. I was starting a corporate career and was leaving my anti-Marcos, student activist days behind me, but in those weeks that I served as her driver in the city, Maita turned me around back to the struggle for national democracy. We talked morning until night about the unjust situation in the country, and about dedicating ourselves to fighting tyranny and oppression, in behalf of workers, peasants and other marginalized sectors of society. She took me on my first trip to a guerilla zone in Nueva Ecija province, where the New People’s Army was empowering poor peasants to fight feudal exploitation and military abuses. Maita opened my eyes to my calling, and before long, I was introduced by her to my new political work collective. I began shuttling back and forth between Metro Manila, Nueva Ecija and Bulacan provinces, carrying out tasks full-time for the movement and the revolution.
And when I later came to the U.S., and continued my activism through the KDP, there was my next leader, Geline Avila, who was high up in the KDP’s senior executive leadership, as well as the National Coordinator of the Coalition Against the Marcos Dictatorship. Geline’s is one of the stories in Mila’s book. She was a strong leader, able to command the confidence and following of her fellow activists, and skilled and insightful at leading nationwide political campaigns, such as the massive opposition that erupted against Ferdinand Marcos in every U.S. city the dictator landed during his state visit in 1982. In the book, Geline chronicles this successful campaign that she led.
Geline had a strong personal influence on me. We lived together for a time in a housing collective of KDP activists – a rented apartment, in Oakland, California, in which all of us shared expenses and household duties. Geline was principled and consistent in pointing out to me back then the many instances in my political and personal life when I was exercising my male and class-origin privileges. To this day, I admire her uncompromising integrity to her values.
“Women Against Marcos” is a treasure trove of stories of valor, such as those of my leaders, Maita’s and Geline’s. The stories have commonalities, such as the stirrings of questioning and discontent that started early in youth, for most even before the declaration of martial law. During her senior year in high school, Geline, as the student council president, organized a protest against the “English-only” rule imposed at her Catholic school run by Irish nuns. Aurora “Oyie” De Dios took an exposure trip to poor peasant areas in her hometown, organized by her university discussion group on problems in Philippine society. Aida Santos got drawn as a student to the demonstrations and teach-ins at the University of the Philippines when nationalist ferment was brewing in the campuses in the late 1960s. Mila Aguilar, as a young journalist with Graphic magazine, covered the student movement and started associating with activists, including with those in the underground. Cindy Domingo insisted on joining her first demonstration in Seattle, Washington, on the second anniversary of the declaration of martial law, despite the objections and concern of his activist brother, Silme, because a recent trip to the Philippines convinced her to oppose martial law in her parents’ homeland.
The women in Mila’s book dedicated themselves fully to their political work, led by the justness of their cause. Activism was their life. They were hard-working cadres and leaders of activist groups, such as the Kabataang Makabayan, Samahan ng Demokratikong Kabataan and KDP. Oyie stepped up to be the spokesperson for the Movement for a Democratic Philippines, a coalition of national democratic groups, when the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus in 1971 caused the arrest of first line movement leaders. Aida organized in the labor front and lived with workers, describing herself in those days as a “grim and determined” activist. When martial law was declared, Viol De Guzman, Mila’s sister, left her life as a Filipino immigrant in New York City to return to the Philippines to organize against the dictatorship in the underground. The Philippine consulate office in New York refused to renew Mila de Guzman’s Philippine passport because of the extent of her anti-Marcos organizing activities in the U.S. Mila Aguilar rose to become a member of the executive committee of the Mindanao regional organization of the CPP, and of the CPP’s Central Committee. She also later led the CPP’s National United Front Commission.
There was inner strength that braved adversity. When martial law was declared in the Philippines, Oyie, Mila Aguilar and Aida did not skip a beat and continued their political work in the underground. They married and raised children while in the underground. Most of the women became known and hunted by Marcos’s repressive military and police apparatus, and experienced arrest, interrogation and abuse in detention. They showed courage through the ordeal. Sister Mary John Mananzan’s “baptism of fire” came when she and other nuns supported striking workers at the La Tondena and Solid Mills factories, putting themselves in harm’s way while protecting workers from being arrested and beaten by the police who were breaking up the strikes made illegal under martial law. Cindy Domingo carried on to organize the Committee for Justice for Domingo and Viernes in the aftermath of the assassinations in Seattle of her brother, Silme Domingo, and Gene Viernes, both KDP activists, by local gangsters acting upon orders of the dictatorship, which was trying to silence the U.S.-based Filipino-American opposition.
A number of the women also involved themselves in advocating on women’s issues, and in women’s organizations, such as Kalayaan and GABRIELA. Mila Aguilar saw sexism within the CPP, and wrote articles critiquing the official line of the CPP that the women’s liberation issue was secondary to the principal issue of national liberation.
The stories of these women who fought Marcos remind us of the greatness of a generation of activists who gave it all for the people. At a time when there was tyranny, suppression of civil liberties and violation of human rights - meant to sow fear and compel submission - there were women who stood up to a brutal dictator. This book showcases the best of what is Filipino and Filipino-American during a time of despotism. With the dictator’s son, Bongbong Marcos, running for vice-president in the recent May 2016 Philippine elections, and brazenly recasting his father’s image in a good light, “Women Against Marcos” tells inspiring stories that move us to swear, “Never again to dictatorship.”
June 14, 2018
Fascinating first-person accounts from women active in the anti-Marcos movement. They occupy a breadth of positions but all emphasize how their participation in leftist movements made them more aware of sexism within Filipino culture and within these supposedly radical organizations as well. Useful to my work!
August 10, 2022
it sucks to read this at a time where another marcos is in power, but i think people should get a hold of this to never forget history so that we won’t be doomed to make the same mistakes (even if by the looks of it now, it seems like we already are making worse ones)
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews