AUGUST 21 came and went, and all we had was PBBM’s Proclamation No. 665 which moved the commemoration of Ninoy Aquino Day to today, August 23.
The 40-year-old Pinoy was born in 1984. Ask him about Ninoy and I gotta feeling he will say, Ninoy who? Even I asked the same question upon learning about the assassination in the afternoon of August 21, 1983.
I used to write about the assassination once August was near. That part of history brought the yellows out of their comfort zones, an awakening that led to the 1986 People Power.
In 1991 when then President Cory Aquino allowed the Marcoses to come back to Pinas for the cases that were filed against them, I began to suspect that all that ado about tying yellow ribbons was a product of public relations (PR).
When I became a PR whatever of whatever and whoever, the more my suspicions grew about PR work making things happen.
I started to lessen my focus on the yellows, though, after BBM added a P before his usual initials. Because para que? The Marcoses are occupying Malacanang again—that’s a slap on the face of those who thought the Marcoses would stay in Hawaii forevermore.
Even before BBM leveled up to PBBM, the yellows had already morphed into pink, care of then presidential candidate Leni Robredo who adopted that as her political party color. A wrong move by her PR team, by the way. Red (for PBBM) versus pink—blah. But red versus yellow—yay!
By then, who cared, anyway? BBM’s campaign strategies were all over Pinas already, they resembled rock concerts. I almost became a fan. From yellow to red. I like pink only for clothes and school uniforms.
How shallow, eh? Agonizing over political party colors instead of political party platforms. But that’s the vibe the Pinoy gets during the campaign season. Just look at some names in PBBM’s senatorial slate for Election 2025: Manny Pacquiao, Bong Revilla, Tito Sotto, Lito Lapid. Popularity contest yarn?
And PBBM’s eldest sister Imee Marcos is in that list, of course, along with familiar names that don’t require flowery introductions, the kind of intro that’s longer than the campaign speeches they will deliver.
FYI for political candidates: only interesting and funny speeches can attract attention. Outside of that, people would rather check out Facebook, Instagram, and X, much like what the Cagayanon did on August 21 while stuck in traffic for at least two hours.
The travel time from uptown to downtown Cagayan de Oro may take 15 minutes on traffic-free days. But August 21 was one of the busy days for the Higalaay Festival which sums up the activities happening almost daily until the city fiesta on August 28.
But there’s the other side of Higalaay: traffic. With August 21 having one of the worst. What was supposed to be Ninoy Aquino Day became Traffic Jam Day as a bridge and some streets had to be closed for the motocross and the fireworks competition. The wise uptowner then decided to stay in the uptown area until after the city fiesta. If he has no important work that could be accomplished only in downtown CDO, he’s better off discovering what the uptown area has to offer.
