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- EDD K. USMAN | Twitter: @edd1819 | Instagram: @bluestar0910 | Facebook: SDN – SciTech & Digital News
CLUB FILIPINO, San Juan City (SDN) — “Utang na loob”, often translated in English as a “sense of gratitude”, is a popular cultural trait among Filipinos instilled when they were still young.
Gratitude then is the sense of being thankful and appreciative of acts that benefit a person and, to some extent, may embrace a receiver’s willingness to reciprocate. Though the giver may not necessarily expect anything in return.
Comes the Partido Federal ng Pilipinas (PFP) at the time it was a monolithic political organization, sometime before the May 9, 2022, national and local elections.
Remember that then Sen. Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr. rode the PFP bandwagon to Malacañang in that political exercise, eventually registering a massive victory through the PFP.
Going back a bit more, PFP Vice President for Mindanao Assam Ulangkaya said Marcos joined the party in 2021, a party sworn to push federalism, the party of grassroots Filipinos, not of the elites — with members, among them, laborers, manicurists, drivers, vendors, household workers, security guards, and others. It is also sworn to fight corruption, terrorism, and illegal drugs.
According to Page 121 of “The King Maker,” the book authored by former Marcos, Jr. man and executive secretary Vic Rodriguez, the senator “met with a group of supporters led by South Cotabato Governor Jun Tamayo and Moro leader Assam Ulangkaya, vice president and national chairman of the membership committee of the Partido Federal ng Pilipinas.”
Marcos, Jr. tears up after Assam’s narration of Marcos Sr.’s legacy among Moro youths
Rodriguez described the PFP as “a miniscule party based in Mindanao.” On the other hand, the former Palace official said Assam “effectively organized the ground in time for the campaign.” Rodriguez was then PFP external vice president.
The former Cabinet official recalled in his book that Marcos, Jr. “seemed impressed with the PFP organization setup as presented by Ulangkaya, even if it was a small unknown party.”
Assam, of the big Ulangkaya Clan in Maguindanao that includes retired Police Col. Salipada Ulangkaya, among others, told SDN – SciTech & Digital News he was the one who signed Marcos, Jr.’s Membership Application Form for the PFP.
But before that, Assam had already briefed the then senator on the PFP in July 2018.
Assam said he even touched on the legacy of the President’s father, former President Ferdinand E. Marcos, Sr., concerning many things, including the National Integration Study Grant Program (NISGP) that sent many Moro youths to school and earned their diplomas in various colleges and universities in the country.
Assam told the younger Marcos that Muslims are very thankful and are in gratitude to his father for the NISGP. The former NISGP scholar indicated that more Moro youths could have become rebels if not for their education supported by Marcos, Sr.’s study grant.
He said the senator was very attentive about his father’s contributions to the Moro youths’ education, and even became emotional as he was digesting Assam’s recollection. He even showed the senator his study grant ID.
“Senator Marcos, Jr. became really emotional, and even shed some tears upon seeing my scholarship ID and learning about how his father’s legacy touched the Moro youths,” Assam tells SDN.
The Moro leader also appreciated and welcomed having given Marcos, Jr. the briefing on the PFP. “I felt the sincerity of his emotions as I was reminiscing to him how his father touched the lives of hundreds of Muslim youths at the time when Mindanao is being consumed by strife.”
He said the senator took his oath to the PFP administered by PFP President Reynaldo Tamayo, Jr. on October 6, 2021.
Marcos, Jr. went on to win the 2022 presidential election with a huge plurality of votes, though his votes were overshadowed by his Vice President, Inday Sara Duterte.
Alas, the PFP, the party that catapulted the senator to Malacañang developed a schism, two groups — the Leandro Verceles Camp and the Tamayo Camp today.
Assam said Tamayo, South Cotabato governor, former police general Thompson Lantion, and lawyer George Briones, whose terms as PFP officers should have ended at two years, orchestrated amendments to the party’s Constitution and By-Laws (CBL), which in effect extended their terms to three years.
Gratitude has not gone extinct among Filipinos
He said this is the reason the Verceles Camp filed two complaints at the Manila Prosecutors’ Office, alleging forgery and falsification of documents — re: using an e-signature of then PFP National Chairman Abubakar Mangelen without his participation or authorization.
Not that Assam and the other Verceles Camp members were asking for government positions, but Assam said they were soon forgotten by the President in spite of their big contributions to his campaign and winning the presidential race.
PFP members fought tooth and nail during the 2022 presidential campaign against those who vehemently opposed Marcos, Jr.’s candidacy, even calling him “corrupt and a thief”, he said.
But what rubs salt to injury, so to speak, is that those who called the senator names during the campaign soon switched allegiance even when the President had hardly warmed his seat in Malacañang, said Assam.
“Where are we now? We are outsiders,” he points out. “While those who staunchly opposed the President are now with the Marcos administration. To be clear, we are not after government positions. But gratitude even through a smile is a cherished trait among us Filipinos.”
‘In Islam,” he points out, “smile is a form of charity.’
Assam hailed the resilience and fortitude of his colleagues in the PFP, as he singled out Eng’r Anthony Marfori for using his own money to pay to the tune of Php3 million the Commission on Elections (Comelec) for the PFP’s accreditation as national political party.
Without Marfori, he said, the PFP would not have gain its status as national political party.
Another of Assam’s unnamed party mates told SDN they tried to reach the President, but they were often caught in the web of the Malacañang Palace’s intricate and labyrinthine cordon sanitaire.
The Verceles Camp suffered a setback as the Comelec decided over the week in favor of the Tamayo Camp on the Omnibus Petition filed by the former, challenging the latter’s legitimacy.
But the Verceles Camp has not lost hope, as lawyer Leandro Verceles, PFP national president, and former governor and congressman of Catanduanes, Bicol Region, said they are eyeing a Motion for Reconsideration (MR), and will continue the fight for legitimacy even up to the Supreme Court.
This was made clear by Verceles himself in an interview with select journalists at the sidelines of the PFP National Assembly on September 14, at the Club Filipino, Greenhills, San Juan, Metro Manila.
Let us hope a win-win solution in the manner of King Solomon is arrived at, and those in power like Presidents realize that in life as in politics, no man is an island.
That in politicians’ climb to the top, it’s good to look back and, maybe, smile at or tap the shoulder of those friends, supporters, and allies who sacrificed and pushed them up.
And realize as well that gratitude is a Filipino cultural trait that has not gone extinct. (/)
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This article has been updated with some more details.