Holiday twice over

TODAY is a special day for Filipino workers because they get paid more than double. Those who have to work, that is.

And we have the late Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino Jr. and our Muslim brothers and sisters to thank for that.

And, of course, Malacañang, which decided to lump the two events together.

To those who are too busy enjoying the day-off and still don’t know what I’m talking about, today is a special non-working holiday to commemorate the 35th anniversary of Aquino’s assassination at the then Manila International Airport.

Millennials who have no idea who he was, well, here’s a teaser.

Ninoy was the father of Kris and Noynoy— yup, the guy who was president before Rodrigo Duterte who baffled nonTagalog speakers like me every time he delivered his State of the Nation Address because he assumed everyone could understand him.

Oh yes, Ninoy’s death was the beginning of the fall of Ferdinand Marcos, who lorded over the archipelago for over two decades. It managed to galvanize the opposition to unite behind his widow Corazon— yes, the very same lady who had a penchant for wearing yellow dresses.

Less than three years after, on Feb. 25, 1986, Marcos and the First Family were airlifted to Guam before they were taken to Hawaii carrying millions of dollars in “jewelries, gold, stocks and cash.”

None of this is fake news, by the way. I lived through the Edsa Revolution as a high school student in Brent Baguio.

And since Ninoy Aquino Day is “special” and not a “regular” holiday, people who have to toil on this day will get a premium of 30 percent.

Also, the whole of Islamdom will celebrate the Feast of the Sacrifice, or Eid al -Ad ha.

It commemorates Ibrahim’s willingness to heed the command of God to sacrifice his son.

If you’re wondering why Ibrahim is very familiar, it’s because that’s what Muslims call the prophet Abraham in the Old Testament.

But if he thought he could insult them to submission, he actually elicited the opposite reaction not only from the religious but also the laity. He even managed to offend the non-religious and atheists, who are mostly, contrary to popular (mis)perception, actually very tolerant of religion and religious differences.

So he shifted his aim from clergy to deity, calling their god “stupid,” succeeding only in stoking greater outrage even if, sadly, many of those he angered saw it their duty to defend their god but not his creation.

Now he and his minions are targeting individuals who have chosen kindness and compassion as their life’s work in the mistaken notion that they are the weakest link.

Thus, we have the effort to deport of Sister Patricia Fox, the deportation of three foreign Christian missionaries, and the detention and deportation of Australian law and human rights expert Gill Boehringer. And these are just those from other lands whose compassion transcends borders, whose good works are labeled “political” and therefore grounds to kick them out.

A cynic might say they are actually lucky for being able to return – albeit unwillingly – to the safety of their homelands. Sadly, that might be true.

For almost every day in these isles of our joys and greater sorrows, Filipinos are killed, threatened, harassed, arrested, tortured, falsely accused, for the grievous offense of defending the human rights of their brethren, from the thousands upon thousands mowed down by the insane “war on drugs,” to the farmers and the laborers, the fisherfolk and teachers fighting for a better lot, to the indigenous peoples defending their lands and cultures from the plunder of “development.”

Yet slowly but surely – slowly for the fear of death and violence admittedly remains strong; surely for the determination to end the deviltry gripping our land has become the stronger impetus – the end is coming. It is inevitable. For this is the paradox: the more evil triumphs, the deeper it digs its grave, while good can only grow stronger the harder it is suppressed.

If July 23 was any indication, this is NOT just one man’s opinion.— Nonoy Espina