Truth is more exciting than fiction
Former Sen. Edgardo “Ed” Angara, the longest serving post-EDSA senator, has unveiled his front-row impressions of many watersheds in Philippine history through his biography, In the
Grand Manner. The book was launched recently at the Manila Polo Club with the stalwarts of the political, business and cultural worlds in attendance.
Written by Jose “Butch” Dalisay Jr., it features, aside from a compelling narrative on Angara’s life story, frank — uncensored — quotes about crucial moments in modern history that Angara witnessed, and participated in: EDSA I, EDSA II, the Corona impeachment trial, among others.
For instance, he bares his efforts in 1989 to broker peace, admittedly uneasy, between then President Cory Aquino and her first Defense Secretary Juan Ponce Enrile, who was suspected of plotting a coup to unseat her.
“She asked me to tell Johnny that she wanted to talk to him, and had nothing against him and that they could live and let live,” Angara recalls in the book. The outcome of their meeting, held in Angara’s house, is known to all of us now. The “God Save the Queen” coup unraveled and Cory fired Enrile. Angara also talks about the days leading to President
Estrada’s ouster in 2001. Dalisay writes, “Sometime in December 2000, around Christmas, Estrada spoke with Angara and asked him to take over as Executive Secretary. His administration was falling apart, and it needed a firm hand and a clear mind to pull together.”
Angara himself confesses that on his first day as Executive Secretary, a group of Makati businessmen asked him “to bail out. They couldn’t understand why I was staying on, in what they saw to be a sinking ship.” So why did he? “I could feel that Erap was on his way out. But I wanted to be able to manage a peaceful transition, to spare the country unnecessary bloodshed,” Angara, who was ES for exactly 14 days, says.
When the end was near, “I knew that Erap wasn’t scared, but felt that he might have been concerned about being shamed. Based on my conversation with him, I could sense that he was willing to go, but with dignity,” recounts Angara.
When negotiations broke down ( Gloria Arroyo already took her oath as President) and Angara relayed to Erap the call of Mrs. Arroyo’s chief negotiator former Defense Secretary Rene de Villa about events on the streets rendering negotiations “practically moot,” Angara says the former movie star was prepared to exit. “His maids were ready with his bags and belongings, and the barge was waiting.”
*** Ironically, though Angara was part of Erap’s senatorial slate in 2001, he was left out of the opposition slate in 2007 (in the book, he tells in detail why) and President Arroyo “really mounted a courtship campaign for me.” Angara joined the administration’s senatorial lineup.
Dalisay acknowledges that “Angara’s turnaround should have caused waves in the media, but it didn’t.” Angara, he said, “took that as just one more proof of how badly the party system had failed and how indistinguishable the parties and coalitions had
become.” It was right after the “Hello, Garci” scandal, and when the results of the elections came in, only three administration bets made it: Angara,
Joker Arroyo and Migz Zubiri (who would later yield his seat to Aquilino
Pimentel Jr.)
But the book isn’t all about backroom politics, betrayals (a miniversion of the Kevin Spacey starrer, the political drama series House of
Cards). It also talks about family and miracles.
*** Some t i me du r i ng h is f i rst senatorial campaign in 1987, Ed Angara took a break and played tennis at the Manila Polo Club when he suddenly had to stop midway. He was sweating profusely and was rushed to the Makati Medical Center, where he was later given some jolting news: he had a heart attack.
His wife Gloria and President Cory herself campaigned
personally for him, and when it was clear that he was going to win by a large margin, he flew to San Francisco for a heart bypass.
“Before I left,” Angara recalls in the book, “Cory gave me a rosary. She told me it was miraculous, that one of the sisters of Fatima had given it to Cory herself ( actually, it was Lucia, one of the children who saw the apparition of
Our Lady at Fatima — JRR). So I brought it with me. On my third day in San Francisco, before they wheeled me to the operating room, they took an angiogram, something that wasn’t available in the Philippines back then. Then Dr. ( Richard) Myler told me, ‘There’s nothing wrong with your heart.’ There’s no block! My doctors had been unanimous about the bypass surgery, but now they had been told that all I had was a spasm, caused by lack of sleep, too much smoking and the fatigue of a month-long campaign. My heart had stopped for a while but there was no blockage in there. The revelation was a miracle. I felt like I had been given a second life.”
And Ed Angara lived not only to tell the story of the miracle but to author or co- author most of the outstanding pieces of legislation post-EDSA that changed every Filipino’s life: from the Kindergarten Education Act to the Free High School Act; from the PhilHealth Act to the Senior Citizens Act, to name a few.
Informative, exciting, juicy at times, heartwarming, easily relatable. Dalisay’s In the Grand Manner, published by the University of the Philippines Press, is history with the breathtaking, engrossing qualities of a novel. Sometimes, the twists and turns of truth are more exciting than fiction.