ACCEPTANCE SPEECH – UNO Award

Note: Delivered during the virtual presentation of the Upsilon Sigma Phi’s Outstanding and Noble (UNO) Award on 20 February 2021.

Thank you for choosing me as a recipient of the UNO Award. Let me now share with you what I recall in my development journey since  I joined the Fraternity fifty-eight years ago:

I recall joining  our fraternity as a young man eager to know about life, real life, the Upsilon way. Like other neophytes, I was made to recite the poem IF by Rudyard Kipling in a number of unique situations, for example, while holding a mosquito net at one end to induce sleep among some fraternity members;

 I recall being advised by several alumni and resident fellows to temporarily abandon reading books and exert more efforts to understand life by living it to the hilt, from direct experiences, rather than from books;

 I recall being mentored to serve as stage hand and act in cameo roles in several plays, the theatre being a monopoly of the Upsilon in those days, to be confident, as though I am the leading actor;

 I recall joining all sorts of contests, impromptu speaking, debates, and winning honor for myself and the fraternity and, in the process, getting out of my bookish self and be more active in campus activities;

 I recall serving as editor of the campus paper for two terms, the first time that it happened, and founded in the process, to the delight of fraternity brothers, Tangent, the first and only literary paper of the then UP College of Agriculture which dealt with contemporary issues and thus helped boost the reputation of the Fraternity as a socially relevant organization;

 I recall that during this period of intellectual ferment and clamor for the University to be socially relevant, our fraternity transformed the then Student Party into Partido Kaunlaran with pronounced nationalist orientation inspired by the teachings of modern-day historians such as Teodoro Agoncillo and Renato Constantino;

 I recall that during this period of the late Sixties, a new wave of nationalism set in, more militant than the previous one, this time inspired by Mao Tse-tung and other Marxist thinkers as well as by protest movements which emerged in other parts of the world.

 I recall that during this period, a number of fraternity brothers joined both the legal movement and the underground, in pursuit of ideals shared with the greater Upsilon community but translated into various ways in accordance with individual perceptions and preferences, under the popular mantra of the day, “Serve the People.”

 I recall doing time as lecturer or discussion group leader for several months on Philippine Society and Revolution and the three isms, Feudalism, Imperialism, and Bureaucrat Capitalism in a semi-liberated area of Sierra Madre as security measure so I could be invisible to the military and its intelligence agents in town centers and cities;

I recall getting arrested and put behind bars in a military camp, interrogated but not tortured, and allowed to live and work at the Nayong Pilipino, as information officer for the Green Revolution, one of the pet projects of the then First Lady, Mrs. Imelda Marcos.

 I recall how I recovered from this relative isolation for six years at the Nayong Pilipino to craft and implement a strategy that enabled me with the help of close friends to continue my studies; find employment,  and resume development work in the poorest communities in the Philippines and 13 other countries in the Pacific and faraway Maldives in the Indian Ocean;

I recall how I came to settle in Bohol, far from my native Quezon province determined to seek more innovative ways to reach the poor and continue with much-needed efforts to help liberate them from what we called at that time the “constraints of underdevelopment,” with provision of social services, including livelihood assistance, but this time with their genuine commitment and participaion.  

I think this story is consistent with what Upsilonians aspire for in reciting our Credo and the poem IF – which is to to find courage and true grit in pursuing a dream “to help create a better world,” if I may be allowed to say it in a grand manner on this occasion.

Finally, I believe that the Upsilon Sigma Phi should remain a microcosm of the larger University, a marketplace of ideas, a citadel of freedom and liberalism where we could subscribe to varying schools of thought and ideologies but we must uphold adherence to the truth, social justice and equality.

Hence, I dedicate this award to all of you who share a common dream for our University, country and people and, guided by the light of wisdom and courage, continue to show true grit in pursuing a vision of peace and prosperity for all.   

Thank you and have a good day ###

NMP/07 Feb 2021/11,24 a.m.