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(Continued from last Saturday)
The Partido Komunista ng Pilipinas’ (PKP)
account of Filipino participation in the Spanish Civil War says:
“Not all of the Filipinos in the Republican
ranks were attached to the l5th Brigade, and at least one—a
certain Dimitri Gorostiaga [probably a pseudonym]—enlisted from
Mexico. By March to April 1939, Gorostiaga was reported to be
imprisoned in the concentration camp at Angeles-sur-Mer, one of the
places in Southern France where those fleeing Spain [after the March
1939 fall of the Spanish Republic] were confined. Within the camp,
Gorostiago was placed with the ‘Groupe Sur Americaine’ implying
that he had been with the Latin American 3rd Battalion of the 15th
International Brigade.
“Another Filipino, Aquilino Belmonte Capinolio
[born 1902] was also captured by the fascists and was listed, as
late as 1942 [already during the Second World War], as still being a
‘prisoner without help’ who was interned with other Spanish
Republican detainees at the Miranda del Ebro concentration camp in
Burgos, Spain.”
There were efforts in Manila to organize “Aid
to Spain” centers; a pro-Republican magazine Democracia had
writers including anti-fascist Spaniards and Filipino-Spaniards as
well as Filipino progressives like Pedro Abad Santos, chairman of
the Socialist Party, and Bishop Gregorio Aglipay of the Philippine
Independent Church. The PKP also said: “Several other publications
carried articles attacking the falangist forces of Franco in Spain
as well as their prominent sympathizers in the Philippines [the
Catholic hierarchy and the falangist Spanish businessmen such as the
Sorianos, Elizaldes, Ayalas, Zobels, Roxases and Ortigases].”
A history buff reader said that among the
journalists who supported the Falangists were Adolfo Garcia, Antonio
Estrada, Benito Blanco, Miguel Colayco, Enrique Fernandez Lumba,
Theo Rogers and Joaquin Ramirez Arellano.
He said several streets in Metro Manila were
named after Spanish falangists: Solchaga, Sotelo, Primo de Rivera,
Aranda, Cabanelas, Davila, Mola, Barron, Tella, Ponte, Goded,
Cervera, Yague, and Mascardo in Makati; Jimenez in San Andres; and
Paredes in Sampaloc.
The Republicans who were imprisoned in Manila by
the Japanese were Miguel Pujalte (father and son), Tomas del Rio
(father and son), Restituto Ynchausti, Ricardo Ariandiaga, Leonor
Gonzalez, Rafael Anton, Jose Maria Campos and Benito Pabon.
Our reader added that Fr. Gabino Olasco Zabala,
Agustinian friar who was executed by the Republicans and beatified
in 2007, ordered the torture of a Filipino priest Mariano Dacanay
during the 1896 Revolution. Dacanay while in prison translated Jose
Rizal’s Noli into Ilocano.
The Basques in Cagayan Valley were said to be
opposed to Franco. This is corroborated by a friend who now lives in
New Jersey. Here are excerpts of his e-mail:
“Your last two postings were like Proust’s
madeleines. I was reminded of my grandfather who was a loudly
proclaimed atheist, and a full-time hater of Franco and the
Falangistas. Lolo was the typical Catalan and loudly proclaimed his
disdain for the Spanish even as he worked for Tabacalera out there
in the compania’s tobacco sites in Cagayan and Isabela.
“I remember the Casino Espanol right beside
the Jai-Alai building, behind which was the San Marcelino church. I
had vainglorious dreams [at age 13] to become a pelotari and
sometimes practiced in the Casino’s cancha. Talk about social
stratification; since I didn’t look like your typical Castila, I
sometimes drop my father’s name who was then with La Vanguardia.
“Your mention of the Franco’s war reminded
me of Hemingway, Malraux, and beyond that, Koestler and Silone, as
well as the local names, Callanta, Saulo, and of course, as you
cited, Pomeroy, Celia, Jess Lava and the others in Padre Faura. I
attended a few meetings of what was called the Philippine Cultural
Committee at the old YWCA on Lepanto and listened to the lectures
from Callanta, Feleo, Crudo. I didn’t have any ideology or
politics. I was just curious. But I think I could relate to all who,
in one way or another, were involved with the PKP—it was ‘the
only game in town’ that promised to get things aright, as what
happened, I think, to the Rosenburgs. At that time, at my age then,
I was searching. I even signed up, along with some of the guys in
Padre Faura, to join the Merdeka Movement; we were supposed to go to
Indonesia and help our brothers there oust the Dutch. Romance.”
Why is it that the writers/artists on the
Republican side like those mentioned above are the ones who
count—add Picasso, Federico Garcia Lorca (killed by fascists),
Luis Bunuel, George Orwell (Homage to Catalonia), Pablo Neruda,
Muriel Rukeyser, Langston Hughes, Paul Robeson, Robert Capa
(photographer) and more. Of those listed as Franco supporters, only
one stood out—Salvador Dali (surrealist).
Filipino writer, SV Epistola, wrote a short
story “The Andalusians,” about Republican exiles in Manila.
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