The President campaigns in Maguindanao

By Andrew Jonathan S. Bagaoisan

BULUAN, MAGUINDANAO—Things were different when the previous sitting President last visited this province.

Pres. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s low-profile stop at Shariff Aguak, the capital of Maguindanao, late in March 2009 was hardly note-worthy and routine at most.

On her itinerary was a briefing on the Solid Waste Management Program in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) and a ribbon-cutting at the newly-built P218-million provincial capitol complex.

The photo-ops of Arroyo and her hosts, the Ampatuans, took a different light eight months later, when 57 corpses of civilians and media workers were found and dug up in Ampatuan town.

Arroyo and the Ampatuans in 2009 (Best available photo from the Office of the Press Secretary, c/o Pinoy Weekly)

The so-called Maguindanao massacre was tagged on the ruling clan, particularly Andal Sr. and his son, Andal Jr. In turn, it also tainted Arroyo’s term being the climax of hundreds of extra-judicial killings during her stay in power.

Year 2013 found them replaced by rivals and detained under criminal charges. But politics has its way of repeating itself. Maguindanao still proves the election trophy crucial even to opposing administrations.

Last April 12, red, yellow, and green frills welcomed Pres. Benigno Aquino III to Buluan, hometown of re-electionist Gov. Esmael “Toto” Mangudadatu.

No longer is the governor’s seat in Shariff Aguak, where the palatial capitol complex came to signify the opulence of the Ampatuans amid the squalor of the province.

Aquino flew from Cotabato City where he checked on projects being implemented by Mujiv Hataman, the ARMM caretaker governor who is vying for an elected term this May.

This next stop was more political than administrative—an opportunity to raise the hands of Mangudadatu, Hataman, and the Liberal Party (LP) bets here. Nearly all top officials in ARMM and Maguindanao had now aligned themselves with Aquino.

Buluan’s nearly-completed gymnasium hosted the area’s first LP rally. Residents–estimated from 50,000 to 70,000–endured the midday heat and lined up through security checks.

The covered court could not contain all, explaining the second stage put up outside. Spectators listened to local candidates there while sitting or standing under gigantic umbrellas.

There, Team PNoy senatorial candidates Koko Pimentel, Jun Magsaysay, Risa Hontiveros, Bam Aquino, Sonny Angara, and Loren Legarda first gave their campaign speeches before repeating them inside the gym.

The attendance shows what has changed in Maguindanao in more than three years. Even a political rally here was unthinkable before.

The night Dolphy died

By Andrew Jonathan S. Bagaoisan

Sol Aragones breaking Dolphy’s death on ABS-CBN News Patrol. (Shot by Anjo Bagaoisan)

I will remember where I was when I learned we lost Dolphy.

The big story that day was the extreme traffic wrought by keeping the Metro Manila buses along one lane of EDSA. Our van was at a concrete island on the turn to Quezon Avenue from EDSA.

After we aired a live report for TV Patrol, the news desk told us to stay put while deciding if we would do another for the 11 p.m. newscast.

It was nearly 9 and raining. A crew mate and I were already settling down from dinner, shut in our crew cab.

The desk editor on duty called. “Who’s on standby at Makati Med?”

I gave the name. “Okay. You get ready too,” he said, and hanged up. I called our guy at Makati Medical Center.

“Nag-tweet na si Ruffa,” he said. “Nag-aabangan na dito.”

We read Ruffa Gutierrez’s post via a workmate’s Blackberry: “R.I.P Ninong Dolphy.”

The Net was already abuzz, but no one was yet confirming it.

Commentators on DZMM radio were still bantering about the traffic, cryptically telling listeners who texted queries, “Please wait. We still don’t know.”

At the ABS-CBN newsroom: Monitoring TV channels covering Dolphy. (Shot by Anjo Bagaoisan)

By then, we were told to pack up, pick up some hardware at the base, and proceed to Makati Med. Another crew watching traffic elsewhere in EDSA was diverted there too.

The TV news break greeted us when we got to ABS-CBN. Dolphy’s partner, Zsa Zsa Padilla, confirmed that Dolphy had indeed passed away.

And just like that, our headlines quickly shifted gears from commuting to the loss of a showbiz great.

Erap’s big move

By Andrew Jonathan S. Bagaoisan

(Shot by Gani Taoatao, ABS-CBN News; c/o morefunmaker.com)

Manga Avenue rarely sees the bustle of the nearby residential areas in Santa Mesa, Manila.

While the buildings along this street are bounded by big gates and high walls, it isn’t part of any subdivision. There are few stores close by, and the traffic it usually gets comes from passing tricycles.

The quiet at Manga Ave. may soon change with the transfer of its newest and likely most illustrious resident.

If the house-move last May 9 gave any hint, hubbub won’t be stranger to this place in the next year. Former President Joseph Estrada has brought the noise of Philippine politics to his new territory.

As early as 4 a.m., the one-lane street was already choked outside the gate marked Number 589. News vans parked a pace away were culprits. Their portable generators injected a steady hum to the silence, as TV crews prepped for advancer live shots in the morning shows.

By mid-morning, around a hundred people in white, orange, and green shirts had gathered, holding up the traffic.

The prints on the shirts gave their aim: “Welcome to Manila Mayor Erap”. Others read “Manila ♥ Erap,” “Erap ♥ Manila.”

By then, Erap had left his Polk Street house in Greenhills and was driving to Santa Mesa in his pimped out “Jeep ni Erap.”

Impending showdown

This day would answer if Estrada would follow through on his next reported conquest—this time for the top seat of the City of Manila.

Riding beside him was Manila Vice Mayor Isko Moreno, who with other members of the city council had transferred allegiance to Estrada from his former ally, incumbent Mayor Alfredo Lim.

Estrada had hinted recently of challenging Lim in the 2013 midterm elections. The only deterrent to his qualification for running was his registered address, famously in San Juan.

The transfer convoy, which included three trucks laden with wood cabinets and hard-plastic containers, all timed to the year before the polls.

(Shots by Anjo Bagaoisan)

At Manga Avenue, a brass band, complete with dancing girls, had marched in to perk up the welcoming throng. Ice cream and corn vendors had also stopped by.

Placards were passed around. Their messages ranged from the familiar slogans–“Erap para sa mahirap”–to the shout-outs–“Bawal ang Dirty sa Maynila”. “Dirty” an aside against Mayor Lim, nicknamed “Dirty Harry” for his hard-line stance against crime in the 1990s.

Erap had his own action star moniker: Asiong Salonga, after the mid-20th century local gang leader he portrayed on the silver screen.

The impending showdown in Manila has now been lent ready references to action movies.

TV Patrol 25: Revisiting Ondoy

By Andrew Jonathan S. Bagaoisan

(courtesy TV Patrol / ABS-CBN News)

Cameraman Bernie Mallari and his ENG van teammates will not forget the day stormy circumstances thrust upon them the defining image of a typhoon.

They were told to go to the La Mesa Dam that September 26, 2009. The dam was on the verge of spilling over after an overnight of rains brought by Typhoon Ondoy.

But with Commonwealth Avenue already flooded, the team never got there. Instead, they passed by Marikina and Rizal, where they chanced upon a throng converged at the San Mateo Bridge.

A mass of flotsam was approaching the bridge in a wave. When they saw that the mass also carried people, the team lugged Bernie’s camera out in the rain to capture the attempt of those “surfers” to reach safety.

(Courtesy TV Patrol / ABS-CBN News)

The result is an iconic grab of history. But it did not turn out well for that family caught in the flood.

Last March 28, Bernie arrived at the Marikina Riverbanks with his reporter Sol Aragones to cover the unveiling of TV Patrol’s second commemorative marker as part of the newscast’s 25th anniversary.

The ceremony was awash with memories of the flood—one of the few times the big story struck even those who tell it.

Sol and Bernie preview their shoot at the first TV Patrol marker unveiling in Pampanga. Click pic to watch her story that day. (Shot by Anjo Bagaoisan)

Sol and Bernie were not yet teammates in 2009. But Sol was among the many reporters sent to Marikina, where the destruction only became clearer as the waters cleared.

“Ang unang larawan ko pong nakita yung mga sapatos at tsinelas—(pang) bata man o matanda—ay nakalubog sa putik, parang alaala na talagang nagmadali silang tumakbo para mailigtas yung kanilang buhay,” Sol recalled.

TV Patrol’s big day

By Andrew Jonathan S. Bagaoisan

(Shot by Anjo Bagaoisan)

High up a mountain in Nabuclod, Floridablanca, Pampanga on the night of March 4, six Aeta men mixed cement to fill the foundation where a slab of hardened lahar would stand.

The wind chilled, and the only light came from a blue-head lamp started up by the ABS-CBN technical crew that was also setting up on this upland eco-tourism park.

The 5-foot tall slab lay beside a shallow pit. Embossed on it: “TV Patrol 25,” followed by rows of commemorative text.

“Good thing it took us till night to bring this up here,” said Mae Purificacion, one of two women from ABS-CBN News’ business group who were supervising the work.

“Otherwise, other people here would be taking shots of it way too early.”

The tech crew had already mobbed the slab with photo-ops after it was brought out from a crew cab. But no posting on Facebook yet, they were warned.

They only hoped the cement would harden by morning.

Such was the subtle flurry of activity in the hours counting down to the celebration of TV Patrol’s 25th birthday.

Andrei Felix & Venus Raj (Shot by Anjo Bagaoisan)

The tech team prepped for Umagang Kay Ganda, where hosts Andrei Felix and Venus Raj would ride the park’s zip line and cable car live.

In Manila that night, the people at post-production outfit Acid House ran overtime rendering the new opening billboard (OBB) and segment intros for the special March 5 telecast.

Acee Vitangcol, an ABS-CBN digital strategist put the finishing touches on the timeline of TV Patrol’s Facebook page. It would go public at midnight with photos of the show’s past sets, logos, and reporting moments.

The network was pulling out all the stops for this milestone. After all, TV Patrol was one of the driving forces that propelled ABS-CBN back to ratings leadership in 1988.

On its silver anniversary, the groundbreaking newscast was giving back to the public.

Sleepless, contact-less in Quiapo

 

(Shot by Anjo Bagaoisan)

“I just experienced how they gathered news back in the 1990s,” said reporter Jeff Canoy when he arrived at our technical setup in Plaza Miranda.

Jeff and his crew had followed the venerated image of the Black Nazarene when it left the Quirino Grandstand on the morning of January 9, the anniversary of its translacion or transfer to the Quiapo Church four centuries ago.

The procession was not due to arrive until around midnight, but the team pushed on to Quiapo earlier for Jeff’s top story on TV Patrol.

Jeff already went live that noon. But all day, Jeff parted with his routines: tweeting online, phoning reports, and texting regular updates to his desk editor.

All because a terror threat prompted authorities to jam cellular signals from Quirino to Quiapo.

The threat announcement was made by no less than President Aquino came the day before.

It surprised reporters who earlier heard police chief Nicanor Bartolome say after he met the President that there were no serious security threats on the celebration.

It turned out this year’s translacion still had something new despite being covered and shown on TV for so long.

With cellphones rendered useless, our ENG vans along the procession route became the only spots with a semblance of communication to Quezon City.

Our savior: the citizen’s band radio console retrofitted on each van.

Christmas duty in CDO

CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY, MISAMIS ORIENTAL–Hours before midnight of December 25, some guests at a high-end local hotel dropped by the bar to mark the holiday.

For most, the night out was a long-awaited respite from the circumstances that faced them that week in this typhoon-hit city.

A combo of two was there singing a repertoire of Standard tunes, mostly English and the occasional Latin.

On the keyboard was a lanky man wearing a luau polo. A virtual all-in-one band, he alternated piano and trumpet leads to the customized beats from his synthesizer.

Dodong, the pianist, alternated and harmonized tunes with his partner Rose, who was in a party dress.

The guests were impressed and called for encores. One of them approached the duo and said he wanted to sing.

Dodong said yes. “But first, I need a volunteer to play these.” And he pointed to the unused bongo drums nearby.

The clock struck 12 as the guest belted out another song.

(Shot by Rodrigo Tapales)

Fireworks could be seen from the window overlooking the city. Various areas of CDO answered each other in colorful outbursts of light.

The guests watched, some wondering if the calendar had already turned, and some marveling that one of the cities ravaged by the Philippines’ deadliest typhoon in over 10 years found cause to celebrate.

Seated near the piano was a middle-aged woman browsing a laptop while taking sips at a cocktail and glances at the performers.

“My wife,” Dodong said later as he introduced her. “She’s my manager too.”

As they packed up the microphones and turned off the amps, Rose, the singer said, “We’ll be returning to our flooded houses.”

One of the affected CDO villages. (Shot by Anjo Bagaoisan)

Dodong resided at a higher area of CDO. But the house his children lived in was not spared from the high waters of typhoon Sendong (a.k.a. Washi).

“All my instruments there were ruined–two guitars, my keyboard, my amplifiers. Even my studio,” he said.

“I think God is reminding us with tragedies like this to remember and return to Him.”

Second-guesses at the Gloria transfer

After a month of stakeouts, the much-awaited move finally had a date: December 9.

It meant the news media could relax a little and even reassign momentarily some of the OB vans or people that have long-guarded the St. Luke’s Medical Center in Taguig City.

One station appropriated its St. Luke’s van for the “Occupy Mendiola” protests that diverted attention to the Palace doorstep days before the scheduled transfer. The van returned to find its spot intact and still reserved.

Reporters from the so-called “St. Luke’s press corps” could soon say goodbye to their joked-about Christmas party, and also to the air-conditioned waiting area complete with hot water and the occasional gratis snack courtesy of the hospital.

(Shot by Anjo Bagaoisan)

But while everyone finally knew the day, no one knew the hour former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo would be brought to the Veterans Memorial Medical Center (VMMC) in Quezon City, where she was ordered by court to spend her hospital arrest.

And despite the frequent ambush interviews at the media area–all carried live on ANC–no spokesperson would drop a clue.

“Probably between 12 midnight and 11:59 in the evening,” said Atty. Ferdinand Topacio, lawyer to Arroyo’s husband Mike, and now infamous for humorously answering media queries and jesting with reporters.

The faces of war

(Shot by Anjo Bagaoisan)

IPIL, ZAMBOANGA SIBUGAY–The arrival of flag-draped caskets did not seem to end.

Soldiers greeted them as they were unloaded from trucks at Zamboanga City’s Edwin Andrews Air Base.

The 19 coffins were flanked, three to four soldiers on each side, into a long row of blue and red, being readied for a march of farewell.

Their only identification was written on straps of packing tape: the surname and rank of the body they bore and the city they were headed for.

The coffins were led out to the waiting C-130 plane as a dirge filled the air.

A chaplain blessed the caskets. And as the grieving sobbed, all the soldiers at the tarmac raised a final salute.

Watch Jorge's report by clicking on the pic. (Shot by Anjo Bagaoisan)

Reporter Jorge Carino observed later on TV Patrol: “The return of a soldier in this way is probably the saddest of all homecomings.”

Whether the escorts knew their slain comrades or not, the remains remind them of an end they have all prepared for as they respond to duty’s call.

This is the face of war.

Incoming video

Our cameraman Rolly & his assistant Mike at the airstrip. (Shot by Anjo Bagaoisan)

IPIL, ZAMBOANGA SIBUGAY–4:30 PM, two hours before TV Patrol: Our team was still on standby at our setup in the police provincial office.

Usually by that time, we’ve begun editing our report for the newscast, which for the past 3 days had made us their top story.

But the day’s story had not yet arrived.

It was still on its way, in helicopters carrying Gov. Rommel Jalosjos and his team to the Ipil runway, or on a Navy boat of policemen sailing for the local port.

With them were the first images of the central camp occupied until the previous day by groups pursued by the government after the fighting in Basilan island that left 19 soldiers dead.

Media people were discouraged from going due to the threat of being kidnapped for ransom or as shields by bandits. We were assured cameras were brought along to document the location.

I joined our reporter Ron Gagalac and his team at the 102nd infantry brigade, a short drive from the police headquarters and the airstrip.

Ron reported the night before that armed forces had finally seized the camp up north in Labatan, Payao town after days of air strikes.

(Shot by Anjo Bagaoisan)

We were hoping to link up with the army photographer who was flying back, copy his shots into my laptop, and rush to our setup to go live in time for Patrol’s first gap.

5:25 p.m.: Two helicopters landed on the airstrip. The governor waved a greeting to us from the SUV that came to fetch him.

But our man, who walked to where we stood carrying a backpack, boots, and a rifle, had returned empty-handed of the shots.