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I earned my degree in Bachelor of Science in Commerce (BSC) in UST when the institution was still under the direction of Spanish Dominican priests and the Spanish language was a required subject in order to graduate.

The UST campus in Manila still stands out like a well-shaped, dazzling jewelry in a city that is now stained and mottled by ecological ugliness as a result of human neglect. The almost 400-year old University which used to be located in Intramuros is the oldest in Asia and, in student population; it is the largest Catholic University in the world located in one site. The founders of this old institution were Spanish Priests of the Dominican order but Filipinos of the same religious order now get the lion's share in carrying out the administration and direction of the University.

Countless noble and illustrious Filipinos are products of this old venerable institution most famous of whom is Dr. Jose P. Rizal, the Filipino martyr and national hero of the Philippines whose books Noli Mi Tangere and El Filibusterismo started the beginning of the revolt against Spanish tyranny and eventual freedom and independence of the Filipino people from the yoke of Spanish oppression.

There are many versions of how our national hero faced his death by firing squad in Bagumbayan Field, now the Luneta Park, and this version below which I read from the book Rizal Without the Overcoat by Ambeth Ocampo struck smack on my own thoughts on how our hero must have felt when he bravely met his death for his motherland.

To his death Rizal was generally described by eyewitnesses as cool, calm and unruffled. His face was drained of color, was a bit ashen not because he was afraid but because he did not have any food for breakfast. While death convicts today are often given as their final meal their choice of Filipino food consisting of lechon, crispy pata, fried chicken and their favorite dessert, Rizal was said to have been given just three hard-boiled eggs. He is said to have taken his breakfast plate to a corner of his cell saying, This is for the rats, let them have a fiesta too!

With these last words he left his prison chamber. Rizal was said to have nodded his head left and right to acknowledge the familiar faces in the crowd of people. From time to time he smiled and even cracked jokes with the somber Jesuit priests that accompanied him. His eyes raced quickly from left to right. It was believed that his family or the Katipuneros might make a last minute effort to free him from the clutches of his executioners.

Was Rizal waiting for help that was coming up to save him? Was he waiting for a chance to rebuff that help to show his passion to save his country from Spanish autocracy and determination to die for his conviction? Maybe he wanted to see his family and loved ones for the last time? We will in no way know what was in his mind during the last few minutes of his brief life.

Rizal was walking to his fate. In the early break of day he could see as far as Corregidor across Manila Bay . Passing his eyes on this panorama, he was said to have spoken: On mornings like this, I used to take walks here with my beloved. What a beautiful day! Before reaching Bagumbayan (now The Luneta Park, where his statue now stands to mark where he was shot to death), he took one last look at Intramuros where the old UST campus was when he attended University there and the spires of San Ignacio Church and asked: Is that the Ateneo where I spent many happy years there as a student.

Someone took a photograph of the execution. The scene was a box lined with spectators on three sides, the only place vacant being the fourth side facing the bay and in the line of fire from the executioners.

Eight Filipino solders armed with Remingtons formed the firing squad. Behind them were eight Spanish soldiers with Mausers, ready to shoot our hero over the heads of the Filipinos if they refuse to shoot Rizal.

When everyone was in their places, there was a slight delay because Rizal refused the usual blindfold and asked that he face the firing squad. The Spanish Captain insisted that he be shot in the back as ordered because he was a traitor to Spain . Rizal stated that he had never been a traitor to his country or to Spain. After some coaxing Rizal turned his back but again refused the blindfold and refused to kneel. He made one last request that the soldiers spare his head and shoot him in the back toward the heart. When the Captain agreed, Rizal shook the hand of Traviel de Andrade, the Spanish officer appointed as his defense attorney and thanked him for the vain effort of defending him.

Meanwhile, as is common practice before an execution, the Spanish military doctor came and felt Rizals pulse and was surprised to find it regular and normal. The Jesuit priests were the last to leave him. They raised a crucifix to Rizals face and lips, but he turned his head away and silently prepared for death.

The Spanish Captain raised his saber in the air, he ordered his men to be ready and shouted, preparen! The order to aim the rifles followed: Apunten! In a split second before the Captain's saver was brought down with the order to fire fuego! Rizal shouted the two last words of Christ, consummatum est! (It is done).

The shots rang out, the bullets hit heir mark and Rizal made that carefully choreographed twist he practiced years before that would make him fall face up on the ground. People held their breath as a soldier came up to the corpse and gave Rizal the tiro de gracia, the one last merciful shot in the head at close range to make sure he was dead. It was around 7:00 a.m. in the morning. A small dog, the military mascot, ran round the corpse whining and the crowd moved for a closer look but the soldiers kept silence; the Spaniards in the audience shouted Long live Spain! Death to the traitor! The crowd did not respond, and to fill in the gap the military band played the March de Cadiz.

Thus ended the life of our national hero and patriot, Dr. Jose P. Rizal. He was only 35 years old.

My observation regarding author Ambeth Ocampos view that Rizal is an ordinary human being may not be so accurate. For although Rizal has the same ordinary needs (food, love, etc.) and desires (beautiful women) his vision was not. It is not fair to strip him of what he really is: a genius, a patriot of the first order, fearless, lover, etc. How many Filipinos can be compared with him, or any non-Filipino for that matter?

Short in stature, he towers above all of them, including Churchill, Lincoln or Gandhi. My good friend and brother-in-law Professor Ron Navarrete, who himself is an avid reader of Rizal books once wrote in our exchange of e-mails on Rizal: I just wish his brain were preserved so scientist could analyze the composition or convolutions of that gray matter God so delicately designed inside his skull. I still remember what an American politician wrote: If the bullets destroyed your cranium, likewise your ideas destroyed an empire.

Thats precisely what Rizal did. With his books and writings he started the beginning of the revolt against Spanish tyranny and eventual freedom and independence of the Philippines from Spain and the Filipinos from the yoke of foreign oppression.

December 5, 2008

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