Aguinaldo – Bonifacio, clearing some doubts

Posted by Makabayang Supremo
Rome, Italy 11/05/2014

The Supremo has been referred to in history as the Philippine's First (Revolutionary) President.  While certain historians have tried to downplay or dispute his formation and leadership of the earliest national government by and of the Filipinos, there have been clear evidence that Andres Bonifacio was Filipinos' truly first President.

After the Katipuneros launched the uprising against the Spaniards,  the hero set out to transform the secret national organization into an open and de facto revolutionary government. The founder of the Katipunan became the president and formed a cabinet composed of men he trusted, including Emilio Jacinto, Secretary of State; Teodoro Plata, War; Aguado del Rosario, Interior; Briccio Pantas, Justice; and Enrique Pacheco, as Secretary of Finance.

Surviving official letterhead communications dated 1897 point to Bonifacio's various designations that include being the "Supreme President, Government of the Revolution."Perhaps the most telling proofs come from non-partisan sources of his period.

Nineteenth century Spanish historian Jose M. del Castillo, in his 1897 work "El Katipunan" or "El Filibusterismo en Filipinas," describes the first national elections in the Philippines from which Bonifacio emerged as the President, and Plata, Jacinto, del Rosario, Pantas and Pacheco as cabinet officials. This is corroborated by the February 8, 1897 issue of the international publication "La Ilustracion Espanola y Americana" in its article about the Philippine revolution and which featured an engraved portrait of "Andres Bonifacio, Titulado 'Presidente' de la Republica Tagala," clad in a dark suit and white tie.

At any rate, that Bonifacio is the "Father of Philippine Revolution" is undisputed, and his courage legendary. During World War II, his name even was even used by American propagandists to inspire anti-Japanese resistance. His persona was even adopted as a strong theme in the Hollywood World War II movie, "Back to Bataan," which starred John Wayne and Anthony Quinn.

If there is a hero that perhaps historically deserves to be joined with Bonifacio, it is Emilio Jacinto, the "Brains of Katipunan." Jacinto was Bonifacio's confidante and author of Katipunan's moral code, the Kartilya. His principled loyalty to Bonifacio extended even after the Supremo was deposed and murdered: he continued to fight the Spanish soldiers while refusing to join Aguinaldo's forces until his death in April 1899.

For a long time, the US justified its imperialistic turn-of-the-19th-century annexation of the Southeast Asian archipelago by claiming that the Philippines was no nation and was still a Spanish colony when it was 'ceded 'via the 1898 Treaty of Paris. 

Bonifacio have been tricked by the Magdiwang chapter of Cavite's KKK into joining the Tejeros Convention where he was elected Interior Secretary and Aguinaldo, the President.The Katipunan leader was sport enough to accept his lesser position but was enraged (or deliberately made enraged?) when Caviteno Daniel Tirona humiliated him by questioning  his qualifications and even suggesting some lawyer was better fit to handle the position he won. 

A shooting incident was avoided and Bonifacio left. When he and his brother were taking breakfast while on their way back, they were captured and later executed by Aguinaldo's men on May 10, 1897 in a mountain in Maragondon, Cavite.

Just three months since the start of the Phil-Am War, Aguinaldo had another valiant revolutionary killed, Gen. Antonio Luna.

The assassination of this very effective military strategist on June 1899 appears to confirm the theory that Aguinaldo had Bonifacio eliminated for no other reason than for him and his elitist group to take over the leadership of the Katipunan. According to Juan Nakpil:

"(D)riven by his patriotic fervor, he (General Antonio Luna) did not conceal his desire to be the head of the cabinet with the portfolio of war to prevent the autonomists or pacifists from controlling the government of the republic....

"They slandered him of wishing to wrest the presidency from Emilio Aguinaldo, and for that purpose they invited him to enter the rattrap of Kabanatuan to enable the very ones whom he had disarmed for cowardice in different war actions to deal him the deathblow...

"When General A. Luna was dastardly assassinated on the stairs of the Convent of Kabanatuan and already fallen on the ground, the mother of Emilio Aguinaldo looked out the window and asked: "Ano, humihinga pa ba?" (Is he still breathing?)"

Cowardice

In contrast with Magdiwang faction followers of Bonifacio, Aguinaldo refused to fight his captors to death.

On March 23, 1901, American soldiers posing as prisoners of the traitorous Macabebe scouts were led to the whereabouts of the President then on the run. Instead of choosing heroic death over capture as a way of sustaining the morale of his soldiers still valiantly fighting the new colonizing forces, Aguinaldo became a cooperative US Prisoner of War.

Unsurprisingly, his capture led to a succession of surrender of a number of Filipino guerilla leaders. They include the man responsible for the death of US Gen. Henry Lawton, Gen. Licerio Geronimo (surrendered barely a week right after Aguinaldo's capture). 

Quick change of color

Only nine days after American colonizers got him, Aguinaldo swore allegance to US flag. His easy capitulation to the American imperialists was supposedly made under plea that his life be spared. His allegiance to Uncle Sam also caused the Anti-Imperialist League to drop him as their 'poster boy' or rallying symbol for their opposition to the annexation of the Philippines. Aguinaldo's swift betrayal of the First Philippine Republic sharply contrasted with Mabini's adamant, repeated refusal to swear allegiance to America, earning the latter the punishment of exiled in captivity in Guam.