The document summarizes the lives and contributions of three Filipino women during the Marcos martial law period: 1) Liliosa Hilao, a student activist who was tortured and killed by the military for her writings criticizing the regime. 2) Lorena Barros, a feminist leader and poet who founded the activist group Makibaka and was killed in a military raid while underground. 3) Leticia Jimenez-Magsanoc, a journalist who used her columns and editorials to subtly criticize Marcos and promote democracy, surviving to see the restoration of democracy after People Power. These three women bravely challenged the authoritarian regime through their writings and activism.

1. Gonzales, Sellena | May 12, 2017
Three Times a Lady
Given that this is the last reflection paper for the subject, I’d have to be straightforward:
Though I am well invested in Philippine history, it was still difficult for me to not procrastinate
writing about it; with the reason that I wouldn’t know where to begin, as my thoughts would be
a haze of emotions because of the heavy reading material that bears just every amount of
significance. These events were real, and I often found myself overpowered by my own
contemplating that perhaps my writing wouldn’t suffice to give credit to these parts of history,
of the narrative. I’d end up thinking that a paper written with half a heart is an exposition
unworthy of what the country had been through and is going through. Paragraphs half meant are
fraud dedications to the motherland that brought us up. So when the task of writing about three
heroes who rose and fell in the atrocious period of martial law was announced, I knew what this
responsibility entailed. It wouldn’t be enough to just randomly pick out a name from the list
provided by the Bantayog ng mga Bayani, yet also every name on that list is as relevant as
another; I’d have to go beyond the biographies written there. I have this responsibility to respect
their lives, their sacrifices and tribulations, and to know these heroes through deeper literature.
Despite my doubts that my words wouldn’t give them their due justice, I do hope that this
attempt would at least pay tribute to the cause they had fought for.
I chose three women as the rightful subjects of this paper: one that was not supposed to die
just because democracy was dead, a heroine that possessed the blood of the revolutionaries, and
a woman who lived on to see democracy restored and presently threatened. As I believe it is my
duty here to briefly tell their story, I ask the reader to please accept my humble sentences as
homage and as a contrast to the works of these three women that changed the nation.
“...but can you really separate the past from the present, the present from the future?”
It was the 27th
of September 1970 when Liliosa Hilao wrote this excerpt. Some say that
Liliosa, or Lily as she was fondly called, appeared to have a sixth sense to prophetically write
what would be her misfortune two years later. “My anger rises,” Liliosa elaborates, “my
passion seemed suppressed by an iron hand so strong I had to struggle to keep me from being

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smothered, yet I do not know what it is.” Lily would as well state in her diary, at the declaration
of martial law, that “Democracy is dead.” As a sign of mourning, she would always wear black.
An honorable student of the Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Maynila, Lily had many friends
and was active in various extracurricular activities. She was about to graduate cum laude in 1973
when activism was at its peak, but due to the most unfortunate turn of circumstances, such a
future would distance itself from Lily. With a strong belief of justice, she wrote essays for the
university’s student paper as the associate editor; displaying titles that would be considered
subversive at the time. Because of asthma and having a frail body, Lily couldn’t participate in
rallies and demonstrations; instead, she would actively write her passions, which resulted in
consequences that arose one night in April 1973.
Drunk soldiers forced their way into the Hilao residence, looking for Liliosa’s older brother
who was an engineer. Lily demanded a search warrant from the soldiers, members of the
Philippine Constabulary Anti-Narcotics Unit, but the men beat her, her mother, and her sisters:
handcuffing Lily to take her to Camp Crame. It was at this point that Liliosa Hilao would be the
first recorded student victim of Proclamation 1081.
At the headquarters of the Philippine Constabulary, a brother-in-law who was an army
officer was allowed to see Lily. Marks of torture were present on her body, yet the
brother-in-law couldn’t do anything. The following day Lily’s older sister Alice was called to
the camp for her to see the detainee; only, Alice no longer saw a Liliosa alive. Lily’s butchered
body, nearly unrecognizable, was laid on an operating table. Present were eleven injection marks,
handcuff-scarred arms, lips covered with cigarette burns, and gun-barrel bruises. Hints of sexual
abuse was also not excluded from the question. Various reports state that Lily died due to
muriatic acid being forced down her throat, but authorities declared her death a suicide and the
case closed. Some testimonials have gruesome accounts that in the wake of Lily, her innards,
from a post mortem disembowelment, were brought as a mass likened to pig’s blood stew.

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Because of the tragedy, the Hilao family had to leave their home to avoid detention or a
worse fate. Two weeks after, at the graduation ceremonies of the Pamantasan, a seat meant for
Lily was left vacant. Posthumously, the degree of cum laude was given to her.
Liliosa Hilao’s memory sparked an even more intense fight against the oppressive regime of
dictator Ferdinand Marcos. Contemporary activist literature crowned her as the writer’s muse,
dedicating verses to this young martyr who had to die at 23 years of age. Lily, a woman who
was merely caught at the wrong place and at the wrong time; Liliosa, who had a bright future
ahead of her as a consistent scholar and loving daughter; had to suffer the inhumane reality of
martial rule, as though she was just an innocent game hunted out of cruel leisure in the forest.
“The new woman, the new Filipina, is first and foremost a militant…”
Lorena Barros was a poet, charismatic leader, and remains today as a name associated with
modern Philippine feminism. Lorena was born a revolutionary, having a mother who served in
the World War II guerilla resistance Hukbalahap, and a great-grandfather who was once a
Katipunero. An honor student from grade school to college possessing a keen social awareness,
Lorena graduated from the University of the Philippines in 1970 with an anthropology degree.
She began teaching immediately after, while taking masteral courses, and earned the reputation
of a prolific writer because of her many published works of essay and poetry. Lorena was
eventually elected as president of the UP Writers Club.
She, the “gentle warrior” who seldom spoke (but when she did, everyone was drawn to her)
accomplished all this vocation whilst not sacrificing her work in the political activism sphere.
Lorena was exposed early on to the struggles of those in the rural areas, to street demonstrations
held at the Malacanang or at the U.S. Embassy, to the fiery speeches and courage of fellow
young men and women who fought against the dictatorship. A follower, Lorena would become a
leader and found the Makibaka (Malayang Kilusan ng mga Kababaihan): an organization
comprising of women, for as the first chairperson she believed that women should have their
own place in the movement. Makibaka chapters soon spread quickly, and Lorena’s writing
became more provocative, making her an undesirable of the law. Lorena Barros was not one to

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exude the stereotypical image of a feminist activist: she taught and interacted with her usual
kindhearted personality.
“...the new Filipina is one who has learned….” she challenged her fellow women, “to
convince the male comrades that they need not take care of her, please.” These traits Lorena
bore, going underground at Marcos’ suspension of the writ of habeas corpus, and balanced the
two roles of mother and warrior as she married and had a son. She kept a discrete
correspondence with family and friends back in the city, but not long after as Lorena was
arrested and transferred several times from one province and camp to another. It was in 1974
when Lorena escaped from the Fort Bonifacio’s Ipil Rehabilitation Center with three other
political prisoners and rejoined the underground for two more years; continuing her writing and
militant fighting. A reward of 35,000 pesos was promised by the government to whoever could
find her. On March 24, 1976 Lorena Barros was to take her last stand. Government troops raided
a hut in Mauban, Quezon and Lorena’s comrades had an encounter, yet Lorena ordered her
companions to escape. She was left alone, armalite in her hand, and exchanged shots with
soldiers until she was killed in the nape of her neck. Lorena was 28 years old.
Family and friends gave her a heroine’s wake and burial; her comrades carrying her coffin
and singing songs that proclaimed of revolution, despite the risks of arrest. Years later, Lorena
Barros would become the woman of dedication in the poetry of Bienvenido Lumbera (and many
more poets inspired by her martyrdom): verses chanting for all the Lorenas, all the women who
yearned for the restoration of freedom, and all the Filipinas who are warriors in the battlefield.
“Fun and Freedom”
This was a phrase Leticia Jimenez-Magsanoc would frequently use, keeping the optimistic
side of her responsibilities as a journalist and as a beloved editor of the Philippine Daily Inquirer.
But before she was Letty or boss LJM with the infectious laugh and admirable wit, Leticia
Jimenez was a child of a military officer who grew up in a comfortable home; becoming part of
the staff for the Philippine Panorama at the time of the declaration of martial law in 1972. As the
editor, Letty maintained the light Sunday tone of the magazine while crucial and political points
were still raised. Though known for her bright personality, Letty took the happenings in the

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national scene as serious subjects of her writing: voicing out what she believed in and what
injustices she saw under Marcos via the Panorama. She remained a strong confidante of her
writers, defending them when she needed to, all the while publishing sarcastic and satirical
pieces in her column. As her writings provoked the government more, Letty was forced to
resign.
Many would consider it ingenious of LJM to dodge the case of journalists being arrested
one by one, as she had an alternative way of writing that wasn’t as open as her contemporaries.
She proceeded to write columns in the background, occasionally slipping anti-dictatorship
comments in a family-friendly and entertainment magazine. Letty would constantly write these
anti-Marcos columns until the assassination of Aquino, the signal that fanned the flames of the
revolution, and used her daring prose to attract a multitude of readers: upholding the cause
within the editorial room. LJM would become the Inquirer’s first editor-in-chief, pushing the
publication to high levels that earned it the reputation of an award-winning medium which
exposed malpractices in the government. This she and her journalists did, without sacrificing the
quality of the publication’s feel-good stories. Although herself a renowned receiver of numerous
titles, LJM did not bask in the limelight. She stayed true to her word that journalism is a
vocation, a calling.
Leticia Jimenez-Magsanoc lived on to witness the stolen democracy of the country restored,
and at present time threatened by the still-corrupt administrations following the People Power.
She was a journalist who evaded harsher circumstances either out of ingenuity or sheer luck, but
those who knew her deemed the former. As she passed away on the Christmas Eve of 2015,
LJM did not cease to receive utmost praise for her contributions. Posthumous honors were given
her, so were memories appreciatively reminisced of how she challenged an oppressive regime.
Liliosa, Lorena, Leticia
Three heroines of the same time, but with diverse personalities and different fates, they
deserve every recognition there is for a bravery that exhibited two actions: Showing the country
what a Filipino woman is capable of, and speaking against a two-decade authoritarian rule

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through writing and much more drastic measures in the open field. From hereon they will be
remembered, so will the other unnamed martyrs who are yet to be known and rightly honored.