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PHILADELPHIA, USA – EDSA I, those fateful days in February 1986, is glibly remembered as the peaceful uprising that overthrew a cruel, overstaying, money laundering dictator. It’s also the event that rekindles memorable images of , all important and popular characters then and even now. So do you also remember Fr. Efren Dato?
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Father who? I guess not. The EDSA I peaceful uprising has always centered on these few figures and media has contributed much to cementing their historical figures in books, articles, documentaries and clips. But they are not the only ones who played vital roles in turning the tide against the dictator. There were thousands of activists who have rallied, mobilized and organized since the late sixties and seventies.
There were also the millions of people who have lined EDSA, Channel 4 in Quezon City, and other metropolitan areas around the country to ensure that the former Marcos First Family left the country and relinquished control. There were also lesser known personalities who have contributed both tangible and intangible efforts in the basic fight for a better Philippines.
Here’s where Fr. Efren Dato, the radical priest, enters the picture. His biography is an amazing travel through all forms of activism – from his brief student days at the University of the Philippines, his voyage to young priesthood, his struggles as a progressive-
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THE LIFE AND TIMES OF FR. EFREN DATO – (A) Fr. Efren Dato as a broadcast journalist, circa 1981; (B) Kissing the hand of Pope John Paul in Manila, 1981; (C) Pleading to government soldiers who surrounded PTV-4 not to barge in nor use violence, 23 February 1986; (D) Radio Veritas anchorman; and (E) Efren Dato now, married with a beautiful daughter and living in New Jersey, USA.
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thinking priest in a highly conservative Catholic jurisdiction, his unplanned venture into Radio Veritas, penultimately resulting to self-exile in the United States. He married soon thereafter.
Fr. Efren Dato (now just Efren Dato) is a remarkable source of EDSA I and post EDSA history, as seen from someone who at that time was not surrounded by loyal soldiers, the political opposition, or the Catholic hierarchy. It was his voice, analyses and peaceful appeal that significantly lent a hand in the last days of struggle against the dictatorship. He was simply a man in a robe with Catholic convictions who performed his most dramatic role in the most critical of times.
Brief Activism in UP
His political activism can be traced back to his days at the University of the Philippines in the late 60s. Unrest and dissension from Marcos’ draconian rule swept the country and the state university in particular. Fraternities instituted harsh physical initiations to weed out government infiltrator-applicants from legitimate UP students wishing to join the brotherhood ranks. The First Quarter Storm – the mass demonstrations and street protests from January to March 1970 – was brewing.
A pure product of the public school system, he spent two years at UP taking up Political Science. He became a member of the then activist Catholic organization UPSCA, a theatre society, and if his recollection is correct, a left-leaning university-based fraternity. A year into UP, on July 1968, his mother unexpectedly passed away. Recalling his mother’s dying wish for him to become a priest, he openly vowed during her funeral that he’d enter the seminary out of love for her. He left the famed state university for the San Carlos Seminary a year later.
Entering Priesthood
His transition from UP activism to the calmer setting of the seminary was inordinately difficult. He was still a reformer within and, in extraordinary circumstances, even a revolutionary. He was still aggressive, forthright, frank but with amazingly great people skills. He was, first and foremost, an organizer. The seminary’s inculcation of conservative doctrinal values was, however, slowly changing him into a man of God and a genuine people’s servant.
While becoming verse in scripture, he still was a pursuer of truth. He knew his activism would come out one way or another. Together with a band of seminary classmates (later to be known as “The Eleven”), he led a protest against the decision to dismiss from the Philippines five Belgian progressive priests by the late Cardinal Rufino Santos. Strict and intolerant of dissent, Cardinal Santos kicked them out of the seminary due to lack of vocation or the desire to serve the priesthood.
This meant that for them to continue on with their priestly studies, an adoptive Bishop must accept them into his fold. The Eleven were scattered everywhere; he landed in Malolos, Bulacan. Surprisingly, despite the Cardinal’s admonition but perhaps due in part to the need of more priests in the countryside, he was ordained as a priest on his third year of theological studies (instead of on his fourth). At 23 years old in April 1974, only five years removed from UP, he became a priest. He recalls those five years as a rather “short, unorthodox and simply irregular formation for most ordained priests.”
He entered the seminary bearing a sickle, he left with a white cassock.
As a priest, rather than leading mass demonstrations against Martial Rule, he instead marshaled his efforts on community organizing. He was appointed as Youth-Student Director of the Malolos Diocese and assisted the Student Catholic Action of the Philippines. Through these organizations, he was able to use his strong personality and enigmatic charisma to mobilize and empower the youth, as well as attend conferences and training abroad.
As a young priest and organizer in Malolos, he trained a lot of youth including former Bulacan governor Josie dela Cruz and the incumbent governor, her brother Jon-Jon Mendoza. While professing Love for God in his homilies, Fr. Efren Dato was still involved in political transformation by joining street protests and political rallies that were abundant during that epoch. He believed then that his “priestly ministry included politicizing the people as a constitutive part of (his) evangelizing function.” It was social conscience among the youth and the people that drove him to evangelize and politicize at the same time.
Voice of Radio Veritas
In the 1980s, actress Nova Villa and the late veteran broadcaster Orly Punzalan were hosts of Radio Veritas, a Catholic broadcasting station transmitting from Fairview, Quezon City. While serving as guest entertainers in a San Carlos Seminary alumni function, they spotted the emcee as one with a credible radio voice. He turned out to be Fr. Efren Dato and they immediately invited him to be a guest on their radio program.
Guest broadcasting on Radio Veritas appealed to him immensely and made him realize that it was his cup of tea. In 1981, he accepted the offer to be a full-fledge broadcaster, in time for the Papal Visit of the well-loved Pope John Paul II. He was assigned to cover the historic visit and was stationed close to the Pope as he himself was living at the papal nuncio’s residence.
Without formal broadcasting or media training, he was able to immediately rise up in the ranks of Radio Veritas and became an anchorman, producer and reporter. It even allowed him to take up broadcasting and management courses in Washington, DC, as a scholar in the mid 80s.
In late February 1986, Fr. Efren Dato was broadcasting when the EDSA uprising began. It was an ordeal that would forever change his life. He continued on broadcasting during those tumultuous days without ever going home, shaving or getting well-deserved sleep.
One of the things he was broadcasting then was the destruction of the Malolos transmitter owned by Radio Veritas by troops loyal to the dictator Marcos on February 23, 1986. The besieged President, feeling that the Catholic radio station was not only highly critical of him but was likewise moving in consonance with radical fronts bent on ousting him, wanted to debilitate the radio’s exhortative messages and its influential broadcasters.
Feeling very angry and recalling his radical core, he sought a brief temporary relief from broadcasting duties lest he spews bitter words and livid outrage against the people behind the faltering Marcos regime. He was temporarily relieved by Fr. Larry Faraon, another Radio Veritas priest who had a much calmer tone. Returning soon thereafter, a less anxious Fr. Efren Dato resumed his radio voice. He was cautioned several times by his bishop manager to shut up or to at least tone down his dissidence.
Several times, they received phone calls from Malacanang instructing them to cease sensationalizing Johnny Enrile’s defection from the Marcos government. They did not heed these calls which is a prime reason for the bombing of the Malolos transmitter.
Since Radio Veritas was hampered in its broadcasting ability due to the destruction of its transmitter, they knew they needed another media to speak the truth and
encourage people to go to EDSA. With Lt. Col. Mariano Santiago leading a band of rebel soldiers, Fr. Efren Dato in a white cassock accompanied the raid on Channel 4, the government-owned TV station. Gunfire from Marcos loyalist soldiers from inside the station greeted their arrival.
He accompanied these soldiers without a clear plan on what to do in case the soldiers loyal to Fidel Ramos and Johnny Enrile succeeded in liberating Channel 4. All he knew was that, “in (his) own wisdom, the use of the television station as a medium to inform the people and broadcast the truth was of severe importance.” The rebels were able to seize control of the station with minor fatalities.
Channel 4 was an important continuation of Radio Veritas as the battle now shifted from radio to TV broadcasting. Again, the dictator Marcos threatened to bomb Channel 4 in Bohol Avenue in Quezon City if they did not desist from broadcasting. Fr. Efren Dato, Maan Hontiveros, Orly Punzalan, the bandana-clad Lt. Col. Santiago, and others did not surrender and continued on broadcasting. While at Channel 4, Fr. Efren Dato did not have the blessings of the Catholic hierarchy and was frequently admonished to shut up and calm down in his TV anchoring work.
Crystallizer of Cardinal Sin’s Advocacy
He and his Radio Veritas colleagues knew that if they did not pacify the people, bloodshed would ensue. At that time, helicopters were bombarding buildings along EDSA between Ortigas and Shaw boulevards since rebel soldiers were strategically deployed therein. They needed to tell the truth about the actions of Marcos but could not incite the people to take up arms and engage in bloodletting revolution.
One of the key characters of EDSA I, who was also the administrative superior of the Radio Veritas priests, was the late Jaime Cardinal Sin. What Fr. Efren Dato and the rest of the broadcasters did was to patch interviews of the Cardinal who exclaimed the need for peace and calm amid the storm of protests. They would either call the Cardinal and patch in his message, or would repeat over and over again his prerecorded voice. It was this sense of calm from the spiritual leader of the Catholic Church that stemmed the seething rage of violence.
As Cardinal Sin advocated a peaceful resolution of the crisis, Fr. Efren Dato was able to crystallize the late Cardinal’s advocacy. He quoted from the bible from time to time and narrated scriptural teachings as a way to shift the building momentum of potential violence into a back-to-the-basic Catholization preaching love, sacrifice, peace and brotherhood. Even as a radical priest, he knew that a provocative stance would not only be counteractive to what the Cardinal was emphasizing but will lead to many losses of lives. He, too, wanted change but it cannot be attained through mass slayings.
He recalls that at some time in his life in UP, he almost wanted to go to the hills and continue the fight for change from there. As a priest in the turbulent 70s, he again revisited that option but decided to empower the youth instead. At the radio and TV platform he was wielding at that time, he could’ve brought back his revolutionary ghost and incited the people to ensure that Marcos was deposed by whatever physical means. But he did not. Though his voice was riddled with emotions, he toed the Church’s and his own line.
Due to the extent of Efren Dato’s life and advocacies – particularly his marriage in the United States, his reverberating electoral run as Sheriff in the rich Somerset county in New Jersey, and his illustrious service as Deputy Economic Director of Franklin township, this article will continue on in a Part II in a few days time.
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