REWRITING history to fit political ends is not new and is quite prevalent.
The Marcoses are known to spend millions of pesos in their attempt to change what everybody knows about Ferdinand Marcos and the Martial Law days.
Even those who helped the former dictator engineer the imposition of dictatorship are in frenzy, rewriting what every Filipino knows about their role in the death of democracy in the country.
Shameless
While changing facts in history by these crooks in the Marcos regime is looked down by the country, the worst is happening somewhere in Laguna where a shameless campaign group is attempting to rewrite the life of Dr. Jose Rizal, our national hero.
In San Pedro City, Laguna, a self-proclaimed publicist, who is reportedly heading the media campaign of one interested to represent the city in the Lower House, claims Dr. Jose Rizal has roots in San Pedro City.
Twisted claim
Clearly, this is a twisted claim that even San Pedro City has not dared to take, as Biñan City had always been recognized as the place where the national hero grew up.
After all, monuments and old houses could attest to Biñan as Rizal’s origins.
In an attempt to connect this congressional aspirant to the noble house of Rizal, the shameless move to rewrite Rizal’s story drew flak from local historians.
“MAGKAURI….Sina Jose Rizal at Dave Almarinez ay parehong tubong San Pedro…”,
goes a quote from the publicist’s post on FB, mentioning names in the life of Rizal while twisting events to create impressions that had local historians shaking their heads if not laughing at this desperate stretching of facts.
Ploy to earn San Pedro’s trust
OpinYon’s own research led to the story of one Bernarda Monica, referred to in the publicist’s claims. Monica’s life was not clearly chronicled in the life of Rizal, leaving gaps that opened the opportunity for a big lie.
This twisting of facts was not missed by local historians. Some laughed it out as an attempt by a shameless liar to earn trust from San Pedro voters.
But others are outright mad, claiming that even city officials of San Pedro have never dared to make this claim as it is a big lie.
Almarinez had always been known as a political official from Biñan City. In campaigns for a board seat in the provincial council, he is officially from Biñan City, representing the first district of the province.
Suspect reasons
Even a story on his colorful life written by a respected writer and daughter of former Senator Blas Ople, Toots Ople, writes of Almarinez’ ancestral home in Biñan City. But today, Almarinez claims his ancestral home is San Pedro City.
Knowing Ople’s reputation as a well-respected media personality who writes on facts, we ask: who’s telling the lies now?
The attempt to convince San Pedro that Almarinez is from San Pedro and not from Biñan is understandable as it is common knowledge that he badly needs to win a congressional seat for “suspect reasons”.
But resorting to rewriting history is just too much and speaks of the character of the person and how badly he wants that seat.
Real facts
It is a fact that he heads an agency tasked to manage tens of billions of pesos in the procurement of government supplies and equipment.
It’s also a fact that the agency he heads, the Philippine International Trading Corporation, is in hot water and was under investigation for funds mismanagement by the Senate.
Observers are connecting the dots. They are making guesses on the “suspect reasons”. There is a common ending in the drift in analysis. Guess what is it?