CLARK FREEPORT—Angeles City Mayor Edgardo Pamintuan and Mabalacat City Mayor Marino Morales lingered longer at a corner of the new Clark Museum during its opening last month in time for the start of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) meeting at Clark Freeport in Pampanga province.
At a prominent section of the museum’s second floor, a display drew their attention. Its wall, 2 meters wide and 2 meters tall, features how Philippine senators had voted on the future of US military bases in the country.
There was surprise in the two mayors because this major chapter in Philippine history —which unfolded at the Senate on Sept. 16, 1991, and ended almost 100 years of US military bases’ presence on local soil—occupies so little space, like a mere footnote, in the old museum.
For Pamintuan and Morales, that big shift forever altered the direction of their cities from being base towns to being hosts and providers of workers and services to what is now the Clark Freeport. Unique to them are their experiences in taking part in the base conversion process.
“Clark is proof that Filipinos are doing good in turning [Clark] from military to civilian use,” Pamintuan said.
Morales said the attention on, even a reminder of, the Sept. 16, 1991, event was proper because the end of that era signaled the participation of local governments in the development of Clark.
This part, titled “How the Senate Voted,” belongs to the museum section called “Evolution of Sovereignty Over the Bases.”
Aside from a short commentary on the geopolitics of Clark and Subic, the wall shows photographs and brief statements on why senators voted for or against the bases’ extension.
Those who favored the extension of the 1947 Philippine-US Military Bases Agreement were Heherson Alvarez, Edgardo Angara, Ernesto Herrera, Jose Lina, John Osmeña, Vicente Paterno, Santanina Rasul, Alberto Romulo, Mamintal Tamano, Neptali Gonzales and Leticia Ramos-Shahani.
Those who voted to end the stay of the bases were Agapito Aquino, Juan Ponce Enrile, Joseph Estrada, Teofisto Guingona Jr., Sotero Laurel, Ernesto Maceda, Orlando Mercado, Aquilino Pimentel Jr., Rene Saguisag, Wigberto Tañada, Victor Ziga and Senate President Jovito Salonga. These senators, called the “Magnificent 12,” went against the wish of then President Corazon Aquino to retain the bases.
Subic Bay Freeport, then chaired by Felicito Payumo, honored the 12 senators through a monument across Building 229, fronting the bay that saw Spanish and American wars.
Dr. Ferdinand Llanes, consultant of the new Clark Museum, explained the recognition given that period: “The evolution of our taking over the base lands was always a question of the leadership that gradually, inch by inch, asserted our control of the bases. And the Senate vote was the culmination of that long process.”
“That’s why the theme of this museum is the Filipino spirit, its bravery, industry, ingenuity through all those periods in our history, and that in the end, it would rise after so many challenges,” said Llanes, a former commissioner of the National Historical Commission of the Philippines.