Uphold the Militant and Revolutionary Tradition of the First Quarter Storm!

FIRST QUARTER STORM NETWORK – U.S.A. (FQSN-U.S.A.)

PRESS STATEMENT
January 31, 2007

Uphold the Militant and Revolutionary Tradition of the First Quarter Storm!

San Francisco – On the 37th anniversary of the First Quarter Storm of 1970, we, the members of the First Quarter Storm Network (FQSN) in the United States, pay tribute to all the living activists and masses who
participated in this historic event and to those martyrs who have given up their lives for the people, and were products of this momentous occasion.

On January 26, 1970, the national-democratic movement and other sectors mobilized in front of the Philippine Congress to protest the intervention of then President Marcos on the Constitutional Convention of 1971. Aware that Marcos was out to perpetuate himself in power,
the youth movement then led by the Kabataang Makabayan (KM – Patriotic Youth) and the Samahang Demokratiko ng Kabataan (SDK – Democratic Youth Association) and other youth groups mobilized more than 50,000, called for true systemic change and not to hinge their hope on a “non-partisan constitutional convention” – then slogan of the Christian socialist and reformist sectors.

The fascist military and police brutally attacked the unarmed protestors and ushered in the series of mass action now known as the First Quarter Storm (FQS). Hundreds of students were beaten up, arrested, and jailed. Both the militant and the reformist youths
scheduled massive indignation rallies and actions within the next days.

On January 30 and 31, 1970, during the indignation marches and rallies, angry students and youth, who were defending themselves again from unprovoked attacks by the military and police as well as
water-housing firemen, stormed the gates of Malacañang. Using a captured fire engine, they rammed the gates and made it inside the compound of the palace.

The military counter-attacked and this time using rifles and pistols, they tried to break up the mass demonstrations. The students angered by the military response raised barricades and fought the military
police the whole night of January 30 until the wee hours of the morning of January 31, 1970.

The result of the battle was lopsided. Four students were killed and more than 150 were wounded. More than 200 were arrested and jailed but were released later. It was really a firestorm in Philippine history that until now has not been surpassed.

For several months, rallies, people’s congresses, marches and protest actions were conducted almost weekly and in different forms. The people were mobilized by the tens of thousands. The FQS produced
thousands of activists, cadres and mass leaders who fought and died for the interest of the masses. It was truly a political storm.

The Significance of the FQS

But the FQS was not just a spark that light up the movement. It was product of more than a decade of organizing by earlier activists from the Student Cultural Association of the University of the Philippines (SCAUP) and the Kabataang Makabayan (KM) from the late 1950’s to 1964 and the October 24th Movement of 1966. They laid the foundations of the FQS which changed the history of the Philippines.

In May 2001, when veterans of the FQS gathered during the First International Assembly of the International League of Peoples’ Struggle (ILPS) in Zutphen, The Netherlands, they decided to form the FQSN in the United States and align themselves with the FQSM in
the Philippines.

They saw the need to uphold the militant and revolutionary tradition of the FQS so as not to let it be an “intellectual property” of fake historians, revisionists and opportunists who tried to misappropriate the name of the FQS for their own selfish interests. They took note that there were different groups calling themselves as “veterans of the FQS” and were using them to attack the real spirit of the FQS and malign the present-day revolutionary movement. Some of them were even from the military and former NPA members who had surrendered to the government and are now in the pay of the reactionary
regimes. Some of them were even high officials of the government.

The two EDSA uprisings which overthrew the political leaderships of Marcos and Estrada in 1986 and 2001 but maintained the reactionary system made the FQS even more relevant to the masses and the youth to uphold its revolutionary and historic tradition.

The FQS was an impetus for many activists to fight for systemic and lasting change in the Philippine society. We hope to look into the day that the barricades will rise again, and the youth will be in the streets to fight for real systemic change and effect real and lasting change for the downtrodden of the society. #