‘Being Frank:’ A thriller
Frank Drilon’s memoir Being Frank is a like a Netflix political thriller from the moment the first chapter comes to view. It begins with a blast. Literally.
He wasn’t a spectator, watching footage of the bombing in the news. He and his family were at the epicenter of it.
I already concluded that Drilon’s life is a thriller even before the book’s third chapter, where he wrote quite frankly: “If, thus far, my life on replay has been unreeling like a thriller, at least in my own mind, it has truly been action-packed, especially in the early days after the EDSA Revolution.”
In fact, during his opening remarks at the launching of Being Frank at the Manila Polo Club’s Turf Room—which was bursting at the seams with legal and political heavyweights—Drilon said, “I chose to begin (my book) with disorder, because that is how public service revealed itself to me.”
“My first foray into public service was marked by chaos. My office in the department of labor was attacked by the leftist labor unions. Soon after, the rightists bombed my family home.”
Drilon, whose government career has spanned six administrations (Aquino, Ramos, Estrada, Arroyo, Aquino III and Duterte) was labor secretary, justice secretary, executive secretary, senator and three-time Senate president. He has never lost an election. He participated as senator judge in two impeachment proceedings (Estrada and Corona). He also was Justice secretary (1990-1995) when the most sensational heinous crimes gripped the nation’s attention, including the Cochise-Beebom abduction and murder; the Eileen Sarmenta rape/murder and Allan Gomez murder; and the Myrna Diones case. His mantra then and later in the Senate, “Justice agad.”
While Justice secretary, he also had the professional task of prosecuting his wedding ninong and fellow Sigma Rhoan Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile for “rebellion complexed with murder and multiple frustrated murder.”
Drilon narrated in his memoir, “It was becoming clear to us that he had a hand in the planning of the December 1989 coup against President Cory Aquino.”
Drilon said it was an “unenviable yet absolutely necessary” position he found himself in. “Our mandate was clear: we had to preserve the government, protect our nascent democracy, and enforce the law without fear or favor.”
But in fairness to JPE, Drilon wrote, “he understood.”
Years later, Drilon’s second wife Mila was godmother at Enrile’s grandson’s wedding. And Drilon himself marched down the aisle, upon JPE’s request, as proxy for Jojo Binay.
Ang buhay nga naman. As they say in Filipino, “Walang personalan, trabaho lang.”
***
In his foreword, former Supreme Court Chief Justice Art Panganiban declared, “Franklin M. Drilon should have been President of the Philippines.”
He added, “I tried to inveigle him for the presidency as I was sure the retiring, popular President Benigno Aquino III would support him.”
Panganiban said he also asked Drilon to consider being Chief Justice. The Ilonggo statesman said he never aspired for the presidency, and refused to heed calls for him to be chief magistrate (He revealed PNoy asked him to consider it, too, in a meeting with Butch Abad present).
In his afterword, Education Secretary Sonny Angara, whose baptism Drilon actually attended, said of his Tito Frank, “The young man from Iloilo, known at UP Law for arriving in class with only a small notebook, yet topping the bar exam, proved equal to every responsibility history placed upon him.”
Since I was executive editor of the Presidential Press Staff during the presidency of Cory Aquino, I knew “Sec. Frank” quite well, first as labor secretary, then justice secretary and eventually executive secretary. I admired the way he would articulate the toughest of legal matters and the most difficult decisions. I also thought he was calm and even tempered. I remember him telling a Malacañang reporter who was complaining about certain decisions of the President, “____, you do not have a monopoly on love of country.”
***
Drilon’s book, which he dedicated to the youth, is also very personal because he shared his love story with his first wife Violy, who succumbed to cancer, and how it led to his next and present love, his wife Mila.
On her deathbed Violy told Mila Genuino, a family friend, confidante and a widow, “Take care of Frank.”
Likewise, she told Frank, “Marry Mila.”
I was at Frank and Mila’s wedding in 1997. I am so happy to have witnessed the union of two people who are now living happily ever after. Frankly speaking. *
(Grab a copy of Being Frank at http://beingfrank.drilon.com.
It is hard to put down.)
