Who was Iloilo’s Atong Ang?

“The cock does not just crow! It crows for a reason. Do not just concentrate on the cock crowing and mind the reason why it crows”

—Author Unknown

 

By Alex P. Vidal

 

SOMETIME in February 1991, two cockfight enthusiasts (sabungeros in Tagalog or manog bulang in Hiligaynon) were murdered at past 8 o’clock in the evening near the popular chicken house in Fort San Pedro, Iloilo City in the Philippines.

Ricardo and Jonathan (not their real names) were drinking beer in one table when a lone gunman approached and peppered them with bullets. They died on the spot from fatal gunshot wounds, according to police reports.

After receiving tips from witnesses, then Iloilo Police Metro District Command (Metrodiscom) chief, the late former city councilor, Colonel Achilles Plagata, and his men immediately proceeded to Iloilo St. Paul Hospital to arrest the suspect, Enrique (not his real name), who was “confined.”

But Enrique’s older brother, Pacquito (not his real name), a lawyer, prevented Plagata and his men from entering the “patient’s” room.

I was with Pacquito, who asked me hours earlier to accompany him to that hospital “to visit my sick brother.”

 

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Suspicious, Enrique initially did not want me to enter his room, but Pacquito assured him I was not a hostile guest and let me in.

Pacquito said his brother Enrique was rushed to that hospital the same evening because of hyperthermia, which can manifest as heat exhaustion or, in its most severe form, heat stroke. Hyperthermia is characterized by a core body temperature above the normal range, often above 104°F (40°C), and can be caused by exposure to high heat or strenuous physical activity.

While we were inside, the policemen led by Plagata arrived and threatened to barge in forcefully if Pacquito and Enrique wouldn’t open the door.

The cops said they were there to implement a “hot pursuit operation” against a suspected killer, they referred to as Enrique.

“Yuta nio eh ako pa kuwaan nio ulo. Naano ina sia? Init lawas ya? Naton gin daskan nio lang sibuyas buli ya para mag init lawas ya.” (SOB, stop fooling me. His whole body is only heating up because you inserted onions inside his anus),” barked Plagata, who insisted to arrest Enrique.

Pacquito, invoking Enrique’s “basic” rights, tried to stop Plagata and his cops from arresting Enrique to no avail.

To make the long story short, police were able to successfully remove Enrique from his hospital bed and brought him to the Iloilo City Police Office (ICPO).

 

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Police theorized Enrique went to the hospital several hours after allegedly killing Ricardo and Jonathan “pretending” he was ill. How he was able to immediately secure a private room boggled Plagata’s mind.

If he was the one who pulled the trigger in the crime scene that occurred some four kilometers away (estimated distance between Fort San Pedro and the hospital on Gen. Luna St., City Proper), why did Enrique allegedly shoot and kill Ricardo and Jonathan?

Investigations that followed said the victims, who weren’t originally from Iloilo City, had been accused of cheating or game-fixing in a derby in a Jaro cockpit days earlier.

Enrique was allegedly “tasked” to follow and give them a “disciplinary action” until he was able to find the “perfect” opportunity to mow them down.

Other versions claimed Enrique and the two victims only accidentally met in the crime scene for the first time and the suspect, a known trigger-happy maniac in his neighborhood, shot them after they gave him a dagger look, a version Plagata and his investigators had shunned.

 

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The families of Ricardo and Jonathan failed to get justice for the slain sabungeros or manog bulang after Enrique was killed in a shootout with relatives after corrupt jail guards allowed him to attend a family party during a holiday.

We remember the case of Ricardo and Jonathan now that the Department of Justice (DoJ) is investigating the case of the 34 sabungeros in Metro Manila kidnapped, killed, and “most likely” dumped in Taal Lake, Batangas.

Witness Julie ”Totoy” Patidongan, claimed that businessman Charlie “Atong” Ang is the mastermind behind the disappearances, while former actress and Ang’s investor Gretchen Barretto allegedly voted on the kidnappings.

If Enrique was Iloilo’s Patidongan, who was Iloilo’s Atong Ang?

(The author, who is now based in New York City, used to be the editor-in-chief of two leading daily newspapers in Iloilo, Philippines.—Ed)

 

 

Iloilo journalism’s bravest soldier

“I go to the ocean to say goodbye.”

―Charlotte Eriksson

 

By Alex P. Vidal

 

AMONG my senior colleagues in community journalism, I ranked Limuel Sotto Celebria, 69, as among the best opinion writers in Iloilo of all time.

As a local columnist, he was in the category of Manuel “Boy” Mejorada, Herbert Vego, Atty. Teopisto “Pet” Melliza, Wenceslao Mateo, Jr., the late Sonny Rico, Bel Sobrevega, and Dean Art Jimenez.

They were the crème de la crème in the Iloilo print media after Martial Law was lifted in1981, and before the 1986 EDSA Revolution.

I mentioned only a few because they were really the most active columnists in the English periodicals then who became part of the household of regular newspaper readers in Western Visayas.

Limuel was already a prominent figure in Iloilo journalism when I was still member of the College Editors Guild of the Philippines (CEGP)—both the original and the “reform movement” in late 80s.

I first met Limuel in the press conference of the 1988 Paraw Regatta Festival at Hotel del Rio’s Igmaan Hall in Iloilo City. I was reporter of News Express and he was associate editor of Western Visayas Daily Times. Limuel attended the press conference with sportswriter and future wife, Gina Hablero-Celebria.

The meeting was casual with no earthshaking moment, but it was the first time we saw each other in real time.

 

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Not all newspaper columnists are gifted. Not all who write columns are good opinion makers and analysts.

Because of Peter Principle, any charlatan can call himself a “columnist” even without substance and empirical evidence or basis.

Limuel was not only intelligent but was also a remarkable critic, a political, cultural and social gadfly who could easily sway public opinion and educate the readers.

Aware that tabloid space is a premium, Limuel had clarity and conciseness. His writing style was easily understandable; he knew how to circumvent jargon when writing for a broad audience.

Limuel was best known for using descriptive language and imagery to paint a vivid picture for the reader in his “calumny” column.

When I briefly joined the Western Visayas Daily Times sometime in 1993, he was the paper’s “outgoing” associate editor; Mejorada was the “outgoing” editor-in-chief.

The late Ivan Suansing, future first editor-in-chief of Sun.Star Iloilo in1996 and managing editor of Cebu Daily News in 1998, was their senior reporter.

Limuel lived a simple life. I noticed he never wore fancy or branded clothes, shoes and jewelry. He loved his family first and foremost, cold beer in a cold bar, and to belt out his favorite videoke song, Bon Jovi’s “Bed of Roses.”

 

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Too bad Limuel had to suffer from several serious ailments after his health problems began in late 2021 after experiencing blood in his urine.

The issue recurred, leading to a CT scan in 2022 that revealed stage IV renal cell carcinoma (kidney cancer) that had spread to his lungs after initial treatment offered some relief. Limuel underwent a nephrectomy to remove the cancerous kidney, but sadly, the cancer had already metastasized.

Limuel was also treated for the following: Pneumonia in an immunocompromised state; Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in acute exacerbation; Stage II hypertension; Gouty arthritis.

He underwent targeted drug therapy for the cancer, but the cost of treatment presented a significant challenge.

After saying his final goodbye on July 4, 2025, Limuel must now be resting in peace in the bed of roses prepared by his Creator.  Farewell Limuel, Iloilo journalism’s bravest soldier. So long, my dear friend and colleague!

(The author, who is now based in New York City, used to be the editor-in-chief of two leading daily newspapers in Iloilo, Philippines.—Ed)

 

 

Murder of Pinay nurses remembered

"Successful crimes alone are justified." 

—John Dryden

 

 By Alex P. Vidal

 

WE remember the "crime of the century" that happened 59 years ago when two Filipina nurses were butchered beyond recognition by a drunken rapist evening on July 13, 1966 inside a dormitory on 2319 East 100th Street (I regularly passed by this street on my way to the Union Station when I was in Chicago many years ago) in Chicago, Illinois, USA.

Corazon Pieza Amurao, 23, of San Luis, Batangas; Valentina P. Pasion, 24, of Jones, Isabela; and Merlita Ornedo Gargullo, 22, of Naujan, Mindoro were among the nine student nurses attacked by a lone assailant, Richard Franklin Speck, a drifter from Texas, inside the dormitory. Only Amurao survived.

Pamela Lee Wilkening, 22, of Lansing; and Nina Jo Schmale, 24, of Wheaton, both in Illinois were raped and killed. The others who suffered multiple stab wounds and strangulation were Patricia A. Matusek, 21, Mary Ann Jordan, 20, and Suzanne Bridget Farris, 21, all of Chicago; and Gloria J. Davy, 22, of Dyer, Indiana.

According to US-based Fil-Am journalist Joseph Lariosa, who interviewed Jack G. Wallenda, the first Chicago police homicide detective to arrive at the crime scene, the incident chipped away at the conventional wisdom of accommodating an armed intruder instead of putting up a resistance to survive.

Amurao and Gargullo tried to loosen their hands and Amurao whispered to others that when she freed herself, she could pick up a steel bunk ladder and hit the man with it. They could have leaped on him and overpowered him.

Lariosa said they could have done this when Speck was stripping the bed sheets to use them to tie their hands and ankles as he laid his gun aside.

But the rest told them to keep still as they accommodated Speck’s demand to give him $38 as he was heading to New Orleans.

 

DETECTED

 

Although a sneeze away from getting detected, Lariosa said two things that saved Amurao’s life were her foresight and her pure luck when Speck lost count.

As Speck took Gargullo out of the bunk bed from the room and stabbed and killed her in another room as he had done with the rest, leaving Davy on top of the bunk bed and Amurao under the bunk bed, Amurao summoned all her strength to wiggle herself towards the bunk bed earlier occupied by Gargullo.

So that when Speck returned to look at Amurao’s previous location and saw it empty, Speck thought that Davy was the last in the room.  She then climbed out of the bedroom window onto a ledge and screamed that her friends were all dead.

The next day, Amurao fled a scene of such great carnage that it made veteran cops and police reporters vomit.

Detectives would find Davy dead on the sofa, naked and sexually assaulted. Upstairs, Wilkening had been gagged and stabbed through the heart.

Farris was in a pool of blood, having been strangled with her own stockings and stabbed 18 times. Jordan was stabbed three times.

Schmale was stabbed in a pattern around her broken neck. Paison's throat had been cut. Gargullo had been stabbed and strangled. Matusek was also strangled.

The women had been so disfigured that the director of nurses was able to recognize only 3 of them.

According to Amurao, Speck, armed, had forced entry into the dormitory and tied up the women. She hid under a bed, forced to listen as he raped, beat, and killed each of her friends.

His was an easy conviction, and Speck died in prison when suffered a heart attack in 1991.

 

RIGHTS

 

The case also demonstrated that individual rights take precedence over diplomatic niceties, added Lariosa. As the Philippine Consul General Generoso Provido in Chicago at the time wanted to provide legal assistance to Amurao, the young nurse diplomatically declined the offer after getting wind of the scheme that the Filipino American lawyer being recommended by Provido was more interested in getting a slice from money generated from rights to her story than protecting her legal rights.

In a curt statement, Amurao issued the following statement: “It is my desire to make it clear that the memory of dear colleagues is of such character that I do not want to have it tainted by the acceptance by me of money or other personal benefit.”

Aside from getting $5,000 out of the $10,000 reward money offered by the South Chicago Community Hospital leading to the solution of the case, Amurao has stuck by her word, resisting bids for her to sell her rights to her horrifying experience.

Let’s leave God alone when Pacquiao collides vs Barrios

"You cannot believe in God until you believe in yourself."

--Swami Vivekananda

 

By Alex P. Vidal

 

WE don’t want a repeat of what we saw 13 years ago when our sports hero, Manny Pacquiao, kissed the canvas and nearly lost his life after collecting a $26-million purse in that WBO tragedy.

On July 19, 2025, the boxing senior citizen, 46, who just failed to reclaim his seat in the Philippine senate, will get a comparatively paltry amount in his 12-round WBC 147-lb bout versus champion Mario Barrios, 30.

But the risk of reenacting the gruesome canvas-kissing scene remains higher since he is supposed to be spending his leisure time in the nursing home instead of the square jungle trying to snatch the WBC welterweight diadem from a younger beak buster.

I was in the ringside together with fellow accredited journalists from the Philippines and other countries in the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas evening on December 8, 2012 when Juan Manuel Marquez brutally knocked out Manny Pacquiao in the sixth round in their 12-round fourth and final match billed as “Fight of the Decade.”

We saw and heard what happened. We, too, were horrified and momentarily frozen in disbelief.

We were used to watching Pacquiao making a mincemeat of all his Mexican customers from San Antonio to Arlington and back to glitzy La Vegas. Now, he was the one who got decked—horrifically.

 

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Pacquiao, then 33, fell face first from Marquez’s thunderous right to the mouth. Referee Kenny Bayless did not bother to count as Pacquiao deposited himself on the canvas motionless.

It was a terrifying sight no Filipino present inside the arena with a seating capacity of 17,000 wanted to see.

Many superstitious fans and critics were quick to blame Pacquiao’s transformation from a Catholic faithful to “Born Again” Christian.

“God must’ve punished him,” they eerily surmised.

If true, then God is not just; He is cruel and plays favorites.

Since most of us believe that God is pure love in its most supreme form, He could not have guided Marquez’s lethal right to inflict harm on a faithful follower.

God has laid down from all eternity the law which governs all things, like light from the sun; but He will never change the economy of world boxing for Marquez, who is also a Roman Catholic from Iztacalco, Mexico.

What happened to Pacquiao had also happened to other great marquee names such as Muslim convert Muhammad Ali, Mike Tyson, Lennox Lewis, Roberto Duran, Tomas Hearns, Sugar Ray Leonard, and the late Rev. George Foreman. 

 

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When all these ring titans were felled with one blow in their own high-profile fights, nobody blamed God or their supposed conversion to any faith for the Waterloo.

Ali (56-5, 37 KOs), formerly Cassius Clay, converted from Christian to Muslim after winning the world heavyweight crown from Sonny Liston on February 25, 1964.

As a Muslim, he racked up 10 straight wins before losing by unanimous decision to Joe Frazier for the world heavyweight championship on March 8, 1971 in New York.

In this defeat to Frazier (32-4, 27 KOs), Ali was floored with a single punch and nearly suffered a knockout loss but managed to finish the fight scheduled for 15 rounds.

Nobody blamed his shocking loss to his decision to embrace Allah.

Before he became a pastor, Foreman suffered a humiliating 8th round technical knockout defeat to Muslim Ali on October 30, 1974 in Zaire.

In this epic war dubbed “Rumble in the Jungle,” the Christian God and Allah did not intervene to save their respective “bets.”

 

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Another Muslim fighter Hasim Rahman (50-9-2, 41 KOs) made headlines all over the globe after scoring a major upset in the heavyweight division with a one-punch knockout win over previously indestructible British Lennox Lewis (41-2, 32 KOs) at the Carnival City, Brakpan, Gauteng, South Africa on April 22, 2001.

Again, nobody credited Allah for Rahman’s extra-ordinary power that night.

Nobody blamed Lewis for missing his “duties and obligations” as Christian Anglican faithful.

The distinction between religion and superstition is fundamental in the fall of Pacquiao.

Voltaire, in his magnificent prayer, once addressed to God in the article “Theist” where he expounded his faith finally and clearly:  “The theist is a man firmly persuaded of the existence of a supreme being as good as he is powerful, who has formed all things; who punishes, without cruelty, all crimes, and recompenses with goodness all virtuous actions…Reunited in the principle with the rest of the universe, he does not join any of the sects which all contradict one another. His religion is the most ancient and the most widespread; for the simple worship of a God preceded all the systems of the world.”

(The author, who is now based in New York City, used to be the editor-in-chief of two leading daily newspapers in Iloilo, Philippines.—Ed)