The forgotten innocents of the Maguindanao Massacre: A family's shattered dreams

"The Mangundadatus, the media people, the lawyers, the women -- they all have their advocates to advance their cause. But how many have take up the cause or much less even heard of the story of Eduardo (Nonie) and his wife Cecil Lechonsito, Mercy Palabrica, Daryll delos Reyes, and Wilhelm Palabrica, the five occupants of the red Toyota Vios whose only fault they say was to be in the wrong place at the wrong time?" This the lament of the members of the Lechonsito family when I talked to one of the members of their clan recently regarding the Maguindanao Massacre.

I agree with Antonio J. Montalvan (Inquirer, 10 Janurary 2010) that “not much was brought to the public consciousness about the occupants of that red Vios.” A search through the internet produced nothing much other than an Inquirer column of Ma. Ceres P. Doyo (Inquirer 12/24/09), a letter to the editor (Inquirer 12/27/09) by Katz Serrano (a niece of Nonie), and the combined TV documentary by Kiri Dalena and Pat Evangelista’s print story in ANC. The rest of the entries were “list of victims” making Eduardo Lechonsito and companions mere statistics, unknown faces that will most likely fade in time. That is, unless we the people tell their story.

This blog post then is in response to the plea of Katz Serrano in her letter not to forget the story of her Tito and Tita, “to bring to the public consciousness that there were other innocent victims in that massacre who were not even part of the convoy”. I am writing this because this is not just another story about the Maguindanao Massacre, but the story of a family’s shattered dreams because of a clan's greed for power. I am writing this because Lea Lechonsito-Bacalian, a first cousin of Nonie, is a close friend of mine and like a daughter to me. She gave me most of the materials for this story.

Nonie comes from the large and apolitical clan of the Lechonsitos of Tacurong City. He was born in Tacurong of migrant parents, typical Ilongos from Lambunao, Iloilo who are gentle and God-loving. Nonie was raised by his hard-working parents and was sent to the Catholic-run Notre Dame of Tacurong for his education. Cecil, his wife, is from Dumaguete, who migrated to Tacurong as a young student. As fate had it, she boarded with Nonie’s relatives while studying at Notre Dame. They met one day and soon Nonie started courting her. The courtship ended in a mutual decision to get married and raise a family together. Their union produced two lovely girls who became their parents’ treasures. The couple nicknamed them Honey and Sugar. (I thought no names could have been sweeter… And come to think of it too, they are names that speak of the sweetness and closeness of the family to one another.)

And so together Nonie and Cecil built dreams for their children. They planned to give them the best education and to support them in their chosen careers no matter what it would take. In return the two Lechonsito girls did their utmost best and brought not only sweetness, but also unspeakable joy to their parents.

Two years ago when Sugar had started to go to college, Cecil decided to take the route of going abroad to work as an OFW. Nonie’s salary as city Licensing Officer of Tacurong City, even when combined with Cecil’s salary as manager of a recruitment agency, was not enough to support the two girls’ needs in college. Honey had pursued a course in Manila while Sugar had gone to Iloilo and was in a dormitory. There was an opening for a Nanny to the daughter of a Sheik in Qatar. She decided to apply for it and got the job. With heavy hearts Nonie and the girls let Cecil go. The sweet happy family was “broken”. Nonie remained in Tacurong, Honey in Manila, Sugar in Iloilo, and Cecil in far away, strange, and lonely Qatar. But they all knew it was going to be temporary. The separation was the price they had to pay for their dreams. Anyway, they could look forward to reunions in between, they thought.

The first of such reunions was scheduled to happen last December 2009. Cecil was to come home for vacation starting mid-November in time for her birthday on November 25, then stay for Christmas and all the way until March for Honey’s graduation from college. Everything was set. Nonie had sent the girl’s tickets already.

Cecil arrived from Qatar on November 7, 2009 and stayed in Manila where she, Nonie and Honey had some sort of a mini reunion among themselves and with close relatives. Sugar was in Iloilo and could not join them. But her mother’s promise of a laptop computer as pasalubong and Christmas gift was there.

On November 14 Cecil and Nonie flew home to Tacurong to celebrate Cecil’s birthday and then would just wait for the two girls to come home for the Christmas reunion.

As we all know by now, Cecil never got to celebrate her birthday and the planned Christmas reunion for the sweet lovely family never happened…

Nonie suffered a mild stroke sometime after he and Cecil arrived from Manila. The doctors in Tacurong wanted a CT scan taken which can be done either in Cotabato City to the North of Tacurong or in General Santos City to the South. As fate would have it again, Cecil apparently made arrangements in Cotabato City for the needed CT scan for practical reasons and not in General Santos City where facilities were probably better.

On that fateful morning of Monday, November 23, 2009, two weeks after that mini reunion in Manila with Honey, Nonie and Cecil stepped into a service vehicle, a red Toyota Vios, driven by a Tacurong City Hall employee named Wilhelm Palabrica. They were accompanied by Nonie’s secretary Mercy Palabrica and his faithful aide Daryll delos Reyes. It was supposed to be a normal trip that takes only two hours, more or less, to negotiate, but alas, the trip took a different turn.

Patricia Evangelista of ANC wrote: “On the road to Shariff Aquak, the red Vios with its cargo of five was stopped along with a convoy of vehicles from Buluan city.

Wilhelm and Mercy’s bodies were found on Tuesday, inside the mangled red Vios that the investigators dug out of a pit in a hill two kilometers from the main road.”

I need not mention anymore the gory details of what happened on that lonely stretch of highway in the boundary of Esperanza in Sultan Kudarat province and Ampatuan in Maguindanao that morning of Monday, November 23, 2009…

But, I must mention that for two agonizing days, the two Lechonsito girls and their relatives were storming heavens in the dimmest of hope that Nonie and Cecil were still alive. On, Wednesday, November 25, Cecile’s birthday, they prayed for Cecil to guide those who were doing the retrieval operations and to lead them to where they were since it was her birthday anyway. Sure enough they found the bodies of Nonie and Cecil that afternoon. The two bodies have been buried deep under the Vios and a van, mangled beyond recognition but uncannily one lying beside the other probably in a last embrace before breathing their last. Until death, the two were still together as they had vowed many years ago. They were buried beside each other in Tacurong City on December 5, 2009.

It has been almost two months since that day of infamy in our history that is now known as “The Maguindanao Massacre”. The victims have been buried. The slow wheels of justice have at least started to grind. But the ones left behind by the victims remain inconsolable.

Today Honey is back in Manila preparing for her final exams and then graduation and possibly the Med Tech board exams. With the help of relatives, she hopes to continue on to Medicine Proper to become a Doctor someday and fulfill the dream of her parents.

While Honey is with relatives in Manila, Sugar is virtually alone in a dormitory in Iloilo with the last memento from her mother – a laptop computer. She requested her Mom for a laptop hoping she could exchange emails, chat or even talk via Skype with her in Qatar, Honey in Manila. and Dad Nonie in Tacurong. Now the laptop computer and the internet can wait. Like Honey, her dear sweet sister, she still has to dry her tears and nurse her grief…

But until when?