Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko of Japan are currently enjoying the traditional hospitality of the Filipino people on their first State visit to this country. Japan has been a valued friend and partner of the Philippines for the last sixty years, a fact that their Imperial Highnesses help celebrate. We welcome the Emperor and Empress. They deserve the Filipino people’s warm welcome in full measure.
History sometimes gives rise to very interesting coincidences, when situations and personages from the past connect with and relate to situations and personages of the present. The current visit of Japan’s head of State and his lady presents one such coincidence.
The coincidence presented by Emperor Akihito’s visit has to do with his and President Aquino’s recent forebears. I refer to President Aquino’s paternal grandfather and the Emperor’s father, Hirohito.
Hirohito reigned as Japan’s emperor through the 1930s, a time when an increasingly powerful Japan was parlaying its economic and military might into a position of influence in world affairs and of dominance in the Asia Pacific area. Hirohito was the leader of the Land of the Rising Sun during the days when Japan’s top military officers, with the cooperation and support of that country’s industrial establishment, were planning to unleash Japan’s impressive military might on its Asian neighbors, starting with China. There is a continuing debate on the part, if any, played by Emperor Hirohito in the decision-making that led to the disastrous decision to embark on the campaign of conquering Japan’s Asian neighbors and the US. That campaign reached the shores of the Philippines, then American colony, when Japanese aircraft bombed the US Navy’s Pearl Harbor base. The Philippines, which was being prepared for independence, was now at war with the Japanese empire.
This is where the Aquino-Akihito coincidence arises.
Being an extension of the US, and having been the object of fierce Japanese attacks on its territory—including the Bataan Peninsula in Corregidor—the Philippines was hostile terrain. Japan had to restore peace and order and it had to put in place a civilian government and a political infrastructure to replace those that were in existence before Pearl Harbor. The Japanese military government decided that the centerpiece of that infrastructure would be an organization called KALIBAPI (Kapisanan ng Paglilingkod sa Bagong Pilipinas).
The Japanese Occupation authorities selected Benigno Aquino, a leading pre-war political figure, to be the head of the Kalibapi. I can only surmise that Benigno Aquino was a reviled figure—given the temper of the times—and that he was a prime target of Filipinos who were actively anti-Japanese, especially the guerillas.
It appears that Benigno Aquino was very friendly with the Japanese occupying forces and that they got along very well. Thus, it is but fitting that Emperor Hirohito’s son should be welcomed and be extended warm Filipino hospitality by Benigno Aquino’s grandson and namesake.
Again, welcome to the Philippines, Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko, and enjoy your stay. Long live Philippines-Japan friendship.
E-mail: rudyromero777@yahoo.com