Today is the 15th anniversary of the passing of ex-Vice President Salvador “Doy” Laurel, the best president the Republic of the Philippines never had. Relatives and friends led by his widow, Mrs. Celia Diaz-Laurel, will celebrate the occasion with a late afternoon Mass at Doy Laurel’s resting place at the Libingan ng mga Bayani in Taguig.

Doy Laurel grew up under the guidance of his father, President Jose P. Laurel of the Second Philippine Republic (1943-1945). From his staunchly nationalistic dad, Doy learned the importance of nationalism. That is why President Laurel and Doy took their membership in the Nacionalista Party (NP) very seriously.

As a young lawyer, Doy established the first private free legal aid organization in the country, the Citizens Legal Aid Society of the Philippines. CLASP later won for Doy recognition from the international community of lawyers.

In November 1967, Doy was elected senator under the NP banner, and at the age of 38.

Doy is best known for five “Laurel Laws” which guarantee free transcripts and transportation for indigent court litigants nationwide. Although the Laurel Laws remain in the statute books, Congress and the Supreme Court (SC) seem to have forgotten about them.

The ties between President Ferdinand Marcos and the Laurels run deep.

It was Justice Jose P. Laurel who wrote the 1940 SC decision which acquitted a young Marcos in a criminal case for the murder of Julio Nalundasan, an Ilocano politician of the period. During the Japanese Occupation, President Laurel secretly arranged for the escape of Marcos from the deadly dragnet of the Japanese Kempeitai or secret police.

House Speaker Jose Laurel Jr. steered Marcos’ selection as the NP presidential bet in the November 1965 elections where Marcos defeated Diosdado Macapagal of the Liberal Party (LP).

In 1978, after Marcos promised to ease his iron grip on the country, Doy Laurel gave Marcos the benefit of the doubt and ran for the Batasang Pambansa in a coalition of NP bets and candidates Marcos himself selected.

Two years later, when Marcos seemed disinterested in political reforms, Laurel bolted the coalition and, after assuming the leadership of the NP, established the United Nationalist Democratic Organization, a coalition of the NP, LP and other anti-Marcos political parties. Under Laurel, the UNIDO vowed to unseat Marcos.

In 1983, after the assassination of Laurel’s childhood friend, ex-Sen. Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino Jr. (who was also an UNIDO stalwart), Laurel assumed the leadership of the political opposition.

The next year, Laurel unified the fragmented political opposition under the UNIDO which won one-third of the seats in the Batasang Pambansa polls.

In 1985, when Marcos announced the possibility of a special election for president and vice president, the UNIDO held a national convention at the Araneta Coliseum and named Laurel its presidential candidate. That jampacked convention at the Araneta Coliseum holds the record as the biggest political assembly in Philippine history.

Unfortunately, opportunists surrounding Ninoy’s widow, Corazon Cojuango Aquino, pushed her to run for president, too, even without a party machinery to back her.

Sensing that Aquino’s entry in the presidential race will split the opposition votes in favor of Marcos, Laurel accepted Aquino’s offer to run for vice president, on her promise that after ousting Marcos from office and serving as president for two years, Aquino will resign in favor of Laurel.

The special election pushed through in February 1986, with Marcos and his vice-presidential running mate, Arturo Tolentino, as official winners. However, a military-backed civilian uprising allowed Mrs. Aquino to seize power. Aquino and Laurel took their respective oaths at the Club Filipino in Greenhills, San Juan.

With Aquino in power, the opportunists surrounding Aquino convinced her to breach her promise to Laurel. First, the ungrateful Aquino eased Laurel out of the political equation by appointing him Secretary of Foreign Affairs (so he will be out of the country often). Later on, she treated Laurel like an outsider.

An exasperated and disappointed Laurel resigned his Cabinet post in February 1987 and joined the ranks of the political opposition. With Laurel out, Aquino, her cabal, and her Rasputin Jaime Cardinal Sin, ran the country amidst accusations of corruption, nepotism and incompetence.

In 1992, as a final act of ingratitude, Aquino destroyed Laurel’s chances of ever becoming President that year by throwing her full support to Gen. Fidel Ramos, her late husband’s jailer during martial law.

Betrayed by his best friend’s widow, Laurel retired from politics in 1992 and served the nation one last time as the chairman of the Centennial of Philippine Independence in 1998.

The nation lost big, when it lost Doy Laurel.