The death of Juan Ponce Enrile elicited various reactions among Filipinos. Some stuck to the time-old tradition of respecting the memory of the dead. There were also those who reacted to his passing with indifference. At the extreme end were those who never forgot his role during martial law. Add to that the scandals — both political and personal — that hounded him toward the end of his life.

     But for all that people say about Enrile, it cannot be denied that his was a brilliant mind. His life story is also too colorful that it would be a shame not to retrace it now that he is gone.

In the space below, therefore, The Butcher will share pieces of information about the man that the public may not know yet or had probably already forgotten. Enrile, by the way, also extended help to Philippine cinema in several instances through his half-sister Armida Siguion-Reyna, who was a feisty industry leader. And so, this is his story.

What’s in a name?

Although Juan Ponce Enrile is identified as an Ilocano from the province of Cagayan, both the Ponces and the Enriles hail from Baliwag, Bulacan. An eminent relation was Mariano Ponce, a physician and statesman who was among the founders of La Solidaridad, the paper that exposed the injustices committed by Spain against colonized Filipinos.

Why were the surnames Ponce and Enrile combined? It all started with his father, Alfonso Ponce. Another brilliant mind, Alfonso once worked with the Bureau of Justice. When he was assigned to Cagayan, he married a local woman from a rich and prominent family. 

Cagayan became Alfonso’s bailiwick after he raised a family in the province. He ran for Congress there and won. When he decided to run for another term, political opponents tried to dilute his chances of winning by fielding a nuisance candidate also named Alfonso Ponce.

To counteract his rival’s dirty tactic, Alfonso registered his candidacy under the name Alfonso Ponce Enrile. Enrile was his mother’s maiden name.

Until the late 1960s, there were still individuals who appended their middle name after the surname. This was the Hispanic way.

Let’s use the name of a famous person to illustrate how it was done before: Sharon Cuneta, for example. Sharon was born Sharon Gamboa Cuneta. Gamboa is her middle name. Had she been around in the old days, her photo in the yearbook would have been identified as Sharon Cuneta y Gamboa. Y is Spanish for “and.”

In the case of Alfonso, he merely used a hyphen to attach his mother’s name and not used “y” anymore. He therefore became Alfonso Ponce-Enrile starting from the time he ran for re-election. He lost, by the way. But his descendants began carrying the double surname after that and along the way, the hyphen was dropped. 

Had it not been for that nuisance candidate who ran against his father, Alfonso, Enrile would have carried the name Juan Valentin Furagganan Ponce. The name Enrile would not have been in the sphere of Philippine politics.

As for the Furagganan, that was the maiden name of his mother, Petra, an illiterate fishmonger from the Gonzaga town of Cagayan — in Barrio Mission, to be exact. (Barrio Mission is now Barangay Casitan.) While soliciting votes in Gonzaga, Alfonso met Petra and the two had a brief romantic affair that resulted in the birth of Enrile.

Alfonso, already married by then, never knew that he sired a son in that town. From Enrile’s end, he only recognized his father through a campaign handbill that carried the older man’s picture. Enrile, in fact, grew up in the barrio as Juanito Furragganan.

Poverty and perseverance

Enrile’s childhood was difficult. His mother eventually married a fisherman who, mercifully, was not a mean “padrastro” (stepfather) to the young Juanito. But they lived in grinding poverty, especially since he had six half-siblings to look after. 

To be able to study, Enrile had to work as a houseboy even as early seven years old. He wasn’t interested in education in the beginning. He had to be threatened with a whip by his mother just so he’d go to school. And it didn’t help that he was beaten up by four boys in high school after he figured in a campus love triangle. Although Enrile was the victim in that fight, it was he who was got expelled from school – only because his family could not afford to hire a lawyer to defend him.

Enrile’s initial dream was to become an engineer. But after becoming a victim of injustice, he vowed to become a lawyer. By this time, he had already taken his studies seriously and excelled in academics. Wartime interrupted his schooling. He fought against the Japanese and was imprisoned by enemy forces.

After the war, he decided to look for his father in Manila. He heard that his father was already an “abogado de campanilla” or a lawyer of note. Enrile got a tip that his father had a law office in one of the few buildings that remained standing after the Battle for Manila. That was where he met Alfonso for the first time.

Enrile didn’t ask much from his father, who was absent all 21 years of his life. He only wished that he be sent to school. Alfonso did more than that. He brought his son to live with his second family in Malabon.  This family had been legitimized when divorce was legalized in the Philippines during the Japanese interlude (to the detriment of his first wife and their children who fled back to Cagayan to avoid the scandal). 

The matriarch of that second family was the opera singer, Purita Liwanag. Three of Alfonso and Purita’s children became celebrities: opera diva Irma Potenciano, actor Chito Ponce-Enrile and, of course, Armida Siguion-Reyna.

Purita and her children warmly welcomed Enrile. Alfonso and Purita’s son, Mario, perished at sea while fighting the Japanese during the war. Enrile, more or less, filled the void left by Mario. 

Rise to power

Enrile took up law and then worked in his father’s office. At a party organized by the Bachelors’ Club, he met actress-singer Cristina Castaner, who was the darling of the St. Paul College stage during the 1950s. As a lawyer, Enrile earned enough to build a home for his family in Phil-am life subdivision in Quezon City. They later moved to the more upscale Urdaneta Village in Makati.

When Ferdinand Marcos, Sr. was Senate President, he invited Enrile to join his team. By then, Marcos was already making plans to run for President of the Philippines. Their first meeting was at the Enrile residence in Urdaneta. Cristina prepared dinner for them — fried chicken.

Backed up by Marcos, Enrile went on to gain power in government. In time, he moved his family to a 6,000-square meter property in Dasmarinas Village. Enrile had always wanted to take his mother, Petra, with him to Manila. But already set in her ways, she chose to stay in Barrio Mission. And even if Enrile sent her a regular allowance, Petra still continued selling fish in the market.

Enrile’s lifestyle also remained simple even if he was one of the most powerful people in the country. For someone who introduced consumers to quality corned beef — the Delimondo brand — his favorite breakfast was “paksiw na isda” (fish simmered in vinegar and ginger).

During martial law, Enrile became infamous for the role he played in that dark era. Local cinema, however, benefited from the power he had through half-sister Armida. 

In the early days of martial law, the head of the board of censors was Guillermo de Vega. After he was shot dead in his office in Malacanang (the case remains a mystery to this day), Guillermo was replaced by his wife, Rocio “Chuchi” de Vega. Mrs. De Vega was liberal in her views as censors’ chief. The movie industry, unfortunately, went overboard and began churning out sex movies. This was the time when the term “bold” was coined by the press.

Douglas Quijano put up his own production outfit and one of the movies he bankrolled was Mga Uhaw na Bulaklak, which made a killing at the box-office. The following year, he came up with an even more daring version — Mga Uhaw na Bulaklak Part II. 

There was a public outcry and the sequel got banned from exhibition after a week in theaters. Quijano was detained at the Camp Aguinaldo for more than a month. De Vega was sacked as head of the board of censors. The military took over the job of censoring movies and television shows. 

In 1980, Bancom Audio-vision fielded Marilou Diaz-Abaya’s Brutal at the 6th Metro Manila Film Festival (MMFF). Since the movie tackled sex and drugs, it went through rough sailing in the hands of the censors, then still under the military. 

Since Armida also line-produced for Bancom, she decided to help Marilou with the censors. The military wasn’t exactly Armida’s playground. But the military people were, of course, aware of the fact that she was the half-sister of Enrile, then the Minister of Defense.

Armida accompanied Marilou to the censors and pleaded with the military officials to please allow the theatrical exhibition of Brutal with minimal cuts. Armida’s request was granted and Brutal won several awards at the MMFF. 

Armida, however, never overstretched whatever influence she had as Enrile’s sister. Even she had her own battles with the censors as a film and TV producer. Industry members though took comfort in the fact that when pushed to a corner, Armida will be there to help them out with the censors. Thanks to the Enrile connection. 

No river of tears

Juan Ponce Enrile died last 13 November. Unlike during the time of Cory Aquino’s death, there was no nationwide mourning in this case. On social media, there were even posts that denounced him: No tears for Enrile.

He had the chance to change his public image after he and Fidel Ramos led the first EDSA revolution. Sadly, Enrile got enmeshed again in various controversies in the last several decades. 

There’s no denying, however, that Enrile will always be part of the tapestry of Philippine history, particularly in the field of politics. But no one can say exactly how he will be judged by future generations. 

His descendants can only hope that history will be kind to him.