Zoefia Lapuz November 23, 2023 When life flashes before your eyes, would you still care to have faith?
November 23, 2009, was supposedly just a typical day for Edgardo Lapuz, a video journalist. But, little did he know, he could’ve been a victim of one of the most extensive mass killings and political-related violence ever recorded in the history of the Philippines, the Maguindanao Massacre.
It was a day before the massacre when Lapuz and his team, including Jiggy Manicad, a well-known broadcast journalist, were about to cover a news report in General Santos for Manny Pacquiao’s recent winning. While walking on the way to the shoot for their report, he found a silver pendant that the person had previously ignored in front of him. He picked it up, not minding what the pendant looked like, and then continued to their coverage location. During the evening of the event, a public relations officer of the Mangudadatu, the political rival of the Ampatuan, reminded them of the occurrence for the next day--the filing of the Certificate of Candidacy for the position of provincial governor of then-Butuan Vice Mayor Esmael Mangudadatu.
The next day, just hours before the massacre, Lapuz with his team headed to the motorcade of Pacquiao. However, he realized that he lost the gadget he was playing with during their travel, his PSP. They eventually headed back to where they were so they could further seek the missing device.
Strange enough, Lapuz found it, but in a weird place. He saw it on the ground covered with grass around nearby children–-not inside the vehicle where he thought he had left it. He asked Manicad if they would still be covering the candidacy filing since they might lack time. Manicad responded that they would probably just send a stringer to the nearby location to report.
Minutes turned into hours, and Manicad announced an unforeseen announcement, revealing that supposedly simple-coverage-turned-costs-lives. In his words, he said to Lapuz, “Nadali mga tropa.” and added, “Na-ambush.” (The troupe was killed by an ambush.) At that time, still unable to comprehend the extremity of the just-happened occurrence, Lapuz just brushed it off.
The day after the ambush, their team was asked to visit the crime scene: a mass grave on Sitio Masalay mountain in Ampatuan, Maguindanao, where the victims were led and then buried. There, he saw the slippers of what were once alive victims. Lapuz uttered, “Nanlambot ‘yong katawan ko. Kung nagkataon, kasama pala ako doon.” (I felt weak; I could have been one of them.) He finally grasped the fact that, if destiny allowed, he could’ve been one of the people who was inhumanely assassinated, leaving not only his wife but also his then-4-year-old daughter and a 4-month-old son.
Later that evening, he remembered the pendant he had picked up from days prior. When he looked at it, he saw that it was an engraving of Jesus Christ’s face; he was astonished. Knowing that the person who had previously ignored the pendant had been killed, a part of him believes that it was the pendant that had saved them.
Up until this day, he considers this happening as a second life of the many lives that God had given him throughout his career as a video journalist. Such delays, which they may have first seen as an inconvenience, saved their lives. He was there when history was written, and he lived to tell his children the history through his eyes.
The article's author, Zoefia Lapuz, is Edgardo Lapuz's four-year-old daughter at the time of the incident.
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