There is no doubt that Senator Miriam Defensor Santiago is regarded as one of the most formidable lawmakers in the Senate.

To the reporters, she was always a good source of news, her statements always “banner” material. Reporters loved her for being “quotable,” her statements on issues always on point, her pronouncements on vital issues often fierce.

When I started covering the Senate then, I remember feeling uneasy whenever I would have to ask her a few questions, just like neophyte senators who seemed to tremble at the thought of being questioned by the feisty senator.

After covering the beat judiciously for many years and as I learned to navigate my way through the 24-man Senate, it was then that I figured out the feisty senator commanded the most media attention. It was not because she was asking for it. But you see, just hearing how she presented her arguments during plenary debates made us feel like we entered law school for free. She was always generous with sharing her knowledge, a trait that made all reporters sit attentively when she spoke.

On the side, the senator loved to “lecture” softly when we trooped to her side for an ambush interview. When she was in the mood, she would tell us stories in a grandmotherly way. Or she would joke around when serious questions are thrown her way.

Before the 2016 election campaign period, we asked her if she was ready for the physical rigorous campaign.

Without hesitation, the senator responded enthusiastically, no trace of sickness on her smiling face: “If you mean by rigorous physical campaign is like engaging in battle by means of boxing and wrestling, I’m ready for that, too. Because my father was a martial arts expert.”

Just a few months before that, Santiago had already disclosed that she was battling Stage 4 lung cancer. Later, she also announced that she had conquered the disease and she’s capable of steering the next six years of Philippine history into a higher level.

“The better way of testing the capability of a presidential candidate is not based on their machinery or their organization but the strength of their brains,” she insisted.

We also shared rare moments with her. Once during an ambush interview, somebody in a low tone asked her a question. Her reply startled us. Santiago blurted out: “Iyon lang naman pala ang tanong mo, bumaba pa ang boses mo. Akala ko you were asking about my sex life (Is that all you want to ask and yet you lowered your voice? I thought you would ask about my sex life).”

In the months of the election campaign, she acknowledged that the disease was taking a toll on her physical body. But she showed confidence that she was doing fine under her present medication.

“You can notice for example that I am always out of breath and I cannot always call to mind a word that I want to use. Otherwise, I am going forward. I can read my books very well. I still maintain my intellectual acuity,” she said.

And to lighten the mood, she delivered one of her witty one-liners: “I don’t mistake other people for my husband, for example. I’m quite sure who he is.”

Santiago had two best-selling books – Stupid is Forever and Stupid is Forever More. At the sidelines of her book launching a few months ago, she was asked to enumerate her top three pet peeves. The senator waved one finger: “Maybe not top three, just one: The Senate.”

She even had a one-liner for Pope Francis when asked by reporters weeks before the visit of the Pope in the Philippines in January 2015:  “If you can throw a one-liner to Pope Francis, what would it be?” She gamely responded: “Hi, sexy!”

Santiago explained that was “just to make him laugh, because everybody pulls such a long face when he’s around, everybody pretends to roll his eyes upward, to look very penitential or to look divine.”

“People should put a little bit of humor in the lives of even the Pope. He has shown by his issuances so far that he has a very progressive trend of thought,” said the senator who had her share of “verbal skirmishes” with leaders of the Roman Catholic Church when she pursued the passage of the Reproductive Health law.

Santiago, who studied theology at Maryhill School of Theology at the University of California, reasoned out that those who have studied theology would know that people are either classified as radicals, conservatives, or progressives.

“I, personally, for example, would be classified as a progressive, and I think Pope Francis would classify as a progressive as well. I don’t think he will take offense,” she said matter-of-factly.

When British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher died in April, 2013, Santiago admitted she was despondent after hearing the news.

Thatcher and Marie Curie, were the female leaders who greatly influenced her political career. She even considered herself a Thatcher protége. She met Thatcher in the Philippines after she lost in the presidential elections in 1992. Santiago recalled that the original “Iron Lady” was touring Asia at that time and showed her extraordinary sympathy and compassion.

“She had read up on me, which was amazing because she is a global leader, and she commended me for my book called Cutting Edge. She said that she never reads the newspapers when she was Prime Minister because they ruined her day,” an elated Santiago said, gushing as she recalled that day.

“I idolize her, actually. She is very unique and very brilliant. She started by taking chemistry in Oxford, and then she switched to law, which is very astounding. The kind of mental discipline that is needed to calibrate your brain from the sciences to the more social aspects of society, including social engineering, was amazing. I was very enriched with my experience with her. She was very results-oriented like me,” she said.

Santiago didn’t resist when the British stateswoman asked to have a picture taken with her.

“I remember she came down the stairs, she greeted me and looked at my book, and then said ‘Well, let’s have a picture! Everyone was standing around hoping to get a word with her and she knew people love to have pictures with her, so immediately we all fell in line.”

“And then there was a certain general who was taking his time, maybe out of shyness. So she said rather sternly to him, ‘Oh come on, general! Shake a leg!’ I love her for that memory!” she said, her eyes lighting up while reminiscing.

There will be many memories that people who admired Senator Santiago will tell and retell for many years.  She was what many of her colleagues say was “bigger than life,” the Iron Lady of Asia.

My colleague in the Senate beat, Mario Casayuran, who has been covering the beat since 1988 has many such memories of the feisty senator, starting with her wit and language.

He covered Santiago when she first entered the Senate doors from June 30, 1995 to June 30, 2001 and from 2004 to 2016. He said the Senator Santiago that he knew “had that professorial air whenever she delivered a privilege speech on the Senate floor.”

“She would pause for effect after delivering a punch line with flourish in her privilege speeches, eliciting silent applause from the gallery or smiles from her colleagues in the 24-member Upper House. Her wit was incisive and her language clear. But she was stern while conducting public hearings on bills or resolutions referred to her committee.

On the Senate floor, she would raise her voice to warn anyone who was in the room when his or her cellphone rings because they disturb her systematic and orderly public hearing. Casayuran recalled that not only sounds of cellphones disturbed her. During the impeachment trial of then Chief Justice Renato Corona in May, 2012, Senator Santiago blew her top when lawyer Vitaliano Aguirre, a member of the prosecution panel, covered his ears while she was talking.

The lady senator snapped at Aguirre: “If you don’t agree with us, then don’t listen. Get out of the courtroom.”  Aguirre is now the Justice Secretary.

Like all the reporters who covered Senator Santiago, Casayuran remembers how “she took light of her recurring pain during the presidential campaign where she was seen to stutter at times. For one who had declared that she eats death threats for breakfast, this ‘Iron Lady’ will be missed at the Senate.”

Source:
courtesy of MANILA BULLETIN

by Hannah Torregoza

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