MANILA, Philippines?To friends and colleagues gathered at a hospital Monday, avant-garde composer Ramon Santos is a National Artist.

Santos, 67, has been confined at the Philippine Heart Center since last week after suffering a heart attack.

A former dean of the University of the Philippines College of Music, Santos was dropped from the 2009 list of National Artists recommended by the National Committee on Culture and the Arts (NCCA) and Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP) and was replaced by four others recommended by Malacañang.

His exclusion from the list was widely protested by his colleagues who also expressed outrage over President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo?s conferment of the prestigious award on massacre film director Carlo J. Caparas and National Commission on Culture and the Arts (NCCA) head Cecile Guidote-Alvarez.

Fr. Robert Reyes, who officiated Mass on Monday for his speedy recovery, said: ?Dr. Ramon Santos is no longer a private person after what happened. People who love him and respect him would just like to express their love and concern for him.?

Santos? sisters attended the healing Mass, as did his colleagues from the UP like Dr. Ruby Alcantara, who hailed his contributions to Philippine music.

Flautist Dom-an Manegdeg played a couple of tunes on her bamboo nose flute for Santos? healing.

Manegdeg, whose husband Jose was killed allegedly by a military officer in 2005, plays the flute for ?social healing.?

Meanwhile, the UP College of Law is set to file on Wednesday in the Supreme Court a petition for injunction to stop the proclamation of the new National Artists, according to writer Sylvia Mayuga, one of the artists protesting the new set of National Artists.
The petition seeks to stop the exercise of a presidential prerogative by Malacañang to name National Artists on its own outside of the selection process of the NCCA and the CCP.

If the high court gives due course to the petition, Santos will be restored to the original list of National Artists selected by the CCP and NCCA. The others on the list are painter Federico Aguilar Alcuaz, the late Tagalog novelist Lazaro Francisco (literature) and the late filmmaker Manuel Conde.

It also means that Alvarez and Caparas will be dropped from the awards. With a report from Lito Zulueta