IN his latest book, ?Afro-Asia in Upheaval: A Memoir of Front-line Reporting,? Amando Doronila writes about covering the burial of Charles de Gaulle, the legendary French president who, after being rebuffed in a referendum, quietly retreated to the small town of his birth.
Such is the stuff of the sublime. It should also be a lesson in leadership, particularly to one current head of state who, tarred by scandal and unmoved by national scorn, not only clings stubbornly to the reins of power but also is unsparing in her efforts to install herself permanently.
De Gaulle, Doronila wrote, ?read the referendum defeat as a rejection of his style of rule.? An ?obscure brigadier general? in the Second World War, he rallied his people against the Germans in World War II. He would lead France as prime minister for decades. But when he sought to change the rules that would have enabled him to rule as, according to his critics, an ?elected monarchy,? he got a resounding ?No.?
Yet, when he died, despite his wish to have an ?extremely simple? funeral, all of France and much of the world mourned. And while he was buried in his village beside his daughter, as he willed, heads of state showed up at his wake. It was the passing of an era and Doronila was there, in the small, backward village of Colombey-Les-Deaux-Eglises, to cover it. It may even be worthwhile to note that he was the only Asian face in the crowd.
Right place and time
As every reporter knows, being in the right place at the right time is part of a journalist?s skill set. And ?Doro? or ?Mando,? as he is either called by colleagues and acquaintances, had just arrived in Paris from New York on Nov. 10, 1970 to cover the Vietnam peace talks, only to be met with the headline on El Figaro: ?De Gaulle est mort.? Indeed he has in his illustrious career shown an uncanny knack for showing up at historical crossroads and has the mettle not just to cover events but also put them in social, political and historical context.
Which is what ?Afro-Asia in Upheaval,? the first in a series of two, is all about. Using handwritten notes, carbon copies of his typewritten stories and volumes of historical documents that he kept assiduously through nearly half a century as a diplomatic reporter and later editor, Doronila developed, in this book, a compelling narrative of the efforts of Asian and African nations to seek recognition and respect in the world. Specifically he throws back to the time when the Philippines, then led by the President Diosdado Macapagal, the current president?s father, tried and failed to be a leading voice in efforts to attain Afro-Asian unity. His successor, would-be dictator Ferdinand Marcos, would try to do the same, but would also be frustrated.
Dangerous
Doronila found himself face-to-face with such leaders as Indonesia?s Sukarno, Malaysia?s Tunku Abdul Rahman and Cambodia?s Norodom Sihanouk. His assignments would take him to such places as cosmopolitan as Paris, as remote as Ulan Bator in Mongolia and as dangerous as Algeria, at a time when its government was being toppled; and Hanoi, at the height of the Vietnam War.
When Doronila first told me that he was working on his book, he bounced off me a suggested title: ?A Worm?s View of the World.? He said that was how he saw himself as a journalist. But the image that popped in my head when I heard it was that of a Disney cartoon character. I discouraged it, but offered no alternative, either.
?Afro-Asia in Upheaval? is, I think, not much of an eye-grabber either; it sounds more like an academic tome. But to rephrase the adage: You can?t judge a book by its title. Despite a few typos and sentences that could have been tightened, it is a compelling read. It is a must for teachers and students of journalism, history and political science, as well as policy makers and pundits.
Tech handicaps
Today?s reporters might appreciate the fact that during Doronila?s time in the trenches, the laptop was not yet even a gleam in Steve Jobs? eye. Reporters had to lug typewriters?noisy, bulky machines made of steel that weighed at least 20 pounds. As there was also yet no internet, reporters had to use a telex machine to transmit their stories. So if a reporter were in free-fire zone, as Doronila found himself in Hanoi, it could take days for him to submit his articles.
Technological handicaps notwithstanding, reporters then, like Doronila, could still report not just competently but with a lot of panache. But in foreign affairs reportage, Doronila was nonpareil.
Reportage, to him, is all about perspective and context, which he finds sorely lacking in Philippine newspapers today. What he finds even more appalling and dangerous is the practice of reporters?instead of just reporting the news?injecting themselves, including their biases and judgments, into the news.
?Hey, listen,? he would gruffly remind us, his editors at the defunct post-martial law Manila Chronicle, ?just let the facts tell the story.? But by facts he meant not just a sterile telling of an event as it unraveled but also, if needed, its historical, political or social context. Indeed his column, simply called ?Analysis,? which now runs in the Inquirer, is not so much an opinion piece as it is an explication of an event, with all its nuances and implications.
He once muttered to me, as his managing editor at the Chronicle, his concern about the ideologically-driven reporting of some members of our staff. I myself heard mumblings from these folks that Doro was not ?with us,? which is to say anti-this and anti-that.
Apparently the ideologues mistook Doronila?s writings for his ideological leanings. The fact is Doronila ascribes to no ideology. His is just a worm?s-eye view, taking it all in and reporting?objectively and accurately, if I may stress?on the political repression and economic injustice that persist not just in the Philippines but in other countries as well. If there were such a creature as a pure journalist, Doronila would be it. He calls it as he sees it.
?Afro-Asia in Upheaval? is a memoir but hardly is there anything personal about the author. It is rather about happenings that made history, and how Doronila made sense of them. His is a reportorial skill that has today become an increasingly rare journalistic commodity.
