Like an eaglet which starts their flight training by the sole action of doing what they possess, for months, and watch their parents do– spreading their wings, Bagwis, on this same day some forty three years ago, finally outstretched its wings caught by the drafts of the wind and levitated the fledgling just slightly enough from the nest, giving it a feel for flight.
Dated June 1, 1979, when Bagwis, the official student publication of the Mindanao State University - General Santos City, fledged a bit from its nest, and started a course of a never-ending commitment to service the student body of the university and pursue truth, freedom, and integrity on every published write-up and article that stands with the sentiments and values of every MSUan. But even then, it has never been a smooth sailing course as just like a diamond formation first subjected to high temperature and pressure, Bagwis underwent an extremely impediment before full development and materialization.
In 1990, one decade after its establishment when it was fanned by a challenge. With the university administration’s cessation to subsidize the publication, just after the publication was considered the official student publication of the university, Bagwis was underpinned in the custody of the Supreme Student Council. Bagwis did not on hold their mandates and flapped its wings with the assistance of the funding from the SSC fee, even with the scarcity of fiscal capacities.
On the same decade, alongside the major changes in the administrative body of the university was the huge blow of the unsuspected change ever, that the funding of the school paper was relegated to the SSC via a collection of Bagwis fees. Albeit the management still stand on the pedestal as the board’s inherent prerogative, it was not still a bold move for an organization with roles and mandates not identical. However, what change could be of more interest in the publication is the proposition of the SSC to reduce from the magazine format into a mere tabloid, a mistake confidently undertaken by the SSC as they believed they were armed as the representatives of the student body; a bold move collectively opposed by the board as the publication was never known to publishing trashy and filthy articles.
Relatively, in 2016, with former President Duterte taking over the country’s highest post, extreme tides of red envelope the sea, and on the eagle’s eye view it would be a deterrent to function, as though lives depended on a brink of a gun, gone in a one shot sound. However, the editorial board of the publication still took the flight of going against the tide in the name of journalism and of defending truth and freedom, securing service to the student body and the people. But more so, when the biggest shift in the country’s political paradigm set foot or when the golden commemoration of the imposition of the Marcosian martial law in remembrance of the victims’ struggles and experiences, die-hard supporters and trolls of the then administration flooded Bagwis’ social media platforms, branding the publication and the journalists affiliates of the communist and insurgent groups with aims of overthrowing the government.
However, for the past four long decades, Bagwis continued to live by its mandate: in amplifying voices, defending freedom, and publishing truth. For the past 43 years of service to the studentry and the people, Bagwis was able to bring forth innumerable quantities of campus journalists and individuals who were equipped with the qualities of a responsible citizen who take an enormous role in the community in forging a bequest that will live even beyond 44 years of passing. Bagwis was, is, and for the years to come will continue to be a mechanism that will mold and change lives for the better, that even on issues and matters one thought hold no great significance in the society could be an awakening call to anyone from all walks of life.
For the good and the bad, those and these are just sliver moments of a time so extensive others have yet to be unveiled and so long ago others have already buried it in the past. But even in its ambivalent nature, these will serve as living testaments that will eternally prosper even in the deepest of histories that for the past 44 years since its establishment, Bagwis has continued to flap its wings and soared the highest of heights. From the past 44 years onto another, or so, Bagwis, now fully an eagle, will continue to flap its wings and for the rest of eternity whether it’s an annual commemoration of its establishment or just an ordinary typical day, we glimpse yet another retrospective bird’s eye view and pen out how journalism has already been since then. For now, that still is a future uncertain and in time, in retrospective bird’s eye view, that uncertainty will be ascertained.
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