As Russell Crowe’s Maximus lay lifeless on the Colosseum floor, Lucilla, Emperor Aurelius’ daughter, said to those gathered nearby: “Is Rome worth one good man’s life? We believed it once. Make us believe it again. He was a soldier of Rome. Honor him.”
Much too often, as that scene in the movie Gladiator shows, the good that men do are, as Antony said, “oft interred with their bones,” more so nowadays when memory is too fickle and some see themselves as worthy of eternal praise for simply choosing a gender.
And when they are honored, if they are honored, it is always after they have shut their eyes forever.
But there are men and women, few and far in between, who arrive at a specific moment in time to create history.
Moments in time that are truly worth remembering and men who are worth honoring.
Orlando Edralin is one such man, a general like Maximus, who led and won the fight for our way of life in Negros Occidental province, a way of life that some Negrenses take for granted, even hated and rejected, in exchange for the promise of a brave new world, or so it seemed, that can only be born through strife, hate and bloodshed.
Negros Occidental is the sugar bowl of the Philippines, the Sugarlandia that was historically the first global Filipino industry to trade with the outside world decades before globalization.
This industry, too was the first to send Filipinos abroad or those called now Overseas Filipino Workers, who worked in the canefields of Hawaii.
There is much to fight for for the Negrense way of life that values diligence, dignity in hard work and a belief in people and peace as exemplified by the Al Cinco de Noviembre that some historians say affirm the nature of Negrenses as peace loving yet truly desirous of independence.
The moment he arrived here as a young Special Forces lieutenant to his final few weeks before he retires, Odie Edralin saw those ideals.
He fought for it in the dusty mountain battlefields and is now leading the fight once more to win the hearts and minds of Negrenses in the more deceptive terrain of cities and urban centers where the Communist thinking once had more appeal to the rebellious Negrense mentality.
Odie Edralin led the fight as a brigade commander in February last year, vowing that blood will flow even as he extended the olive branch to Communist rebels who have killed and destroyed with almost total impunity over several decades.
Odie Edralin is the latest in a series of generals from Ibrado to Arevalo to Pasaporte who have provided clarity in the fight against Communist terrorism, a clarity first provided by then President Duterte and carried out through the End Local Communist Armed Conflict councils across the nation.
Odie Edralin leads the Army that is the tip of the spear in this fight.
It is the Army that is not only the main combat force in the battlefields but has also taken the lead role in wielding community support and those of local government officials in a synergy of movement to attain final victory and prevent the return of Communist insurgency in the island.
History has shown that warrior leaders from Genghis Khanin on the steppes of Mongolia to Major Dick Winters on the beaches of Normandy are what the people need in times of crisis to avert destruction.
The fight against insurgency has yet to be won. The Army has cleared the way and that final step is for us Negrenses to take as communities and as individuals.
Odie Edralin is not a Negrense but he led the way to give us a foothold to a new and brighter future.
Odie Edralin fought for us Negrenses when the night was the darkest.
Now that he has led us to the dawning of a new day, it is only right that he and the soldiers who fought and died for Negros should not be forgotten.
Adapting him as a son of Negros is the least we can do to show our gratitude.
Odie Edralin is a soldier about to retire.
He fought for Negros as did a lot others from William Pesase to Van Donald Almonte, to Arnel Calaoagan, J-Jay Javines, and Michael Cuarteros, who all led Army battalions, and their soldiers who died in Negros battlefields.
We can choose to not forget them.
And we can start with Orlando Edralin, soldier, patriot, general.
We must honor him.
