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Under such pressures, the Filipino economy began to crumble. In the Hong Kong open market the peso fell from two for $1 (par) to four for $1. Most schoolteachers and many soldiers did not get paid regularly. Unable to find work in the cities or make a decent living on the land, more & more Filipinos took to the hills of Luzon, to join the Huks. Once the admired guerrilla army that had fought the hated Japanese, the Huks had been taken over by the Communists. As discontent grew, the Huks grew with it.
By mid-1950 they roamed at will over much of Luzon. In some places they levied taxes, ran their own schools and newspapers, and maintained a string of "production centers." They had the help and sympathy of thousands of villagers who found them less objectionable than the government itself. Their Politburo met under the nose of the government in Manila and boldly drew up a "strategic plan for the seizure of national power." At this point, the display in "the show window of democracy" looked pretty shabby.
Taking Ways. But the press was still free and critical, the inaudible masses were eager for something better, and there were still a few politicians unbeholden and uncorrupted. Among them was Ramon Magsaysay.
He had studied engineering at the University of the Philippines, earning his way as a chauffeur. Later he had taken a job as mechanic in a bus company, and wound up as its manager. At war's outbreak, he went to work in the motor pool of the U.S. 31st Division, and ended the war as commander of a guerrilla army of 10,000. In 1950, as chairman of the House National Defense Committee, he attacked his own party, the Liberals, demanding an end to politics in the army, a real fight against the Huks, and a cleanup of the evils that gave them strength. When Boss Perez tried to quiet him with a few Chinese visas or some campaign donations, Magsaysay tossed them back at him. When politicians kept him from buying Quonset huts he needed as schoolhouses for Zambales, he gathered some of his wartime guerrillas, raided a surplus dump and made off with 140 huts. Later he paid for them—50 centavos (25¢) apiece, the price he figured the profiteer who owned them had paid in the first place.
His goings-on caught the eyes of Manila's newspapers, who supported him, and of U.S. officials (including able Ambassador Myron M. Cowen), who keep a fatherly eye on the young republic. It was at U.S. urging that Quirino put through needed economic reforms, so that in one year, tax revenues increased by 70%. Quirino also pushed through a new minimum-wage law, which increased the pay of 90% of Filipino wage earners. The U.S. also diplomatically persuaded Quirino that a cleanup of the army and constabulary was overdue, and that Congressman Magsaysay was just the man for it.