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          Today the Filipino nation honors Andres Bonifacio as the "Father of the Philippine 
    Revolution." He was a leader who believed that the common could be organized 
    and put into action. Indeed he was not disappointed for he found good patriots 
    among them. Many were even willing to die for their country. Despite his poverty 
    and lack of education, Bonifacio went beyond the steps taken by the educated and 
    moneyed class of Filipinos pushing for peaceful change. Eventually even reformers 
    such as Apolinario Mabini and Marcelo H. del Pilar realized that freedom could not 
    be won from Spain without use of force. 

        To this day historians argue whether Bonifacio or Rizal was right. In June 1896 
    Bonifacio sent his aide Dr. Pio Valenzuela to Dapitan to meet with Rizal. On learning 
    about the Katipunan, Rizal opposed the revolutionary aims of the society. It was not 
    because he did not believe in the revolution. As a student of history, Rizal honestly 
    believed that the Filipino people were not yet ready for an armed struggle in 1896. 
    They still lacked weapons and funds for war. 

        Had Bonifacio listened to Rizal, there probably would have been no revolution. 
    In the end, the people’s cry for freedom and justice brought down the walls of 
    colonial power. The outbreak of the Philippine Revolution in August 1896 was 
    the beginning of the end of three-and-a-half centuries of Spanish colonial rule in 
    the Philippines. 

                                                                                      - Dr Isagani R. Medina 
                                                                           http://www.bakbakan.com/heroes.html 
 
        Ninety-two years after the death of Bonifacio, the dream of national unity remains as elusive as before.  Surely
    the seeds of nationhood were there in the Katipunan and in the Philippine Revolution.  But those seeds, so affectionately
    watered with the blood of the early martyrs of freedom, have yet to grow sturdy branches and to sink deep roots.
    Bonifacio and his generation of exceptional heroes—those unselfish men of vision, courage and determination—had
    already done so much and given all of themselves.  But heroes past and present could only be trailblazers.  The decision
    to follow their path rests with those who come after.

        Andres Bonifacio was part of an era when there was a tremendous outpouring of love for the motherland, when
    patriotism was not just a concept but a way of life, when there was profusion of heroism and when the larger interests
    of the country would come first.  Those finest hours in our nation’s history were the collective achievement of a number
    of brave souls:  the secular priests—Gomez, Burgos and Zamora—who fought for racial equality; the articulate Filipino
    propagandists in Spain who wrote of colonial abuses in the islands; the brilliant Rizal who gave the Filipino people a
    clear mirror for them to see a reflection of the national soul; the enterprising and self-motivating Bonifacio who found
    the mechanism with which the nation could reaffirm its sense of self and regain its freedom; and many more who had
    willingly sacrificed comfort and security for the nation’s good.

        At that distant point in time, the Filipino came into being.  The people began to look back to a common past of
    hardworking ancestors.  They dad the same tragic experience and had to fight one and the same enemy.  And they
    shared a common dream—to become one indivisible and independent nation.
 
        Bonifacio did his best to make that dream come true.  He died without seeing the new dawn he had fought for.
    To the very end, he was faithful to the ideal that gave nobility to his unfinished Revolution

                                                                                                                                            - Alejo L. Villanueva, Jr.
                                                                                                                                      Bonifacio's Unfinished Revolution


Bonifacio Monument in front of Philippine Post Office