He was a Floor Leader of the Constitutional Commission of 1986 which drafted the present Constitution. In 1970, he was vice-president of the Constitutional Convention and he authored the celebrated “Ban-Marcos Resolution” forbidding the former President or his First lady from running for the top post.

He has won several journalism prizes including the country’s highest award, “Journalist of the Year.” He was twice the president of the Manila Overseas Press Club (MOPC). He was co-founder of Lakas ng Bayan, Ninoy Aquino’s political group and he ran under the LABAN ticket headed by Aquino against the Marcos team led by Imelda Marcos in the failed congressional election in 1978.

He was voted the Most Outstanding Alumnus of the University of San Carlos. He won the Ninoy Aquino Memorial Award in 1990. In 1992, he won the Premio Zobel, the oldest and the highest Spanish literary award in the Philippines