My first time to have Ninoy Aquino viewed in one full speech. A speech delivered in Los Angeles in 1983. He was assassinated months later.
part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8, part 9.
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Writer F. Sionil Jose has some interesting revelations on Ninoy Aquino in Rizal, Ninoy and Revolution:
1. Ninoy believed only a revolution could cure the chronic ills of Philippine society, but wrestled with how it could be achieved with just a few hundreds dead.
2. It was Ninoy who introduced Dante Buscayno, the leader of the NPA, to Joma Sison, founder of the Communist Party of the Philippines.
3. Ninoy Aquino was indeed supporting the NPA, this according to Victor Corpuz.
All along I thought Ferdinand Marcos and his minions were weaving outrageous tales out of nowhere just to keep an innocent man in prison. Interestingly, Joma Sison himself recently confirmed that he was a frequent visitor in the Aquino home and he and Ninoy had a working relationship in the campaign to oust Marcos. Now, how far did Ninoy go in that working relationship and how much did the communist movement gain in the alliance?
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Ninoy Aquino was emphatic he was not a communist. Maybe so. You need not subscribe to Mao and Stalin to get in agreement to the communists’ diagnosis as to what is wrong to Philippine society in general. Even the idea of violence to bring about change is no monopoly of communists. But was he not indeed actively pursuing his idea of a revolution then by pulling together essential elements into his orbit— for a start, an armed component in the NPA and a theoretical mooring in the CPP through Kumander Dante and Joma Sison?
Clearly, as the end of Marcos’ second term neared, it was becoming certain Ninoy Aquino would succeed him, winning the then-upcoming elections hands down. But, alas, Marcos would not let him, first, through a Constitutional Convention but unsuccessfully, then through Martial Law, his last option, this time successfully. Bad, bad Marcos, Ninoy’s ambitions and intentions, he frustrated them altogether.
Curiously, had Ninoy become President, what would have been the role of Dante Buscayno and Joma Sison in his government? Hard to tell but in those times when events like the First Quarter Storm were viewed as something historic and communism as a concept was at its apex that to be a communist was hip, the unimaginable was possible. Is this why the connection of Ninoy with these two men is hardly ever mentioned?
We can never know but speculate on one man’s motivations. So easy to say that Marcos was nothing but a power-hungry rascal. Or for that matter Ninoy was the God-sent emancipator of the people. Not that simple, people!
