Cory: Loyal friend, brave fighter

That was how former President Corazon C. Aquino was as sister, friend, boss and mother. As they struggled to hold back their tears, family members, friends, former appointed officials and a security aide of Mrs. Aquino described the woman who had touched their lives.

At the necrological services held this afternoon at the Manila Cathedral where 20 persons closest to the former president spoke, Inspector Mel Mamaril, one of her security men, recounted the kindness with which he was treated. The speakers were picked on the basis of unanimous choice by the Aquino children.

Mamaril said, “Aware of (Mrs. Aquino’s) status in society, I felt a sense of wonder and realized that her treatment raised my dignity as a person. She gave me self-respect, self-worth and confidence.”  

He remembered that “even as she lay dying in bed, she was always very concerned about us, asking us if we have had our meals.”

Mamaril was one of two security men assigned to the former president. The two were reportedly withdrawn by the government when Mrs. Aquino was hospitalized.
    
Malacanang later explained that Mrs. Aquino’s security detail were not really recalled but simply asked to report back to headquarters “for accounting purposes.” The Aquino family, however, bristled in anger as they said it was not the first time that the government attempted to remove her security detail.
    
His voice quivering, Mamaril bade goodbye to the former president and saluted in front of the casket that bore her remains.

Alex Ayco, Mrs. Aquino’s doctor, confirmed that his patient “never complained or demanded attention” even when she was ill. He said when the results of the former president’s blood test came out 18 months ago, he did not know how to break the news. But Mrs. Aquino suspected that something was wrong.

“Alex, wala pa bang results? Kasi kung normal ‘yan, tinawagan mo na ako (Are there no results yet? If the results were normal, you would have called me up),” she said.

Addressing Mrs.Aquino, he said, “I struggled to keep my eyes dry but when you saw me, you knew. You said, ‘Alex, I have lived a full life. If it is God’s will, so be it.'”

The former President declined to seek medical treatment abroad, saying, “I trust Filipino doctors. I want to be treated here.”
 
Margie Juico, appointments secretary to Mrs. Aquino at Malacanang and later at the Benigno Aquino Jr. Foundation, said that even when while undergoing chemotherapy, her boss would still report for work at the Cojuangco building.

Juico said she’d often wondered what caused Mrs. Aquino’s cancer and observed that “you kept a lot in your heart” and “had your share of serious disappointments.” Without naming names, she said certain “people you trusted behaved differently.”

 Decency and sympathy

Friends of Mrs. Aquino also spoke and remarked upon her steadfastness both to her friendships and to her principles.

Sr. Remedios Centeno, who met the former president during the anti-dictatorship struggle, said she was impressed by how the Aquino grandchildren had imbibed their grandmother’s integrity and commitment to honesty in government.
 
She recounted, “One day, in Arlegui (where Mrs. Aquino lived as president), Jiggy (son of Cory’s eldest daughter Ballsy) saw some chocolates on the table and asked, ‘Lola, do those chocolates belong to the Filipino people?’ She said, ‘No, I bought them for you.’ Only then did Jiggy take the chocolate.”

Gina de Venecia, wife of former Speaker Jose de Venecia Jr., said she would never forget how Mrs.Aquino condoled with her after the death of their daughter KC in a fire that broke out in their home.

The De Venecia couple had taken shelter in a hotel near their burned house and spent the night there. The next morning at about 8 a.m., Mrs. Aquino and her children were outside the hotel room, waiting to commiserate with them.

Mrs. De Venecia also remembered that when her husband lost his bid for the presidency and was abandoned by his political friends, the former president showed up for her birthday an hour earlier. “I may not have been with you when you were up there but now I am here,” she told the couple.

Mrs. Aquino also had friends who were not well-known. Noni Uy, described by the former president’s children as “her best friend in Cebu,” said they were bound by their common experience as widows. “We were just two women reminiscing about happy memories with our husbands,” Uy said.

Dr. Sansan Hortaleza, another friend, said she was surprised when she saw Mrs. Aquino’s house. “It was so simple,” she said.

 Friends, former enemies

Quezon City Mayor Feliciano Belmonte Jr., Manila Mayor Alfredo Lim, Makati Mayor Jejomar Binay, and former environment secretary Fulgencio Factoran Jr. acknowledged their debt of gratitude to Mrs. Aquino for their political careers that blossomed during her administration.

“What I have been, what I am now, I owe it to you,” Lim said, who was chief of the Manila police during Mrs. Aquino’s presidency.

Businessman Ramon del Rosario said, “She looked at the business community not as piggy bank for favors but as resources to be tapped for worthy projects, especially for the poor.” He said that he had always felt honored when Mrs. Aquino sought his help.

Even a former critic ending up admiring the former president. Conrado de Quiros, columnist for the Philippine Daily Inquirer, said, “Maybe it’s not bad to start out as enemies on grounds of principle but end as friends on the same grounds.”  

Explaining that his political preference lay with the left whose symbolic color was red rather than with the so-called yellow crowd which identified with the Aquinos, De Quiros said, “Maybe colors are there to unite us rather than divide us….Maybe we’re divided only into good people and bad people.”

Sister-in-law Maur Aquino Lichauco recounted the bleak days when her brother Ninoy was ordered arrested by the martial law government and could not be located by his family.  Mrs. Aquino received a bundle of his belongings, including his wedding ring, sending the chilling thought that her husband might have been executed already. When Ninoy was finally found in Laur, Nueva Ecija, Cory had to content herself with seeing him across one meter of barbed wire.

Lichauco, who was already a close friend of Cory even before the latter met Ninoy, also recounted the full-body search that Cory and other family members had to endure whenever they visited her brother. Beyond prison, the Aquinos would be treated as pariahs in social events.

 

“I have not known anyone who would accept such humiliation with grace. Little did I know it was a preparation by God. Like a knight, she was being prepared for a task that none of us would be equal to,” Lichauco said.

Struggles within family

Mrs. Aquino’s brother, former congressman Jose Cojuangco Jr., admitted that he had suggested to her sister to seek a second term as president.

“I told her she has formed a good Cabinet and another six years would result in a better Philippines,” Cojuangco said. But Mrs. Aquino reportedly answered, “My role is to restore freedom and democracy and I’ve already done that. And when I’ve turned over the presidency, I would have completed my role.”

Cojuangco said it was his sister who said the family should not start any new business while she was president. He added that the Cojuangcos did not have an easy time during Mrs. Aquino’s presidency.

Speechwriter Teodoro Locsin Jr. said he joined the Aquino campaign and government because of a long-standing wish to get even with Marcos whose clampdown on media had broken the heart of his father. Teodoro Sr. owned the Philippine Free Press, a hard-hitting magazine that was closed down along with other newspapers and publications when Marcos declared martial law in 1972.

 

As a child, Locsin said he also was fond of stories of chivalry and imagined himself a knight.

But his desire for vengeance vanished as Mrs. Aquino’s victory drew near. Still, he continued to think of himself as a knight who, among all of the president’s advisers, loved her the most.

At the hospital where Mrs. Aquino lay, Locsin tearfully recalled that he imagined himself to be by the bedside of a dying sovereign and saying to her, “If you saw me as I felt myself to be, you’d fall in love with me.”

 

Marred by discord and faced with pressure from Mrs. Aquino’s enemies, the early years of the Aquino administration saw the resignation of the president’s key allies, including Locsin.

 

Mrs. Aquino’s son, Noynoy, indicated his struggle to come to terms with his mother’s death, saying he was torn between wallowing in sadness and continuing the life that his mother had begun. He recalled his meeting with former South African president Nelson Mandela who told him, “So, you are her son. You know how to choose a parent.”

Showing the dynamics between himself and his mother over political issues, the senator said he vehemently opposed his mother’s wish to go to Fort Bonifacio to support mutineers who were calling for President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo’s resignation.

Despite his objections, Mrs. Aquino told him, “Obligasyon ko ang pumunta doon para mapigilan ang pagdanak ng dugo. Tulungan mo na lang ako (It is my obligation to stop bloodshed. Just help me).” He said his mother was always ready to shed her own blood for the country no matter what the consequences.

In all those instances, Noynoy said, his mother was always right.