Claims against fact

It is hard to argue against the inclusion of President Aquino in Time Magazine's annual list of 100 Most Influential People in the World for 2013. At the very least, you have to be in that list if you are the leader of the world's 10th most populous country.

But I cannot agree with certain conclusions made by Howard Chua-Eoan in the accompanying item about Aquino, especially when he said: “His father was the country's most famous political martyr, his mother its most beloved president.”

Chua-Eoan was, of course, referring to Aquino's father Ninoy, who was assassinated on returning home from exile, and his mother Cory, who was swept into power in a bloodless popular revolt that toppled a dictatorship.

I cannot agree with the conclusion Chua-Eoan made about Ninoy until he can prove he did an actual survey among Filipinos on who they think is the country's most famous political martyr, a survey that has to include Philippine national hero Jose Rizal.

Any conclusion about Ninoy as a martyr cannot be credible if it did not take Rizal into consideration. Many may consider Rizal irrelevant today, but for as long as his name is in some street or plaza in every city and town, and his life a subject in school, it is still Rizal.

Ninoy may only seem more famous because his death happened far more recently than Rizal's and is thus fresher in the memory. I don't know if there are still Filipinos alive today who were around when Rizal was martyred.

In fact, the word martyr applies to Rizal more appropriately and comfortably than it would to Ninoy. Indeed, to this day, most written accounts of Ninoy's death refer to it as an assassination, not martyrdom.

Besides, a comparison of the life-long achievements of both men prior to their deaths would show Ninoy paling in comparison to Rizal. I therefore take strong exception to Chua-Eoan's conclusion that Aquino's father Ninoy is the country's most famous political martyr.

As to the conclusion made by Chua-Eoan about Aquino's mother -- that she is the country's most beloved president -- I will not object to it as forcefully. But I still would like to know if Chua-Eoan also surveyed Filipinos on the matter.

This is because, to the best of my knowledge, there is another strong contender to Cory in this regard. He is the late president Ramon Magsaysay. I was too young at the time he died but from what I heard of him, he was just as beloved by Filipinos.

In other words, it is difficult to take the word of a non-Filipino like Chua-Eoan that Cory is the Philippines' most beloved president in the absence of any comparative survey he made that took Magsaysay into account.

The fact that Magsaysay's junior once won a seat to the Senate almost exclusively on the strength of his father's name and now wants to make a return, still using the same campaign tack, should prove that the late president Magsaysay must be well-loved indeed.

Ninoy and Cory certainly have their places in the hearts of Filipinos. But there are some details that need to be clarified in order to set the record straight, especially if those details were provided by non-Filipinos and have not been meticulously verified.

I have nothing against Ninoy and Cory being portrayed as important figures in the history of this country, for that is indeed what they were. But this should be done in the proper context and without having to sacrifice the historical truth.