CLAIM: Marcos Sr. is 100% innocent in the killing of Ninoy Aquino
RATING: FALSE
THE FACTS: The fantasy film “Martyr or Murderer” was vehement in its theory that then President Ferdinand Marcos Sr. was innocent in the killing of Ninoy Aquino at the airport tarmac in 1983.
Director Darryl Yap fawned too much that even movie critic Butch Francisco could only raise his eyebrows and say: Sige na nga.
“A lot of screen time is actually spent trying to establish Ferdinand Sr’s innocence with regard to the Aquino assassination. Was this still necessary?” he asked.
“Through the years, the nation seems to have been convinced that Ferdinand Sr. had nothing to do with Ninoy’s death. A comedic scene in Martyr that shows chief household staff Elizabeth Oropesa playing detective summarizes what has become a scenario in the public mind — yes, the one involves a blood relation as the mastermind behind Ninoy’s killing.”
Your guess is as good as mine.
But is Ferdinand Sr. indeed innocent? Writer Stuart Santiago had a different take.
Santiago quoted Yap as saying: “When I said Marcos did not kill Aquino I meant it with certainty, I know it 100% and if you sympathize with the former Senator, you will realize we are all entitled to know the whole truth; for his supporters’ peace, for the justice we all deserve to feel.”
As if Ninoy committed suicide by insisting on coming home.
Santiago said it depends on what context Yap said because the 100 percent certainty can be argued to be correct.
“Pero malinaw sa 1984 Agrava Reports, Majority and Minority, that Ninoy was shot on the stairs by one of his military escorts, not on the tarmac by Galman, and that it was a military conspiracy on top of which was Ver who we all know was a Marcos stooge. Certainly, 100% kay Marcos at kay Very ang command responsibility.”
That the perpetrators remain unknown showed that evidence were either hidden or destroyed, so much so that when the Aquinos came into power, they had not much proof to work with.
That did not mean that they, too, had a hand in the killing of their loved one.
WHY WE FACT-CHECKED THIS: Even if Martyr of Murderer garners PhP1 trillion in receipts or even if it wins an Oscar for Best Foreign Film, it will not erase the fact, as Kris Aquino had said, that Ninoy Aquino remains a hero.
Photo: Viva Films
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