Friday
Today is a day of crucial decisions. Not only the Metro Manila primary but the last day for
filing the certificates of candidacy for the April 7 election but now I shall remember it as the day the American government tried to pressure me to change the National Security Council decision on the release of Ninoy [Benigno] Aquino [Jr.] so he can campaign and to allow the publication of an opposition paper like the “Confrontation” of S.P. [Salvador] Lopez.
After the call of Ex-Minority Leader [Hugh?] Scott of the U.S. House of Representatives,[1] Amb. [David] Newsom stayed behind to tell me that he has been called to the U.S. for consultations on the status of U.S. proposals on the military bases and on the visit of U.S. VP Mandate. Then the suggestion that it would help change our image IF I 1. and 2. as stated above.
I explained that a decision has been made by the National Security Council and that if I changed the decision I would meet the opposition of the military and the defense establishment; that there is no way to distinguish between Aquino’s case and the communist leaders and that I would lose my credibility as a nationalist and leader if I submit to American pressure for everyone now knows the interest of the Americans is this; that we cannot trust Aquino not to use the NPA [New People’s Army] again; and worse I would lose my self-respect.
[1] There was never a Minority Leader of the US House of Representatives with the last name Scott. There was, however, a Senator Hugh Doggett Scott Jr. from Pennsylvania who was US Senate Minority Leader from 1969 to 1977.