MANILA, Philippines—The chaplain of the National Penitentiary in Muntinlupa has come to the defense of the 10 soldiers convicted of murdering opposition leader Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino Jr.

Msgr. Robert Olaguer, who was the spiritual adviser of the convicted soldiers since 1990, assailed the public denunciation of the pardon by Sen. Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III and his sister, Kris.

Olaguer disclosed that the late Manila Archbishop Jaime Cardinal Sin, one of former President Cory Aquino’s closest allies, had sent him on a personal mission to look for answers from the convicted soldiers regarding Ninoy’s death.

Sin assigned him to be chaplain of the New Bilibid Prisons on Nov. 29, 1990, about five months after the convicted soldiers were transferred to the state prison.

He said Noynoy and Kris should talk to him and the freed soldiers “so that they may be guided on what is false and what is true.”

He advised the Aquino siblings to work for the reinvestigation of the case to clear up what he said were the Aquino family’s “misconceptions” about Ninoy’s murder.

Olaguer said it might help for the Aquino siblings to talk to their uncle, businessman Eduardo “Danding” Cojuangco.

He noted that Pablo Martinez, the only one of the convicted soldiers to have admitted participating in the plot to assassinate Ninoy, pointed to Cojuangco as the alleged mastermind.

Olaguer said it hurt him to read the 10 soldiers—who were freed last Wednesday after serving 26 years of their double life sentence—described in the media as Ninoy’s killers.

“They deserved to be freed. Those soldiers who were incarcerated for 26 years have suffered long enough. They should not have been in jail in the first place,” Olaguer said.

Sin believed in their guilt

He said he personally saw how the convicted killers and their families suffered from the crime “they had no knowledge of.”

“I’m not that stupid to be fooled for [19 years]. In my heart, I know they are innocent. But they had to endure vicarious sufferings for the sin of other people,” he said.

The 10 were those who remained in prison of the 16 Aviation Security Command (Avsecom) soldiers convicted in 1990 and given double life sentences each. Through the years, a number had died or were released after being granted executive pardons.

“I used all my knowledge in psychology in my effort to seek the truth from them. I made use of religious teachings to make them confess. But as I did all those things, all the more I became convinced that they were not part of the plan to kill Ninoy,” he said.

But when he told Sin of the soldiers’ innocence, he said the late prelate gave him the cold shoulder.

“It really made me sad. How can I defend the truth if the Cardinal, who was a close friend of mine, did not believe me?” he said.

Instead of losing hope, Olaguer said Sin’s reaction inspired him to work for the release of the soldiers and thousands of others who were wrongfully convicted of crimes.

Olaguer said Noynoy ought to make use of his power and influence as a senator to uncover the events and personalities linked to the double murder of his father and the alleged gunman, Rolando Galman.

“If my father was killed and I later became elected as senator of the country, I would do all I can to run after those who killed my father. But what did Noynoy do?” the priest asked.

He said the Aquino siblings should take the cue from their mother, former President Cory Aquino, who has not made any comment on the soldiers’ release.

“I respect the former President for her silence. But maybe Noynoy should ask if that silence was caused by some things that only their mother knows,” he said.

He also assailed Kris for saying that the release of the soldiers disrespected the heroism of their father.

“If Ninoy were alive today, I’m very sure he would not be happy to see innocent people being jailed. The incarceration of the soldiers was the real disrespect of Ninoy’s memory because it dishonored the justice and political system of the country that their father loved so much,” Olaguer said.

“The greatest tragedy of all is knowing that people who were responsible for Ninoy’s death remain scot-free while the innocent soldiers and their loved ones were left to suffer,” he said.

The Aquino siblings and their family, he said, were made to believe in some things that were supposedly part of a conspiracy to hide the truth about the double murder case.

Correct misconceptions

“I perfectly understand what they feel right now. The problem is that ever since Ninoy died, Noynoy and Kris only talked with the media. They never tried to see the soldiers and speak with them. If they did, maybe some of their misconceptions about the death of their father will be corrected,” he said.

Asked to cite some of these supposed misconceptions about the Aquino murder, Olaguer said, for one thing, Ninoy was not shot at the back of his head as many believe.

“Ninoy was actually was shot on his left ear by Galman. The bullet then exited through his jaw,” Olaguer said.

The bloodied body of Ninoy, he added, was not brought to the hospital after he was shot, but was taken instead to the office of the now defunct Metrocom Intelligence and Security Group in Fort Bonifacio.

The order came from former Metrocom chief Col. Rolando Abadilla, who was killed years later in an ambush in Quezon City.

Finally, he said the Aquino siblings would do well to talk to their uncle, Danding Cojuangco.

“I’m not saying that it was Cojuangco who masterminded the assassination of Ninoy. But the confessed conspirator in the incident pointed to him,” Olaguer said.

The priest recalled how Martinez, who was released from prison in 2007, admitted to him and the other jailed soldiers that he and several other members of the Avsecom met at the Carlston Hotel in Baclaran, Parañaque, to plan the killing.

He said Martinez also owned up to helping Galman enter the restricted zone inside the Manila International Airport on the day that Ninoy was shot.

“In that meeting, Martinez asked the men who were they working for and they all allegedly replied it was Danding who ordered them to do it,” Olaguer said.

Cojuangco was known to be one of the cronies of the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos.

Danding’s close associates

Olaguer noted that some of the personalities, including several high-ranking military officials, that Martinez mentioned “were known to be close associates of Danding.”

“Even former Sgt. Franklin Maniego, who drove the car which took Galman to the airport, admitted knowing of Danding’s involvement,” he said.

If the Aquino siblings really want peace of mind and “internal healing,” Olaguer said they should respect the rights of the convicted soldiers to be pardoned by the President.

He said the Aquinos and all freedom-loving Filipinos should not debate on the controversial release of the convicted soldiers.

“What we must be working on right now is how to liberate the Filipino people from the lies and deceit that imprisoned us since Ninoy was assassinated. In the end, we should be asking ourselves if we did the right thing to give justice not just to Ninoy, but to Filipinos who suffered long after his death.”

‘They had been fooled’

Reacting to Olaguer’s statements, Noynoy Aquino on Saturday said the claim that Cojuangco was the mastermind behind the Aquino-Galman murders was an old issue and reiterated his earlier position this was “highly improbable.”

The senator said the convicts had been lying since 1983 when his father was assassinated and for several years after that, “stripteasing” about what they allegedly know of the murders.

“I can’t blame Msgr. Olaguer and the others if they had been fooled,” he said in a phone interview.

He said the claim that his uncle was involved was nothing new, it was made around three or five years ago.

Noting that his father and uncle had a “very good relationship,” he said “it would be illogical on the part of those who orchestrated” the assassination “to assign” the job to Danding.

Asked whether he and his mother had discussed rumors linking his uncle to the murder, Aquino said he couldn’t recall.

Rumors

But he noted that when he was first asked about the rumors when he was still a congressman and he said he didn’t think his uncle was involved, his mother would have pointed this out to him if she disagreed.

The senator said being a public servant, he was ready to meet with Olaguer but added he did not see the point of doing so if the latter would just repeat his position on the subject.

Aquino did not see any point either in meeting with the freed soldiers.

“They have been involved in the double murder and cover-up up to now ... I don’t see any value of talking to them,” he said.

He said his father is dead and yet they are still “spitting on his grave.” With a report from Christine Avendaño