Enrile’s claims are pathetic attempt to rewrite history —Diokno family

The family of late Senator Jose "Pepe" Diokno branded Friday as a pathetic attempt at rewriting history the statements made by former Senator Juan Ponce Enrile during his tete-a-tete with defeated vice presidential candidate Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr.

The family took issue with the claim of Enrile that very few were arrested and inconvenienced during martial law and that they were later released; that no one was arrested for criticizing Bongbong's father, late President Ferdinand Marcos; and that Pepe Diokno did not want to be released.

“Each of these statements is a distortion of our history,” they said in a statement.

The family said the thousands of Martial Law victims whose rights were violated by the Marcos regime and whose claims have and are being officially processed belie Enrile’s statements and the words “few,” “inconvenience,” and “for a while” are relative terms.

“To the martial law regime, which Enrile served as the Secretary of National Defense, imprisonment without charges was a mere inconvenience. To Dad and Mom and all of us children, beyond the personal pain and difficulty, imprisonment without charges was—and is—injustice,” they said.

They said many detainees were not only imprisoned but tortured and some, forcibly disappeared.

“Are we now to take torture, forced disappearance, and loss of life as forms of ‘inconvenience’? The denial of freedom ‘for a while,’ whether for a day or for decades, of few or of many, is simply not acceptable, and stating it as a fact—‘They were inconvenienced for a while’— distorts the truth,” the family said.

They further said that their father, who spent nearly two years in prison, was never interrogated and charged.

“To deny that Marcos arrested persons who criticized him is, again, to peddle another falsehood,” they said.

The family denied that Pepe Diokno did not want to be released as, two days after his release, the latter filed a counter-manifestation before the Supreme Court to correct the earlier manifestation of the Solicitor General that he expressed loyalty to the Martial Law regime.

They said Diokno’s manifestation included a detailed account of the proceedings of his release, the persons present, the documents required from him as a prerequisite for his release.

The family said the primary document in question was the pledge of allegiance, parts of which was rejected by Diokno, and which Enrile now recalls as proof that the former does not want to be released.

They said Diokno particularly rejected the part in the pledge stating that he will not “perform any act in violation of Presidential Proclamation No 1081, dated September 21, 1972, or the Decrees, General Orders, Letters of Instruction, or other rules and regulations promulgated pursuant thereto, and that I undertake to bring to the attention of the proper authorities any act or omission by any person which would violate this pledge.”

They said their father told Enrile that the phrases were against his conscience and he could not agree with them so he said he would only sign the pledge if that part would be striken out.

Enrile replied that the pledge was a standard form that had been used in all previous releases but Diokno insisted that he could not agree to that particular part, the family said.

They said Enrile suggested that Diokno sign the pledge “with reservations” which Diokno wrote on the form by hand before his signature.

“To correct Enrile’s claim: Our father objected to the terms of the pledge, not to his release. There is a difference between the two. Enrile’s interpretation of Dad’s objections as ‘not wanting to be released’ is an outright misrepresentation of the facts,” the family said.

They also stressed that Diokno’s release was temporary and has conditions.

They further said Diokno was also required to sign a second document “stating he acknowledged having been given adequate food, fair treatment and so forth, during the entire period of his detention” which he refused to sign.

Diokno, the family said, told those present during the signing that "it was not true that he had been treated fairly or humanely during the entire period of his detention.”

They said Diokno ended his counter manifestation by saying that he filed it “only so that the record will show the true facts.”

“Forty-four years later, we find ourselves having to do the same, and we will continue to resist all efforts to rewrite history that seeks to cleanse shameful acts, records, and reputations,” the family said. — MDM, GMA News