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<img loading="lazy" src="https://cdn.kahimyang.com/resources/ninoy-hacienda-luisita.webp" alt="Ninoy Aquino at Hacienda Luisita" />
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(Ninoy Aquino (far left) at Hacienda Luisita)
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Let us look back on his legacy.
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It is public knowledge that Ninoy supported the bombing of key strategic locations by the <a href="https://kahimyang.com/kauswagan/general-blogs/1751/the-light-a-fire-movement-heroes-or-terrorists" class="news_link">Light a Fire Movement</a> (LAFM) in the early 80s. Ninoy knew that the dictatorship could not be fought through parliamentary means alone.
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According to some accounts, Ninoy, who was the hacienda's first administrator, allowed NPA rebels to hide in its sugar cane fields.  Juan Ponce Enrile in an 
 interview with the Daily Inquirer said that it was Ninoy who introduced founding CPP Chairman Amado Guerrero also known as Jose Maria Sison to renegade Huk commander Bernabe Buscayno (aka Kumander Dante),  allowing for the formation of the CPP's New People's Army. Enrile also said Ninoy's closest bodyguard was Roberto Santos also known as Commander Felman, a "principal" commander of the NPA.
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In his book  "The Aquinos of Tarlac",  Nick Joaquin notes how Ninoy's stint as a war correspondent in Korea and Southeast Asia in the early 1950s allowed him to develop a view of Communism that transcended simplistic Cold War rhetoric. He quotes Ninoy as saying:
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"To me, Communism and democracy had been black and white: Communism was bad, democracy was good. But when I saw how the North Korean prisoners were tortured and yet stuck to their own creed, I began to wonder."
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Ninoy adds in another chapter:
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"The Filipino is aware of and has enjoyed America’s benevolence; but to the rest of Asia, the American looks like the Frenchman, the Britisher and the Dutchman. To Asians, these people are the symbols of oppression. And many Asians would prefer Communism to western oppression."
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<img loading="lazy" src="https://cdn.kahimyang.com/resources/ninoy-taruc.webp" alt="Ninoy Aquino and Luis Taruc" alt="Ninoy Aquino with Luis Taruc" />
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(Ninoy Aquino with Luis Taruc)
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This is perhaps why Ninoy was fond of conciliatory approaches to left-wing uprisings in Central Luzon. Joaquin narrates that when President <a href="https://kahimyang.com/kauswagan/articles/558/today-in-philippine-history-august-31-1907-ramon-magsaysay-seventh-president-of-the-philippines-was-born-in-iba-zambales" class="news_link">Ramon Magsaysay</a> asked the young reporter how he could enhance his public image, Ninoy recommended that the president open discussions with Huk Supremo and Communist ally <a href="https://kahimyang.com/kauswagan/articles/1839/today-in-philippine-history-june-21-1913-luis-taruc-was-born-in-santa-monica-san-luis-pampanga" class="news_link">Luis Taruc</a>. Serving as the presidential emissary to the Supremo, Ninoy negotiated a settlement with Taruc. Because of this, Ninoy notes that he  <i>"had terrific credentials among the Huks: the boy who befriended Taruc”.</i>
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<p>
Aquino's ties with the organized Left extended even after the collapse of the Huk rebellion and the emergence of the young Turks who founded the CPP in 1968.
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<h3>Early Relations</h3>
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In an email interview by Lisandro Claudio (PhD Candidate in the School of Historical Studies in the University of Melbourne),  with the CPP's founding Chairman Jose Maria Sison,  Sison told the story of how Ninoy sought him out in 1967, a year before the founding of the CPP. He narrates:
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"I became friends with Ninoy in late 1967 through his young Senate aide Raul Roco who was then my neighbor in Sta. Mesa Heights. Ninoy had come to my house but I was not home. Raul eventually brought me to Ninoy's house on Times St. (in Quezon City)"
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Sison recalls that, while "Cory served coffee"  Ninoy proposed to him that they launch a joint hunger strike against Marcos to demand reforms. The young activist who headed the radical Kabataang Makabayan (KM) politely declined because he was busy organizing the peasant, labor, and youth sectors. Unknown to Aquino, Sison was also preoccupied with the formation of the CPP.
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Sison has always denied that it was Aquino who introduced him to Dante. He claims it was CPP Vice Chairman Arthur Garcia, with the aid of Tarlac Rep. Jose Yap, who arranged the meeting. "The stories about Ninoy introducing me to Dante revolve around the trip arranged by Yap",  notes Sison. Yap, a member of the Liberal Party, was one of Aquino’s closest allies.
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According to Claudio, he also asked Ka Dante for an interview with him about his relationship with Ninoy, but he declined, saying he was busy tending his Tarlac farm. However, in a 1989 interview with Bob Drogin of the LA Times, Dante, after discussing his long friendship with Ninoy, claimed <i>"It was really Ninoy who made Sison and me talk"</i>. Dante narrates that Aquino took Sison to Hacienda Luisita where two of Ninoy’s aides brought the young Marxist to the renegade Huk commander. Despite disagreeing with Dante's version of the story, Sison confirms that <i>"Ninoy had maintained a certain amount of good relations with the old people's army units headed by Bernabe Buscayno in Tarlac".</i>
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These good relations were most evident in Hacienda Luisita. According to Dante, the NPA never attacked the hacienda because of the rebel army's ties with Ninoy. In a personal interview, Rodolfo Salas (aka Kumander Bilog), CPP Chair from 1977-1986 and NPA Commander-Chief from 1976-1986 (he replaced both Sison and Dante when they were jailed) added:
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"Ninoy protected us in there. So we were able to organize the unions in Hacienda Luisita. The wife of Art Garcia was a nurse. We made her work in the hospital of Hacienda Luisita, and that’s how we organized the union.” Interestingly, he adds that "Ninoy supported the unionization, but the Cojuangcos didn't."
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Salas's predecessor, Sison, offers a slightly different interpretation of CPP-NPA penetration into Luisita: 
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"Hacienda Luisita is a big place of several thousands of hectares. It was an area of mass work by the NPA. The peasants and farm workers welcomed the NPA. Ninoy did not have to open the place for the NPA. But certainly it was helpful that Ninoy was not known to be hostile to the NPA. His local loyalists did not run to the military to report the presence of the NPA."
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<h3>The Benefits of Cooperation</h3>
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According to "Joey",  a former CPP politburo member, 
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"I can confirm that Ninoy provided us with arms, a training area, and lodging."
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In exchange for this aid, the CPP-NPA would support Ninoy's electoral bids. In the same 1989 interview with Drogin, Dante's wife Fatima claimed
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"They brought most of the wounded to Ninoy's house even borrowed money from Ninoy. And he would pay doctors not to tell on the NPA."
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Salas, who served as the Party's liaison officer with Aquino before martial law, told me a similar story.
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"We were the underground (UG) liaison officers. There were other people liaising with him through legal organizations, but we were strictly UG. We were trying to build an army."
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Prior to martial law, Salas, along with Ruben Tuazon, a former Ninoy employee turned NPA rebel, would visit Ninoy in his Times St. residence where they would wait for the senator in the kitchen.  When Ninoy met them, he would give them guns ("at most, 3 at a time",  says Salas), cash, or both. Salas recalls that Ninoy showed concern for his favorite NPA Commanders, asking questions like "How is Kumander Pusa? How is Kumander this and that?"  
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Salas himself brought wounded NPA soldiers either to Times St. in Quezon City or to the old Aquino residence in New Manila. Out of curiosity, I asked him if he ever saw Cory, to which he replied,  "Yah we'd see her, but we never took notice of her".
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These meetings were just the tip of the iceberg. For Salas, Aquino significantly contributed to the expansion of the NPA. For example, he claims  <i>"Ninoy was very instrumental in helping the NPA enter Isabela through Mayor Dy (Faustino Dy Sr). Dy wanted to run for governor of Isabela, but his opponent (a Marcos ally) had a private army"</i>. To aid his friend, Aquino brokered an alliance between the NPA and Dy. Salas recalls:  "I remember we used Dy's house as a base. I slept there myself when I was in Isabela".
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Sison's account on NPA expansion in Isabela once again differs slightly from his successor: 
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"At that time Faustino Dy was indeed pro-Ninoy against Marcos. But it was not Ninoy who introduced the NPA to then Cauayan mayor Dy. It was Ka Ruben Tuazon (the same Ruben Tuazon whom Salas claims helped him liaise with Ninoy), a peasant leader and member of the CPP Central Committee, who introduced the NPA to Dy."
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<h3>Marcos Accuses Aquino of Meeting with Communists</h3>
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On September 16, 1972, President Marcos charged unnamed Liberal Party officials with meeting cadres of the CPP for subversive purposes. Aquino immediately denied the allegations.
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Ninoy Aquino's ties with the New People's Army and the Communist Party of the Philippines