"My wife is not going to be President"
The scene at Manila's Malacañang Palace leaves little doubt that the two most powerful people in the Philippines are both named Marcos. While President Ferdinand Marcos receives a constant stream of visitors in his study, which is just off the main reception hall, First Lady Imelda Romualdez Marcos holds court next door in the music room. Last week, a few days before leaving on his trip to the U.S., the President discussed at length his wife, human rights and other issues with TIME Hong Kong Bureau Chief Ross H. Munro and Manila Stringer Nelly Sindayen. Excerpts from the interview:
Q. In your statements about the U.S. trip, you leave the impression that you consider yourself a good friend of the U.S. but one who has sometimes been badly treated.
A. That's quite true. It's time the two countries—the leadership of both countries—look at these matters with more maturity than has been demonstrated so far.
Q. Is there one particular example you'd want to give, when you and the Philippines were treated badly?
A.. We go all the way back in history: [Admiral George] Dewey and his promises, the proclamation of independence. When the veterans had to send a mission to the U.S. to claim their rights after the second World War. The Bell Trade Act [of 1946] was a symbol of one-sidedness: we were obligated to allow all American products to come into our country free. But eight principal Philippine products were given quotas by the U.S.* And the U.S. reserved the power to impose restrictions on any product imported from the Philippines that would compete with any American product.
Q. What about during the Administration of Jimmy Carter, with its emphasis on human rights in foreign policy?
A. It's not a matter of foreign policy. I would presume it's more a matter of implementation thereof. We have no quarrel with a policy that seeks to support human rights. In your financing institutions, the instructions under President Carter were either to vote against Philippine projects or to cast a neutral vote on the ground that we had violated human rights. Many projects had to be delayed. Some of those projects [approved only recently] had been pending for ten or 15 years.
It's a question of arriving at conclusions based on distorted media and embassy reports. We felt that the Philippines was entitled to more attention in the matter of really determining what was happening. These statements about torture, about alleged misuse of power and things like that insulted the Filipinos more than their leader because it was made to appear as if Filipinos would tolerate a leader who would torture his own people, who would utilize his executive prerogatives for abuses.
Q. First Lady Imelda Marcos recently hinted that if the U.S. treats the Philippines shabbily, the Philippines could turn toward the Soviet Union and China.