FERDINAND MARCOS

PHILIPPINE ADMINISTRATION 1965-1986

INTRODUCTION
Ferdinand Emmanuel Edralin Marcos, Sr. (September 11, 1917 September 28, 1989), was a Filipino dictator who held the title of President of the Philippines from 1965 to 1986. He was a lawyer, member of the Philippine House of Representatives(1949 1959) and a member of the Philippine Senate(1959 1965). He was Senate President from 1963 1965. While in power he implemented wide-ranging programs of infrastructure development and economic reform. However, his administration was marred by massive authoritarian corruption, despotism, nepotism, political repression, and human rights violations. In 1983, his government was accused of being involved in the assassination of his primary political opponent, Benigno Aquino, Jr. Public outrage over the assassination served as the catalyst for the People Power Revolution in February 1986 that led to his removal from power and eventual exile in Hawaii. It was later discovered that he and his wife Imelda Marcos had moved billions of dollars of embezzled public funds to the United States, Switzerland, and other countries, as well as into alleged corporations during his 20 years in power.

EARLY LIFE
Ferdinand Edralin Marcos was born September 11, 1917, in the town of Sarrat, Ilocos Norte to parents Mariano Marcos and Josefa Edralin He was baptized into the Philippine Independent Church According to the Marcos family's oral history, the family name was originallyQuidit, and their Ilokano roots have some Japanese and Chinese ancestry.Marcos said that his forefather was a "15th century Chinese pirate". In December 1938, Mariano Marcos, his brother Pio, his son Ferdinand, and his brother-in-law Quirino Lizardo were prosecuted for the murder of Julio Nalundasan, one of Marcos' father's political rivals. On September 20, 1935, the day after Nalundasan (for the second time) defeated Mariano Marcos for the National Assembly seat for Ilocos Norte, Nalundasan was shot and killed in his house in Batac. According to two witnesses, the four had conspired to assassinate Nalundasan, with Ferdinand Marcos eventually doing the killing. In late January 1939, they were denied bail and in the fall of 1939 they were convicted. Ferdinand and Lizardo received the death penalty for premeditated murder, while Mariano and Pio were found guilty only of contempt of court. The Marcos family took their appeal to the Supreme Court of the Philippines, which on October 22, 1940, overturned the lower court's decision and acquitted them of all charges but contempt.

 Marcos attended college at the University of the Philippines, attending the prestigious College of Law. He excelled in both curricular and extra-curricular activities, he was a valuable member of the university's swimming team, boxing, and wrestling. He was also an accomplished and prolific orator, debater, and writer of the university's newspaper. He also became a member of the ROTC and later an instructor of the subject. He took the 1939 bar exam and topped it with almost a perfect score despite the fact that he was incarcerated when he was reviewing. In 1939, while incarcerated, Ferdinand Marcos graduated cum laude. If he had not been put in jail for twenty seven days, he would have graduated magna cum laude. He was elected to the Pi Gamma Mu international honor society, and the Phi Kappa Phi international honor society which, 37 years later gave him its Most Distinguished Member Award.

CONGRESSIONAL CAREER
House of Representatives When the Philippines was granted independence on July 4, 1946 by the American government, the Philippine Congress was established. Marcos ran and was twice elected as representative of the 1st district of Ilocos Norte, 1949 1959. He was named chairman of the House Committee on Commerce and Industry and member of the Defense Committee headed by Ramon Magsaysay. He was chairman, House Neophytes Bloc in which (President) Diosdado Macapagal, (Vice President) Emmanuel Pelaez and (Manila Mayor) Arsenio J. Lacson were members, House Committee on Industry; LP spokesman on economic matters; member, Special Committee on Import and Price Controls and on Reparations; House Committees on Ways and Means, Banks Currency, War Veterans, Civil Service, Corporations and Economic Planning; and the House Electoral Tribunal. Senate He was the topnotcher in the senatorial elections in 1959. He was Senate minority floor leader, 1960; executive vice president, LP 1954 1961; president, Liberal Party, 1961 1964; Senate President, 1959 1965. During his term as Senate President, former Defense Secretary Eulogio B. Balao was also closely working with Marcos. Marcos led controversial political career both before and after his term as Senate President. He became Senator after he served as member of the House of Representatives for three terms, then later as Minority Floor Leader before gaining the Senate Presidency. He introduced a number of significant bills, many of which found their way into the Republic statute books.

PRESIDENCY
Presidential campaign Marcos was famous for his anti-Japanese guerrilla activity during World War II something that set him apart from his political opponents, many of whom had collaborated with the Japanese. Using a combination of vote-buying, electoral fraud, and coercion, coupled with an effective media campaign, Marcos won the presidency in 1965.

Infrastructure programs The leaders of the SEATO nations in front of the Congress Building in Manila, hosted by Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos on October 24, 1966. (L-R:) Prime Minister Nguyen Cao Ky (South Vietnam), Prime Minister Harold Holt (Australia), President Park Chung-hee (South Korea), President Ferdinand Marcos (Philippines), Prime Minister Keith Holyoake (New Zealand), Lt. Gen. Nguyen Van Thieu (South Vietnam), Prime Minister Thanom Kittikachorn (Thailand), President Lyndon B. Johnson (United States) Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos with Lyndon B. Johnson and Lady Bird on September 12, 1966. In his first State of the Nation Address (SONA), Marcos revealed his plans for economic development and government reform. Marcos wanted the immediate construction of roads, bridges and public works, which included 16,000 kilometers of feeder roads, some 30,000 lineal meters of permanent bridges, a generator with an electric power capacity of one million kilowatts (1,000,000 kW), and water services to eight regions and 38 localities.He also urged the revitalization of the judiciary, the national defense posture and the fight against smuggling, criminality, and graft and corruption in the government. To accomplish his goals President Marcos mobilized the manpower and resources of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) for action to complement civilian agencies in such activities as infrastructure construction; economic planning and program execution; regional and industrial site planning and development; community development and others. The employment of technocrats in key positions and the mobilization of the AFP for civic actions resulted in the increasing functional integration of civilian and military elites.

 Vietnam War To the surprise of many, soon after becoming president, Marcos wanted the Philippines to become involved in the Vietnam War. He asked Congress to approve sending a combat engineer unit to South Vietnam. When the previous Philippine president, Macapagal, suggested in 1964 1965 to send troops it had been Marcos who had led the opposition against this plan on both legal and moral grounds. Despite opposition against the new plan, the Marcos government gained Congressional approval and Philippine troops were sent from the middle of 1966 as the Philippines Civic Action Group (PHILCAG). PHILCAG reached a strength of some 1,600 troops in 1968 and between 1966 and 1970 over 10,000 Filipino soldiers served in South Vietnam, mainly being involved in civilian infrastructure projects.

Second term (1969 1981) 1969 presidential election In 1969, twelve candidates ran for president. Marcos was reelected for a second term the first Filipino president to win a second term.The election was marked by massive violence, vote-buying, and fraud on Marcos' part,and Marcos used $56 million from the Philippines' treasury to fund his campaign.His running mate, incumbent Vice President Fernando Lopez was also elected to a third full term as Vice President of the Philippines

Martial law and the New Society Marcos declared martial law on September 22, 1972, by virtue of Proclamation No. 1081 which he signed on September 21, 1972, extending his rule beyond the constitutional two-term limit. He justified this by exaggerating threats of Communist and Muslim insurgencies.He would later tell historians that he signed Proclamation No. 1081 as early as September 17.Ruling by decree, he curtailed press freedom and other civil liberties, closed down Congress and media establishments, and ordered the arrest of opposition leaders and militant activists, including his staunchest critics, senators Benigno Aquino, Jr., Jovito Salonga and Jose Diokno.Marcos claimed that martial law was the prelude to creating his Bagong Lipunan, a "New Society" based on new social and political values. A constitutional convention, which had been called for in 1970 to replace the Commonwealth era 1935 Constitution, continued the work of framing a new constitution after the declaration of martial law. The new constitution went into effect in early 1973, changing the form of government from presidential to parliamentary and allowing Marcos to stay in power beyond 1973.

From the declaration of martial law in 1972, until 1983, the U.S. government provided $2.5 billion in bilateral military and economic aid to the Marcos regime, and about $5.5 billion through multilateral institutions such as the World Bank. In a 1979 U.S. Senate report, it was stated that U.S. officials were aware, as early as 1973, that Philippine government agents were in the United States to harass Filipino dissidents. In June 1981, two anti-Marcos labor activists were assassinated outside of a union hall in Seattle. On at least one occasion, CIA agents blocked FBI investigations of Philippine agents. The Marcos regime instituted a mandatory youth organization, known as the Kabataang Barangay which was led by his Marcos' eldest daughter Imee. Presidential Decree 684, enacted in April 1975, required that all youths aged 15 to 18 be shipped off to remote rural indoctrination camps, where they underwent a ritualistic program designed to instill loyalty to the First Couple. Defense Minister Juan Ponce Enrile, Chief of Staff of the Philippine Constabulary Fidel Ramos, and Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces of the Philippines Fabian Ver were the chief administrators of martial law from 1972 to 1981, and the three remained President Marcos' closest advisers until he was ousted in 1986. Enrile and Ramos would later abandon Marcos' 'sinking ship' and seek protection behind the 1986 People Power Revolution The Catholic hierarchy and Manila's middle class were crucial to the success of the massive crusade.

 n 1978, the position returned when Ferdinand Marcos became Prime Minister. Based on Article 9 of the 1973 constitution, it had broad executive powers, that would be typical of modern prime ministers in other countries. The position was the official head of government, and the commander-in-chief of the armed forces. All of the previous powers of the President from the 1935 Constitution were transferred to the newly restored office of Prime Minister. The Prime Minister also acted as head of the National Economic Development Authority. Upon his reelection to President, Marcos was succeeded as Prime Minister by Cesar Virata in 1981.

Third term (1981 1986) Aquino's assassination Main article: Assassination of Benigno Aquino, Jr. In 1983, opposition leader Benigno Aquino, Jr. was assassinated by his Philippine military escort at the Manila International Airport upon his return to the Philippines after a long period of exile. The available evidence suggests that Imelda Marcos and General Fabian C. Ver planned the killing, but it is possible that Marcos himself made the actual order to have Aquino killed. This coalesced popular dissatisfaction with Marcos' authoritarian governance and pilfering of public wealth, leading to widespread protests against the regime

 On August 13, 1985, fifty-six Assemblymen signed a resolution calling for the impeachment of President Marcos for alleged diversion of U.S. aid for personal use, citing a July 1985 San Jose Mercury News expos of the Marcoses multi-million dollar investment and property holdings in the United States. The properties allegedly amassed by the First Family were the Crown Building, Lindenmere Estate, and a number of residential apartments (in New Jersey and New York), a shopping center in New York, mansions (in London, Rome and Honolulu), the Helen Knudsen Estate in Hawaii and three condominiums in San Francisco, California. The Assemblymen also included in the complaint the misuse and misapplication of funds for the construction of the Film Center, where X-rated and pornographic films are exhibited, contrary to public morals and Filipino customs and traditions.

DOWNFALL
During these years, Marcos's regime was marred by rampant corruption and political mismanagement by his relatives and cronies, which culminated with the assassination of Benigno Aquino. Critics considered Marcos the quintessential kleptocrat having looted billions of dollars from the Filipino treasury. The large personality cult in the Philippines surrounding Marcos also led to disdain. During his third term, Marcos's health deteriorated rapidly due to kidney ailments, often described as lupus erythematosus. He was absent for weeks at a time for treatment, with no one to assume command. Marcos's regime was sensitive to publicity of his condition; a palace physician who alleged that during one of these periods Marcos had undergone a kidney transplant was shortly found murdered. Many people questioned whether he still had capacity to govern, due to his grave illness and the ballooning political unrest. With Marcos ailing, his equally powerful wife, Imelda, emerged as the government's main public figure. Marcos dismissed speculations of his ailing health as he used to be an avid golfer and fitness buff who liked showing off his physique. In light of these growing problems, the assassination of Aquino in 1983 would later prove to be the catalyst that led to his overthrow. Many Filipinos came to believe that Marcos, a shrewd political tactician, had no hand in the murder of Aquino but that he was involved in cover-up measures. However, the opposition blamed Marcos directly for the assassination while others blamed the military and his wife, Imelda. The 1985 acquittals of Ver as well as other high-ranking military officers for the crime were widely seen as a miscarriage of justice.

By 1984, his close personal ally, U.S. President Ronald Reagan started distancing himself from the Marcos regime that he and previous American presidents had strongly supported even after Marcos declared martial law. The United States, which had provided hundreds of millions of dollars in aid, was crucial in buttressing Marcos's rule over the years. During the Carter administration the relation with the U.S. soured somewhat when President Jimmy Carter targeted the Philippines in his human rights campaign. In the face of escalating public discontent and under pressure from foreign allies, Marcos called a "Snap Election" in 1986, with more than a year left in his term. He selected Arturo Tolentino as his running mate.The opposition to Marcos united behind Aquino's widow, Corazon and her running mate, Salvador Laurel The "People Power movement" drove Marcos into exile and installed Corazon Aquino as the new president. At the height of the revolution, Enrile revealed that his ambush was faked in order for Marcos to have a pretext for imposing martial law. However, Marcos maintained that he was the duly elected and proclaimed president of the Philippines for a fourth term. The Philippine government today is still paying interest in public debts incurred during Marcos' administration. It was reported that, when Marcos fled, U.S. Customs agents discovered 24 suitcases of gold bricks and diamond jewelry hidden in diaper bags and in addition, certificates for gold bullion valued in the billions of dollars were allegedly among the personal properties he, his family, his cronies and business partners surreptitiously took with them when the Reagan administration provided them safe passage to Hawaii. When the presidential mansion was seized, it was discovered that Imelda Marcos had over 2700 pairs of shoes in her closet.

Economy
To help finance a number of economic development projects, the Marcos government borrowed large amounts of money from international lenders.The Philippines' external debt rose from $360 million (US) in 1962 to $28.3 billion in 1986, making the Philippines one of the most indebted countries in Asia. A sizable amount of this money went to Marcos family and friends in the form of behest loans. These loans were assumed by the government and still being serviced by taxpayers. Today, more than half of the country's revenues are outlaid for the payments on the interests of loans alone. Foreign capital was invited to invest in certain industrial projects. They were offered incentives, including tax exemption privileges and the privilege of bringing out their profits in foreign currencies. One of the most important economic programs in the 1980s was the Kilusang Kabuhayan at Kaunlaran (Movement for Livelihood and Progress). This program was started in September 1981. Its aim was to promote the economic development of the barangays by encouraging its residents to engage in their own livelihood projects. The government's efforts resulted in the increase of the nation's economic growth rate to an average of six percent or seven percent from 1970 to 1980. The Philippine economy suffered a great decline after the Aquino assassination in August 1983. The political troubles hindered the entry of foreign investments, and foreign banks stopped granting loans to the Philippine government. In an attempt to launch a national economic recovery program, Marcos negotiated with foreign creditors including the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), for a restructuring of the country's foreign debts to give the Philippines more time to pay the loans. Marcos ordered a cut in government expenditures and used a portion of the savings to finance the Sariling Sikap (SelfReliance), a livelihood program he established in 1984.

However, the economy experienced negative economic growth from the beginning of 1984 and continued to decline despite the government's recovery efforts. The recovery program's failure was caused by civil unrest, rampant graft and corruption within the government, and Marcos's lack of credibility. Marcos himself diverted large sums of government money to his party's campaign funds. The unemployment rate ballooned from 6.30% in 1972 to 27.65% in 1985. Between 1972 and 1980, the average monthly income of wage workers had fallen by 20%. By 1981, the wealthiest 10% of the population was receiving twice as much income as the bottom 60%. With help from the Rockefeller and Ford Foundations, Marcos brought the "Green Revolution" (industrialized, chemical agriculture) to the Philippines. These reforms resulted in high profits for transnational corporations, but were generally harmful to small, peasant farmers who were often pushed into poverty.[After declaring martial law in 1972, Marcos promised to implement agrarian reforms. However, the land reforms "served largely to undermine Marcos' landholder opponents, not to lessen inequality in the countryside",and "encouraged conversion to cash tenancy and greater reliance on farm workers". From 1972 to 1980, agricultural production fell by 30%. Under Marcos, exports of timber products were among the nation's top exports. Little attention was paid to environmental impacts of deforestation. By the early 1980s, the industry collapsed because most of the Philippines' accessible forests had been depleted.

Post-presidency
At 3:00 p.m., February 20, 1986, Marcos talked to United States Senator Paul Laxalt asking for advice from the White House. Laxalt advised him to "cut and cut cleanly", to which Marcos expressed his disappointment after a short pause. In the afternoon, Marcos talked to Enrile, asking for safe passage for him and his family including his close allies like General Ver. Finally, at 9:00 p.m., the Marcos family was transported by four Sikorsky HH-3E helicoptersto Clark Air Base in Angeles City Pampanga, about 83 kilometers north of Manila, before boarding US Air Force C-130 planes bound for Andersen Air Force Base in Guam, and finally to Hickam Air Force Base in Hawaii where Marcos arrived on February 26. Marcos died in Honolulu on September 28, 1989, of kidney, heart and lung ailments. He was interred in a private mausoleum at Byodo-In Temple on the island of Oahu, visited daily by the Marcos family, political allies and friends. The late strongman's remains are currently interred inside a refrigerated crypt in Ilocos Norte where his son, Ferdinand, Jr., and eldest daughter, Imee have since become the local governor and representative, respectively. A Mount Rushmore esque bust of Ferdinand Marcos, commissioned by Tourism Minister Jose Aspiras was earlier carved into a hillside in Benguet. It was subsequently destroyed by suspects that include left-wing activists, members of a local tribe who have been displaced by its construction, and looters hunting for the Marcos' legendary hidden treasure.Imelda Marcos was acquitted of embezzlement by a U.S. court in 1990 but was still facing a few hundred additional corruption charges in Philippine courts in 2006. In 1995 some 10,000 Filipinos won a U.S. class-action lawsuit filed against the Marcos estate. The charges were filed by victims or their surviving relatives for torture, execution and

Corazon Aquino repealed many of the repressive laws that had been enacted during Marcos' dictatorship. She restored the right to habeas corpus, repealed anti-labor laws, and freed hundreds of political prisoners. From 1989 to 1996, a series of suits were brought before U.S. courts against Marcos and his daughter Imee, charging them with executions, torture, and disappearances committed under their command. A jury in the Ninth Circuit Court awarded $2 billion to the plaintiffs and to a class composed of human rights victims and their families. On June 12, 2008, the US Supreme Court (in a 7 2 ruling penned by Justice Anthony Kennedy in Republic of the Philippines v. Mariano Pimentel ) held that: The judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit is reversed, and the case is remanded with instructions to order the District Court to dismiss the interpleader action. The court dismissed the interpleader lawsuit filed to determine the rights of 9,500 Filipino human rights victims (1972 1986) to recover $35 million, part of a $2 billion judgment in U.S. courts against the Marcos estate, because the Philippines is an indispensable party, protected by sovereign immunity. It claimed ownership of the funds transferred by Marcos in 1972 to Arelma S.A., which invested the money with Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith Inc., in New York. Human rights groups place the number of victims of extrajudicial killings under martial law at 1500 and Karapatan, a local human rights group's records show 759 involuntarily disappeared (their bodies never found). Military historian Alfred McCoy in his book "Closer than Brothers: Manhood at the Philippine Military Academy" and in his speech "Dark Legacy" cites 3,257 extrajudicial killings, 35,000 torture victims, and 70,000 incarcerated during the Marcos years.The newspaper Bulatlat (lit. "to open carelessly") places the number of victims of arbitrary arrest and detention at 120,000.