Historical Background under the administration of Corazon Aquino

Corazon Aquino was the first female president of the Phillipines, and is known for leading the People
Power Revolution in 1986 which restored democracy to the country. She was named TIME’s Woman of
the Year in 1986. Cory Aquino did not aspire to be a politician. In 1955, after graduating from Mount St.
Vincent College in New York City, she married Benigno Aquino (nicknamed “Ninoy”), a young politician.
She supported her husband’s career as he was elected senator, raising 5 children at home. Ninoy Aquino
became a popular, outspoken opponent of Ferdinand Marcos, the dictator who held the presidency
from 1965. In 1972, Ninoy was imprisoned for eight long years, and then exiled to the United States.
Ninoy was finally allowed to return to his homeland in 1983, only to be assassinated the moment he
arrived. Ninoy’s imprisonment, exile, and assassination outraged the people and spurred Ferdinand’s
opposition. The economic problems of the country deteriorated even further, and the government went
further into debt.

After her husband’s assassination, Cory took his place as the leader of the opposition. In 1985, Ferdinand
suddenly announced an election to legitimize his hold on the country. Cory was reluctant to run at first,
but changed her mind after being presented with one million signatures urging her to run for president.

During Cory’s run for president, Ferdinand Marcos derided her with sexist statements, saying she was
“just a woman” whose place was in the bedroom."

Cory just answered: “May the better woman win in this election.”

He also attacked her inexperience in politics. Cory responded by admitting she had “no experience in
cheating, lying to the public, stealing government money, and killing political opponents.”

After the elections were held in February 1986, Marcos was declared the winner. There were numerous
reports of election fraud, and the outcome was condemned by Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the
Philippines and the United States Senate. Ronald Reagan called the the fraud reports “disturbing” in an
official statement.

Cory immediately called for peaceful civil disobedience protests, and for organized strikes and mass
boycotts of the media and businesses owned by Marcos. Filipinos were enthusiastic in their support.
These popular, peaceful demonstrations came to be known as the People Power Revolution. Though
Marcos ordered troops against the thousands of protesters (including whole families and nuns and
priests), not a shot was fired and the troops withdrew and many defected.

By the end of February, Ferdinand Marcos withdrew from power, fleeing to Hawaii, and Cory Aquino
became the President of the Philippines.

Cory’s ascension to the office of president signaled a new era for Filipinos. During the first few months
of her presidency, the Philippines experienced radical changes and reforms. Cory immediately created
a Constitutional Commission in charge of drafting a new constitution, and created the Presidential
Commission on Good Government which went after Marcos’s ill-gotten wealth.
The new Corazon Aquino Administration gave strong emphasis and concern for civil liberties and
human rights, and peace talks with communist insurgents and Muslim secessionists. Cory also focused
on bringing back economic health and confidence. The Aquino administration succeeded in paying off
$4 billion of the country’s outstanding debts.

Cory was also a lifelong member of the Council of Women World Leaders, an international organization
of former and current female heads of state and government that helps to mobilize women world
leaders to take action on issues critical to the leadership, empowerment and development of women.

In 1992, President Aquino strongly declined the requests for her to seek reelection. She wanted to set an
example to both citizens and politicians, in contrast to Ferdinand Marcos, that the presidency is not a
lifetime position. She still remained active in the public eye, however, often voicing her views and
opinions on the pressing political issues.

Cory Aquino passed away in 2009 of cancer. Her death elicited a worldwide reaction, and thousands
attended her wake and funeral. Filipino Catholics called on the Church to have Aquino canonized and
declared as a saint.

Hillary Clinton said that Aquino was “admired by the world for her extraordinary courage” in leading the
fight against dictatorship. Pope Benedict XVI applauded her “courageous commitment to the freedom of
the Filipino people, her firm rejection of violence and intolerance”

Cory was an amazing woman who had a huge impact on the freedom and welfare of millions of people.
She accomplished so much in her life and was beloved by many people.

The state of the nation 1991 higlights the Aquino Administration's performance from 1986 to the first
half of 1991. Thus, it answer tree key question which are what have we done? Whohave we become?
What more do we commit ourselves to do together? It attempts to capture and document our three
legacies which are the Legacy of a democracy restored, The legacy of economic recover, and Thhe legacy
of national unity and solidarity. Peaceful and credible political exercises. The cornstone of our
democratic Government is the constitution which the filipino people ratified in our 1987 plebiscite.
Decline in Criminality, administarion of Corazon Aquino achieved real, not illusory gains in this critical
area of concern. The national average monthly crime rate per 100,000 population was 21.3% in 1984 but
by 1990, this fell to 19.14%. Speedy and resonsive Justice. The administration Aquino has always been
commited to human rights but at the same time, it has also been tough on criminality. But there are
initiated amendment of vital laws which would strengthen the ability to enforce law and order. Human
Rights may well be the heart of our democracy. (Aquino, 1991).

ACHIEVING PEACE

THROUGH PEACEFUL MEANS

President Aquino recalls the events which led to the February Revolution, and eventually, her
presidency. She credits her late husband Ninoy for conceptualizing, embracing and promoting the
philosophy of reconciliation and nonviolence that became the moving force of the relatively bloodless
revolution. The real challenge now is to achieve peace by the ways of peace — for so much can be
achieved in peace rather than in war.

I Japan, I understand, it is contrary to custom for women to take the leading role, especially in the realm
of politics. For much of my life, in fact until three years ago, I had much in common with the Japanese
woman and wife. I had chosen to marry a very dominant man; one who was to become the focus and
center of my life, and the vortex of Philippine politics. Ninoy was the kind of man who had to be No. 1
not only in politics but in the home as well. And so my life around his. I was the dutiful wife, silent and
supportive; the woman remembered by his friends as the one who served coffee, much as the Japanese
woman serves tea. Some of these friends of his are now my ministers. They do not talk about the times
when I served them coffee. But all in all I was happy in my role, for I loved him greatly.

Today I am No. 1. Not only at home but over our entire country. Ninoy would have been amazed, but
also proud. For he would not fail to say that it is thanks to the many things I learned at his side. And it is
true – up to a point.

Ninoy no longer influences the specific directions or decisions I must make as President of the
Philippines. But I must say that the reason I am where I am today is because, as was usual between us,
Ninoy took the lead and I followed.

It was Ninoy who conceptualized, embraced and promoted the philosophy of reconciliation and
nonviolence that became the moving force of our bloodless February revolution. It was also Ninoy who
was the first rallying point of People’s Power that propelled me to the Presidency, keeps me there, and
determines the course our nation is taking today.
Most people believe that People Power was born after Ninoy’s death. It was really born in 1978, when
he was still in prison.

In 1978, Marcos called for elections in another attempt to legitimize the naked power grab he made
when he declared martial law in 1972. He wanted to prove that he and his friends had the mandate of
the people. Everyone knew that the elections would be fraudulent, that the results were already
prepared. Marcos controlled the Commission on Elections, the media, and the national mint. The
opposition, which had none of these things, and whose leaders were either in jail, like Ninoy, or under
surveillance or city arrest, clearly did not stand a chance. But Ninoy decided to take up the challenge and
ran as the figurehead of the opposition slate from his prison cell. He could not campaign, of course, but
our daughter Kris, then seven years old, took her father’s place at the platform and appealed to the
people during rallies. On the eve of elections, Ninoy was given one concession. He would be questioned
on television by a government panel regarding his political views and the accusations that the
government had made against him. He was taken straight from solitary confinement and thrust in front
of the television cameras. I don’t know how he did it, but he bested them all. He answered all the
accusations and went on to accuse the government in turn. Right after the broadcast, the city of Manila
exploded in a noise barrage of people beating pots and pans, car drivers honking their horns, and people
shouting in the streets. It was as if they wanted to tell Ninoy, swiftly thrown back in his cell, that he was
not alone. The government was helpless to stop the non-violent, if hardly peaceful, demonstration. This
was the germ of People Power that would hibernate through the rest of the winter of our oppression
until Ninoy’s willing sacrifice of his life brought the spring of our liberation.

Ninoy would remember this night and ponder its meaning in his cell and later on in exile. This
demonstration had shown the limits of tyranny, that could reach everywhere except the hearts of brave
men and women. He went on to read the works of men who had also experienced the peaceful but
irresistible power of ordinary people to say, No more, and demand a change. He read Gandhi and Martin
Luther King. From Gandhi, he drew his arrival statement when he had decided to return to his homeland
for one last desperate effort to bring peace and reconciliation to his divided land.

“I have returned of my own free will,” his statement read, “to join the ranks of those struggling to
restore our rights of freedom through nonviolence. According to Gandhi, the willing sacrifice of the
innocent is the most powerful answer to insolent tyranny that has yet been conceived by God and
Man.” But as you saw on Japanese television, he never read that statement. He was dead before his feet
touched the land he loved.
It was after his death that People Power blossomed in all its glory. Two million people accompanied his
coffin to the grave, under the hot sun and the pouring rain. Again, the government was powerless. It had
issued threats against any who joined the funeral march. It grounded public transport so that people
would be inconvenienced. It held a grand ball so that the people would see its indifference to their
protest. But the funeral march went on, mournful and silent. Thousands of candles lit the way to his
gravesite. As his coffin slipped into the ground, Ninoy’s spirit entered his race. But Ninoy dead was more
to be feared than when he was alive. For now his spirit was free to animate his people with the courage
that had allowed him to face death. Courage, he said, is infectious. That night began the epidemic of
bravery, from which the government learned there was no immunity.

The burden of Ninoy’s mission to liberate his people in peace fell on my shoulders. I was reluctant to
take it on. I was not a politician. And now that he was dead, I had once more to take on myself the role
of father and mother to our children. And so I stipulated two conditions before I would take on the
leadership of the struggle for freedom. Two conditions I believe could not be fulfilled. One was that
Marcos would commit the folly of calling for a snap election. And the other was the impossible demand
that one million people would sign a petition asking me to run for President. And that is exactly what
happened. In an excess of arrogance, Marcos called for elections to prove once and for all that the
opposition was nothing. And over a million people signed a petition to prove he was wrong.

Again, in this election as in the previous one, Marcos had the guns, the goons, and the national mint.
With these things, he believed he could buy the people’s mandate or, at least, thwart their will by
fabricating a victory for himself at the polls. He was wrong. I and my running mate, with hardly any
funds and barely any organization, nonetheless got the people. Or rather, the people got us in the grip
of their determination to be rid once and for all of the tyranny that had abused and degraded them.
Neither his tricks nor his thuggery could stem the irresistible tide of People Power that swept us to
victory. Against his corruption, the people pitted their integrity by refusing to be bought. Against his
threats, the people pitted their courage as they wrapped their arms around the ballot boxes to protect
them from his thugs. Even his computer technicians, who were tasked with fabricating a fraudulent vote
count walked out in protest. And against his debased parliament that proclaimed him the victor in the
face of my overwhelming victory at the polls, they launched their nonviolent revolution. One million
Filipinos gathered in Luneta Park to proclaim me and Doy Laurel as the victors of the election, the
President and Vice-President of the People.

From that spot I proclaimed the strategy to vindicate the people’s will, to implement their decision to
make me President. I outlined a program of passive resistance and civil disobedience that called, as a
starter, for a boycott of Marcos enterprises. I could not predict when we would succeed, but we were
certain that the end of Marcos was near. Marcos could stay in the Palace but he had already lost the rest
of the country. This was so clear to everyone that no one was afraid to join the nonviolent campaign and
in the end, even the army stood down. A military revolt called by a brave handful of soldiers under
Minister Enrile and General Ramos, who declared themselves for my Presidency was immediately
surrounded by a protective wall of People Power summoned by the Cardinal. That wall stood up to the
tanks of the dictator. Marcos had lost every shred of legitimacy and, on the fourth day of the revolt,
slipped away into exile.

As I came to power peacefully, so shall I keep it. This is my contract with my people and my commitment
to God. The way of nonviolence had not exhausted itself in the struggle for Filipino freedom. It has the
potential to give our nation a lasting and honorable peace as well. In that belief, I have called for
negotiations with the communist rebels. Some people say I am naive to have done this. I can only say
that I owe it to our people, who have lived in fear of the gun for so long, to exhaust every means within
reason to give them the peace they so much deserve.

I do not know if I will succeed. I know I must try if only to show that before I take up the sword of war, I
shall have stripped the olive branch of peace of every leaf of offering. I am confident of the power of
government to deal forcefully with the insurgency in the last resort. The courage and skills of the new
Filipino soldier assure us that we shall never lose our dearly bought freedoms. The real challenge is to
achieve peace by the ways of peace. This is the best assurance that it will last and serve as the
foundation for the national cooperation that is needed to restore my country’s wasted fortunes. You
have seen this in your own history. You never achieved so much in war, as you did in peace. It is that
experience of your country that inspires me to go on trying. I ask you to share with me the hope and
prayers that I will succeed.

Reference:

Aquino, Corazon. Speeches of President Corazon C. Aquino . Republic Of The Philippine Policy
Statements, 1986.

“A Report to the Filipino.” SONA-TECHNICAL-REPORT-CCA, 1991,

https://www.officialgazette.gov.ph/downloads/1991/07jul/199107-SONA-TECHNICAL-REPORT-CCA.pdf.
Accessed 2021.

Engel, Keri. “Corazon Aquino, Revolutionary President of the Philippines: Amazing Women in History.”
Amazing Women In History | All the Women the History Books Left Out, 2012,
https://amazingwomeninhistory.com/corazon-aquino-revolutionary-president-philippines/.