PUBLISHED ON August 1, 2009 AT 10:28 AM
The failures of her presidency notwithstanding, Cory Aquino will be remembered for helping restore democracy in the Philippines and dismantle the vestiges of the Marcos dictatorship. When the Arroyo regime increasingly became corrupt and autocratic, she again rose to the challenge. Cory fought tyranny to the very end.
By BENJIE OLIVEROS
Bulatlat.com
MANILA – Corazon Aquino could have just went through the normal grieving process with her family after losing her husband Ninoy to the dark forces of the Marcos dictatorship. But she did not. Cory rose to the occasion to challenge the dictator for the presidency during the snap elections. In the process, she represented the anger of the Filipino people who were fed up with Marcos and his martial-law regime. And Cory, who was belittled by Marcos for being a “mere housewife,” defeated the dictator who was in power for 20 years and was known to be a brilliant lawyer before running for politics. When Marcos committed massive electoral fraud and refused to yield, Cory became the symbol of the “people power” uprising that ensued.
When Ferdinand Marcos was ousted from Malacañang and Cory Aquino assumed the presidency, she immediately went about dismantling the vestiges of martial law. She restored the Filipino people’s formal democratic rights, reopened the institutions of governance, released political prisoners, created the Presidential Committee on Human Rights, and appointed some human-rights lawyers to positions in government.
However, owing to her background, she fell short of implementing substantial reforms. She signed the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law, but the law had to be extended for more than two decades without being completed. The mill and farm workers of the Cojuangco-owned Hacienda Luisita had to fight for the land they have tilled for generations for two decades, paying for it with their blood before being able to gain it. She refused to renegotiate even the onerous foreign debts of the Marcos dictatorship, passing the Automatic Appropriation Law instead. And the Aquino government pursued the same economic policies that have wreaked havoc on the lives of the Filipino masses.
Aquino also implemented the same militarist solution to the armed conflict by “unsheathing the sword of war,” displacing more than a million people in rural areas. The “low intensity conflict” strategy that the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) learned from the US Armed Forces and was implemented by the Aquino government included arming anti-communist vigilante groups, which was responsible for brutal attacks against the people in rural areas. Enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings were also committed although the number of victims pales in comparison to that of the present Arroyo government.
Nevertheless, Cory Aquino, who died today, Aug. 1, has secured her place in history for daring to challenge the hated Marcos dictatorship and becoming the first woman president of the Philippines. More importantly, she presided over the dismantling of martial law and the restoration of the Filipino people’s formal democratic rights and processes.
Cory is much unlike the second woman to become president, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, who is attempting to emulate Marcos by attempting to become a dictator and trying to outdo Marcos in corruption and human-rights violations. Seeing this, Cory Aquino had to rise again to the occasion and ask Arroyo to resign. She became one of the guiding forces of the movement to oust Arroyo. Cory fought tyranny to the very end. (Bulatlat.com)
NDF: Cory an ‘Outstanding and Inspiring Figure’
PUBLISHED IN BULATLAT.COM ON August 2, 2009 AT 1:39 PM
NDFP MESSAGE OF CONDOLENCE ON THE DEATH OF FORMER PRESIDENT CORAZON AQUINO
The National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) Negotiating Panel and its Consultants convey their heartfelt condolences to the family, relatives and friends of former President Corazon Aquino on her passing away yesterday.
Corazon Aquino was an outstanding and inspiring figure in the anti-fascist alliance against the Marcos dictatorship, especially after the assassination of her husband, Benigno Aquino. She was openly critical of the longrunning support of the US for the Marcos dictatorship in exchange for the aggrandizement of US economic interests and the continuance of the US military bases.
Upon assuming the presidency after the fall of the dictator Marcos, she fulfilled her commitment to release all political prisoners, including Prof. Jose Maria Sison, founding chairman of the Communist Party of the Philippines and the Chief Political Consultant of the NDFP.
She engaged the NDFP in peace negotiations, but the military and police caused the termination of the ceasefire agreement between the Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP) and the NDFP when they indiscriminately fired on the peasants and their urban supporters marching for land reform on January 22, 1987.
The 1987 constitution, which was framed under the Aquino administration, contains provisions which may be used to counter land reform. But it also carries provisions which uphold human rights and restrain the proclamation of martial law, retain national restrictions on foreign investments and prohibit foreign military bases, foreign troops and nuclear weapons on Philippine soil.
Beset by coup attempts and threats by pro-Marcos and pro-Enrile factions of the military and police, then President Corazon Aquino sent Congressman Jose V. Yap to NDFP officials in The Netherlands in September 1990 to explore the holding of GRP-NDFP peace negotiations. These efforts were, however, derailed by Generals Fidel Ramos and Renato de Villa.
After she finished her term as president, Corazon Aquino strongly opposed the grossly anti-democratic policies and actions of her successors, Fidel Ramos, Joseph Estrada, and Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. In this regard, she was willing to join up with the patriotic and progressive forces of the people in mass protest actions.
Though suffering from failing health, she condemned the anti-democratic machinations of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo to cling to power beyond her term ending in June 2010. From her sickbed, she sent a powerful message of support to thousands of demonstrators protesting Mrs. Arroyo’s Con-Ass scheme. She called it “a shameful abuse of power!”.
The NDFP Negotiating Panel and its Consultants express their solidarity with the family, relatives and friends of former President Corazon Aquino in their time of mourning and grief and wish them much strength and courage.
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Here are some of the leading Philippine networks' live streaming videos and tribute sites dedicated to former president Cory Aquino:
http://now.abs-cbn.com/videos/live/anc.asx
http://now.abs-cbn.com/videos/live/abslive.asx
http://now.abs-cbn.com/videos/live/dzmm.asx
http://www.gmanews.tv/livestreaming.html
