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Philippines The Inheritance from Marcos
Democratic institutions were introduced to the Philippines by
the United States at the beginning of the twentieth century. The
apparent success of these imported practices gave the Philippines
its reputation as "the showcase of democracy in Asia." Before
1972 the constitutional separation of powers was generally
maintained. Political power was centralized in Manila, but it was
shared by two equally influential institutions, the presidency
and Congress. The checks and balances between them, coupled with
the openness of bipartisan competition between the Nacionalista
and Liberal parties, precluded the emergence of one-person or
one-party rule. Power was transferred peacefully from one party
to another through elections. The mass media, sensational at
times, fiercely criticized public officials and checked
government excess.
Marcos inflicted immeasurable damage on democratic values. He
offered the Filipino people economic progress and national
dignity, but the results were dictatorship, poverty, militarized
politics and a politicized military, and greatly increased
dependence on foreign governments and banks. His New Society was
supposed to eliminate corruption, but when Marcos fled the
country in 1986, his suitcases contained, according to a United
States customs agent, jewels, luxury items, and twenty-four gold
bricks. Estimates of Marcos's wealth ran from a low of US$3
billion to a high of US$30 billion, and even after his death in
1989, no one knew the true value of his estate, perhaps not even
his widow.
If Marcos had been merely corrupt, his legacy would have been
bad enough, but he broke the spell of democracy. The long
evolution of democratic institutions, unsatisfactory though it
may have been in some ways, was interrupted. The political
culture of democracy was violated. Ordinary Filipinos knew fear
in the night. An entire generation came of age never once
witnessing a genuine election or reading a free newspaper.
Classes that graduated from the Philippine Military Academy were
contemptuous of civilians and anticipated opportunities for
influence and perhaps even wealth. Marcos's worst nightmare came
true when Corazon Aquino used the power of popular opinion to
bring him down.
Aquino inherited a very distorted economy. The Philippines
owed about US$28 billion to foreign creditors. Borrowed money had
not promoted development, and most of it had been wasted on
showcase projects along Manila Bay, or had disappeared into the
pockets and offshore accounts of the Marcos and Romualdez
families and their friends and partners. Many Filipinos believed
that they would be morally justified in renouncing the foreign
debt on grounds that the banks should have known what the
Marcoses were doing with the money. Even Cardinal Jaime Sin
declared it "morally wrong" to pay foreign creditors when
Filipino children were hungry. Aquino, however, resolutely
pledged to pay the debt. Otherwise, the nation would be cut off
from the credit it needed. Although the Philippines could pay the
interest on the debt every year, it could not pay the principal.
This never-ending debt naturally inflamed Filipino nationalism. A
Freedom From Debt Coalition advocated using the money to help the
unemployed instead of sending the hard currency abroad.
Data as of June 1991
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