Don’t judge me on my family’s legacy, says Marcos Jr
THE incoming president of the Philippines yesterday paid his respects at the grave of his father, the disgraced dictator, Ferdinand Marcos, a day after asking the world to judge him by his leadership and not by his family’s brutal legacy.
Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr won a commanding victory in Monday’s elections, sweeping the family back to power 36 years after an uprising forced them to flee to into exile in Hawaii.
Photos shared by his team showed Mr Marcos, wearing dark glasses, laying a bouquet of flowers on his late father’s grave in the “heroes” cemetery in the Philippines’ capital, Manila.
One image appeared to show him wiping away tears as he stood at the grave where a photo of his father was displayed.
Mr Marcos’s campaign theme was fostering “unity” but his first move as president after his resounding win underscored the polarisation in the nation over the comeback of the notorious dynasty.
The body of Mr Marcos Sr was only moved to the revered cemetery in 2016 after the family won a lengthy battle to bury him alongside other presidents.
Past governments had refused them permission to bury him there because of his reputation as an authoritarian ruler during a period in which tens of thousands of suspected communist rebels and political foes were jailed, beaten or killed.
Under Ferdinand Marcos senior’s dictatorship, his family and cronies amassed an estimated $10billion in dubiously acquired wealth, a government-appointed commission found. The family denies any wrongdoing. Survivors of the dictatorship have expressed disbelief at Monday’s election result, which his critics say was aided by an orchestrated offensive on social media that rewrote history and presented the Marcos rule as a golden era of economic prosperity.
Mr Marcos, who avoided debates and scrutiny during the election campaign, has so far been vague about his agenda – but he has promised to lower the price of basic goods, build up the country’s infrastructure and steer it out of a pandemic-induced economic slowdown.