Posted on: Wednesday, July 14, 2004
EDITORIAL
Hawai'i welcomes a Philippines hero
The "People Power" revolution 18 years ago in the Philippines is a tale of heroic and epic proportions that, sadly and perhaps needlessly, is still looking for its happy ending.
That can't be said about the revolution's biggest hero, however. Corazon Aquino led the toppling of Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos, served a single term as the country's president, and then chose to step into the role of revered elder stateswoman.
Aquino had by then proved to be much more than the unprepared housewife who picked up the baton at the 1983 assassination of her husband, Benigno "Ninoy" Aquino, a popular opposition senator.
By 1986, Cory Aquino had defeated Marcos at the polls, led a popular uprising to keep him from nullifying the election results and moved into Malacaņang as Marcos was exiled to Honolulu.
The many victims of Marcos, despite findings in several judicial jurisdictions, including Hawai'i, have yet to recover any of his looted millions.
During her six-year term, Aquino survived numerous coup attempts and then refused to break her promise not to seek a second term.
The tragedy of today's Philippines is the failure of Aquino's successors to enlarge upon her legacy. While its political structure mimics that of America, its former colonial ruler, its political culture at times seems a cartoonish distortion of the American original.
Both systems have seen the unlikely rise of movie stars to positions of power — Ronald Reagan and Arnold Schwarzenegger, Joseph Estrada and Fernando Poe Jr.
But the extent of election fraud and wanton corruption in the Philippines remains simply staggering, resulting in paralysis, instability, stagnation, insurgency, backward infrastructure and investment flight.
The victims, of course, are the poor. Over the past 30 years, the Philippines economy has grown by an annual average of 3.5 percent, compared with 5.8 percent in Malaysia and 6.5 percent in Indonesia.
With population growth at around 2 percent, the standard of living is hardly rising at all.
The opportunity to do better — much better — was the yet-to-be-realized gift of Corazon Aquino.
It is for this gift that the East-West Center tonight honors Aquino with its Asia Pacific Community Building Award, and it is for this gift that we honor and welcome her visit to Hawai'i.
