REVISITING CORAZON

AQUINO’S SPEECH BEFORE

THE US CONGRESS
CORAZON “CORY” COJUANGCO AQUINO

• Cory Aquino functioned as the symbol of the

restoration of the democracy and the
overthrow of the Marcos dictatorship in
1986.
SEN. BENIGNO “NINOY” AQUINO JR.

• Ninoy Aquino was the husband of Cory Aquino.

He was a longtime opponent of Pres. Ferdinand
Marcos and was assassinated on Sunday, August
31, 1983 on the tarmac of Manila International
Airport (now named NAIA in his honor).
FERDINAND MARCOS

• Ferdinand Emmanuel Edralin Marcos Sr.

was a Filipino politician and kleptocrat who
was the 10th President of the Philippines
from 1965 to 1986.
THE PEOPLE POWER REVOLUTION OF
1986
• This was widely recognized around the world for its
peaceful character. The overwhelming presence of
civilian in EDSA successfully turned a coup into a
civilian demonstration. The thousands of people who
gathered overthrew Ferdinand Marcos from the
Presidency after 21 years.
• Marcos then called for a Snap Election in which
Cory Aquino was convinced to run against him.
The canvassing was rigged to Marcos’ favor but
people protested against his corrupt and
authoritarian government.
SEPTEMBER 18, 1986

Cory Aquino went to the United States

and spoke before the joint session of the
U.S. Congress.
She began her speech and related,
“The government sought to break him by indignities and terror. The
locked him up in a tiny, nearly airless cell in a military camp in the north.
They stripped him naked and held a threat of a sudden midnight execution
over his head. Ninoy held up manfully under all of it. I barely did as well.
For forty-three days, the authorities would not tell me what had happened
to him. This was the first time my children and I felt we had lost him.”
“When that didn’t work, they put him on a trial for subversion, murder
and a host of other crimes before a military commission. Ninoy
challenged its authority and went on a fast. If he survived it, then he felt
God intended him for another fate. We had lost him again. For nothing
would hold him back from his determination to see his fast through to
the end. He stopped only when it dawned on him that the government
would keep his body alive after the fast had destroyed his brain. And so,
with barely any life in his body. He called off the fast on the 40th day.”
“Finally may I turn to that other slavery, our 26 billion
dollar foreign debt. I have said that we shall honor it. Yet,
the means by which we shall be able to do so are kept
from us. Many of the conditions imposed on the previous
government that stole this debt, continue to be imposed
on us who never benefited from it.”
• Cory lamented about the country’s crippling debt from the
Marcos’ administration which worsened the challenges of the
Filipino people because half of the country’s export earning
amounting to 2 billion dollars would go to pay the interest of the
debt whose benefit the Filipino people never received.
“Has there been a greater test of national commitment to the
ideals you hold dear than that my people have gone through?
You have spent many lives and much treasure to bring
freedom to many lands that were reluctant to receive it. And
here, you have a people who want it by themselves and need
only the help to preserve it.”
• Cory claimed that her main approach to this problem
was through peace and not through the sword of war.
 Thank you. Keep safe
everyone 