Imelda Marcos - First Lady of The Philippines (1965–1986)

First Lady of The Philippines (1965–1986)

In December 1965, when Ferdinand E. Marcos became the 10th Philippine President of the Philippines, Marcos became first lady of the Philippines. She was widely covered by both local and international media, often featuring in magazine articles. In 1969, Ferdinand Marcos became the first Philippine president to be re-elected to a second term.

On September 23, 1972, Ferdinand Marcos declared martial law to preserve his hold on power. It was during the martial law period that he abolished the Philippines' 1935 constitution and established a parliamentary system (Batasang Pambansa or National Assembly) composed mainly of his own political appointees. It was during this period that Marcos assumed a more public and powerful role in the government. She was appointed by her husband to various positions in the government, such as: Governor of Metropolitan Manila, Minister of Human Settlement, and Ambassador Plenipotentiary and Extraordinary. On December 7, 1972, an assailant, Carlito Dimahilig, tried to stab her to death with a bolo knife during an award ceremony broadcast live on television. Critics claimed the assassination attempt was staged. The assailant was shot to death by security police and the wounds on Marcos' hands and arms required 75 stitches. In 1978, she was elected as member of the 165-member Interim Batasang Pambansa (National Assembly) representing the National Capital Region.

As a Special Envoy, Imelda toured China, the Soviet Union, and the Soviet satellite states in Eastern Europe (Romania, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, etc.), the Middle East, Libya, then ruled by strongman Muammar Gaddafi, the non-Soviet dominated communist state of Yugoslavia, and Cuba. To justify the multi-million expenditure of traveling with a large diplomatic entourage using private jets, she would later claim diplomatic successes that included securing of a cheap supply of oil from China and Libya, and in the signing of the Tripoli Agreement.

Imelda's extravagant lifestyle reportedly included five-million-dollar shopping tours in New York, Rome and Copenhagen in 1983, and sending a plane to pick up Australian white sand for a new beach resort. She purchased a number of properties in Manhattan in the 1980s, including the $51-million Crown Building, the Woolworth Building (40 Wall Street) and the $60-million Herald Centre; she declined to purchase the Empire State Building for $750m as she considered it "too ostentatious." Her New York real estate was later seized and sold, along with much of her jewels and most of her 175 piece art collection, which included works by Michelangelo, Botticelli, and Canaletto. She responded to criticisms of her extravagance by claiming that it was her "duty" to be "some kind of light, a star to give guidelines."

She also orchestrated lavish public events using millions of dollars in public funds to extol her husband's regime and bolster her public image. Imelda secured the Miss Universe 1974 pageant for Manila, which necessitated the construction and completion of the 10,000-seat Folk Arts Theater in less than three months. Marcos organized the Kasaysayan ng Lahi, an extravagant festival parade showcasing the history of the Philippines. She initiated social programs such as the Green Revolution, a program that, although it did not address hunger and the core problem of agricultural land reform (most Filipino farmers were tenant farmers and did not own their land), encouraged Filipinos to plant vegetables and fruits in their gardens. Other short-lived social programs included a national family-planning program to reduce the country's population growth.

On the other hand, institutions such as Cultural Center of the Philippines, Philippine Heart Center, Lung Center of the Philippines, Kidney Institute of the Philippines, Nayong Pilipino; Philippine International Convention Center, Folk Arts Theater, Coconut Palace, and the Manila Film Center, built in 1982 to host her short-lived international film festival are all Marcos' brainchildren.

On 1981, martial law was lifted and, in the same year, Ferdinannd Marcos was re-elected as the president of the country.

When Ferdinand Marcos began to suffer from lupus erythematosus in the 1980s, it was said that Imelda Marcos was effectively the acting or de facto president of the Philippines. There was also speculation at that time that if Ferdinand Marcos were to die, Imelda Marcos and her husband's trusted military adviser, General Fabian Ver, then the chief of staff of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, would seize power. After the assassination of opposition leader and one Ferdinand Marcos' most prominent critics, former senator Benigno Aquino, Jr. on the tarmac of then Manila International Airport on 1983, Imelda Marcos and Ver (in addition to from Ferdinand Marcos) would be accused of ordering his assassination. In fact, Imelda Marcos was summoned to the investigation of the Agrava Commission, an independent fact-finding panel formed by her husband to investigate this assassination. Marcos denied the allegations against her.

On the 1986 snap presidential elections, she supported Ferdinand Marcos in his bid to be re-elected for the presidency against Corazon Aquino, a neophyte opposition leader and the widow of Aquino.

In the same year, Ferdinand Marcos would be ousted in a non-violent People Power revolt, which was triggered by the defection of then Defense Minister Juan Ponce Enrile and then AFP vice-chief of staff Lt. General Fidel Ramos.