Rekindling the spirit of Ninoy Aquino: 'The Filipino is worth dying for'

From being a correspondent of The Manila Times who covered the Korean War in the early fifties, Benigno 'Ninoy' Aquino, Jr. became the youngest elected town mayor of Concepcion, Tarlac; then the youngest governor of Tarlac province; and catapulted himself to national politics as the youngest senator in 1967.

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When martial law was declared in 1972, he was among the first to be arrested. Together with fellow former Senator Jose Diokno, he was placed in solitary confinement. Convicted to death, his sentence was commuted to life imprisonment on account of international pressure. In 1980, he agreed to the government’s offer of a medical furlough and underwent heart bypass surgery in the United States.

Citing the imperative to restore democracy, he opted to return to the Philippines. After he arrived at the Manila International Airport, he was assassinated while in the custody of government soldiers after he disembarked from the plane. His death stirred the consciousness of the Filipino people. His funeral took 12 hours, as tens of thousands joined in bringing his remains from the Manila Cathedral to the Manila Memorial Park in Parañaque.