Benigno Aquino, Jr. (27 November 1932-21 August 1983) was a senator in the Philippines from 1967 to 1972 and an opposition leader to the regime of Ferdinand Marcos. The husband of future president Corazon Aquino, he was murdered in 1983 by Marcos.
Biography[]
Benigno Aquino, Jr. was born on 27 November 1932 in Concepcion, Tarlac, Luzon in the Philippines. He was the grandson of general Servillano Aquino, and his father Benigno Aquino, Sr. was the speaker of the Filipino House of Representatives during World War II. Aquino was well-educated and was a journalist during the Korean War, and Aquino became Mayor of Concepcion in 1955. In 1966, Aquino became Secretary-General of the Liberal Party of the Philippines, and in 1967 he became the youngest senator elected in the country's history at the age of 34. He rose up to challenge Ferdinand Marcos' dictatorship, and on 21 August 1971 the Plaza Miranda bombing killed 9 people and wounded 95, including Liberal Party members. It was blamed on the New People's Army, but Marcos used the incident to suspend habeas corpus and increase his control over the government. Aquino emerged as an opposition leader, and in 1972 he was arrested on trumped-up charges of murder after martial law was declared. In 1975, he performed a hunger strike, but in 1977 he was sentenced to death. In 1980, he suffered a heart attack in prison, and he decided to go to the United States for treatment.
Death[]
Aquino dead
On 21 August 1983, he decided to return to the country and landed at Manila International Airport, with his bodyguards forcing him up and escorting him out of the plane. He was shot in the head, allegedly by Rolando Galman, and his mother decided not to embalm him to show the people what the killer had done to her son. It has been accepted that he was murdered by Marcos' government, and his wife Corazon Aquino would go on to lead a revolution against the government and restore democracy.