Corazon Aquino, in full Maria Corazon Aquino, née Maria Corazon Cojuangco , (born January 25, 1933,

Tarlac province, Philippines—died August 1, 2009, Makati), Philippine political leader who served as
president (1986–92) of the Philippines, restoring democratic rule in that country after the long
dictatorship of Ferdinand Marcos. Corazon Cojuangco was born into a wealthy, politically prominent
family based in Tarlac province, north of Manila. She graduated from Mount St. Vincent College in New
York City in 1954 but abandoned further studies in 1955 to marry Benigno Simeon Aquino, Jr., who was
then a promising young politician. Corazon remained in the background during her husband’s
subsequent career, rearing their five children at home. Her husband, who had become a prominent
opposition politician, was jailed by Marcos for eight years (1972–80), and Corazon accompanied him
into exile in the United States in 1980. Benigno was assassinated upon his return to the Philippines in
August 1983. This event galvanized opposition to the Marcos government. When Ferdinand E. Marcos
unexpectedly called for presidential elections in February 1986, Corazon Aquino became the unified
opposition’s presidential candidate. Though she was officially reported to have lost the election to
Marcos, Aquino and her supporters challenged the results, charging widespread voting fraud. High
officials in the Philippine military soon publicly renounced Marcos’s continued rule and proclaimed
Aquino the Philippines’ rightful president. On February 25, 1986, both Aquino and Marcos were
inaugurated as president by their respective supporters, but that same day Marcos fled the country. In
March 1986 Aquino proclaimed a provisional constitution and soon thereafter appointed a commission
to write a new constitution. The resulting document, which restored the bicameral Congress abolished
by Marcos in 1973, was ratified by a landslide popular vote in February 1987. Aquino held elections to
the new Congress and broke up the monopolies held by Marcos’s allies over the economy, which
experienced steady growth for several years. But she failed to undertake fundamental economic or
social reforms, and her popularity steadily declined as she faced continual outcries over economic
injustice and political corruption. These problems were exacerbated by persistent warfare between the
communist insurgency and a military whose loyalties to Aquino were uncertain. In general, her
economic policies were criticized for being mixed or faltering in the face of mass poverty. Aquino was
succeeded in office by her former defense secretary, Fidel Ramos.