President Bongbong Marcos considers his family’s years in exile as a dark period not only for them but also for the Philippines.
In an interview with World Economic Forum president Børge Brende in Davos, Marcos said that he was forced by his family to run again in 1992 when they were allowed to come back home.
“We were in exile for six years. We weren’t sure if we were coming back at all. My father never made it back. He died in Hawaii. That was a very trying time. Those were dark days for the family and I dare say even for the country,” he said.
Marcos said that it has been more than 30 years since his father was ousted through the People Power revolution.
“But after we came back from the United States, after exile, when we were first allowed to come back, the political issue was Marcos. And for us, to defend ourselves politically, somebody had to enter politics and be in the political arena, so at least, not only the legacy of my father but even our own survival required that somebody go into politics,” he said.
Marcos ran and won a seat in Congress in 1992. He later became governor of Ilocos Norte in 1998 and then ran again for Congress in 2007. Marcos became a senator in 2010 and ran for the vice presidency in 2016 but lost to former Vice President Leni Robredo.
“But life takes you to places that you did not expect and so once I was entrenched into political arena, well, if you’re going to do this, you better do it well,” he said.
“Every lieutenant wants to be general, every clerk wants to be the CEO, I’m saying that let’s do the best we can and take it as far as we can take it, so we just never stopped,” he added.
Marcos said that his election victory was a product of Filipinos believing his call for unity.
“I was blessed that the Filipino voters agreed with the message that we put out during the campaign and returned a very strong mandate for the presidency,” he said.
