After a landslide victory in Monday’s presidential election, the son of the country’s late dictator faces pressure to set out policies as critics raise fears about the country’s democracy
in the Philippines’ presidential election, winning more than twice as many votes as his closest competitor and by the largest share since democracy was restored to the country in 1986.is under pressure to show what kind of leader he plans to be.
“What I like about them is they want there to be no more Filipinos who are poor and struggling,” said Raymond Cumandao, a 30-year-old product promoter at a department store in Manila who voted for Mr. Marcos. “I believe that they will change the rotten system of the Philippines.” With a decisive mandate, the spotlight has shifted to how Mr. Marcos will lead the nation through some of its most pressing challenges: lifting people out of poverty, modernizing derelict infrastructure and balancing relations with the U.S., its ally, and China, its neighbor.
Mr. Marcos’s father, who he was named after, was a dictator who ruled the Philippines for 21 years. He was elected president twice, then declared martial law and clung to power for another 14 years, an era of rampant corruption and human rights abuses. Government investigators say the Marcoses stole $5 billion to $10 billion from the state. Critics were arrested, tortured and killed. The assassination of then-opposition leader Benigno Aquino Jr.
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