Tita Cory

Health problems forced Corazon Aquino to take time off from work only once during her presidency.

Suffering from vertigo and a ringing in her ears, she was diagnosed with Meniere’s Syndrome – a non-life-threatening fluid imbalance in the inner ear.

Another time, she sprained her ankle as she stepped off the presidential helicopter near the rice paddies of Nueva Ecija, but she proceeded with the visit.

Both afflictions triggered a lot of jokes within the Malacañang press corps, especially Meniere’s Syndrome.

Some of the jokes were mean. We were such a nasty, scruffy bunch of mostly junior journalists Palace officials referred to us as the Brat Pack. Once, we boycotted Malacañang coverage (not very effective) to demand more interviews with the president. And Cory Aquino boycotted us back, snubbing us as she walked past.

She could be as bratty as the worst of us, and I liked to believe she secretly found the infantile relationship as entertaining as we did.

And she made sure we never had to scrounge around for information about the health of the president of the Philippines — unlike her predecessor, who tried to keep his lupus and regular dialysis a secret until his death. The president, after all, is the only citizen of this republic whose health is a public matter.

We had regular updates on the sprained ankle; we were shown the ear device she had to wear for Meniere’s Syndrome. We knew when she had a cold, a mild flu, diarrhea. And when we were told that the president was suffering simply from the common cold, we believed it.

If there was something she didn’t want revealed to the nation through mass media, she and her aides did not lie; they simply kept their mouths shut, or else advised us to wait for further developments.

There was a bond of trust between Corazon Aquino and the journalists who covered her presidency. Sincerity and honesty are rare commodities in this country; she has them in abundance. She was Tita Cory to the brats, and to all Filipinos.

None of her successors has enjoyed that kind of trust.

* * *

The sincerity and honesty, the uncompromising stance when she believed she was right, did not sit well with many Filipinos who were used to transactional politics. Cory Aquino avoided being swallowed up by the system, in the process adding to her already long list of enemies.

Her insistence on justice first before reconciliation was seen as vindictiveness.

And she wielded power reluctantly, even in her first year when the country had a revolutionary government and her critics said the times called for strong leadership.

Probably because she had seen how absolute power corrupted absolutely, Cory Aquino became the antithesis of Ferdinand Marcos. She thought moral leadership was enough, and everyone would fall in line behind her, and everything would fall into place.

Critics describe her as a weak leader. I see her as a different Philippine leader – one who would have been more effective in a functioning democracy where those governing and the governed alike are aware of their rights and responsibilities.

Also, a president who survives seven coup attempts and manages to keep democracy alive despite repeated armed challenges can hardly be described as weak.

Corazon Aquino describes herself as a transition president, whose main task was to shepherd the country from the ruins of dictatorship to democracy.

In that she succeeded. At the end of her presidency, her mission accomplished, she handed over power to her handpicked successor, with a grace that has also become rare in this country.

In retirement, she looked happier and healthier than she ever did when she was president. And in retirement, she apparently saw herself as a guardian of the fragile democracy that she worked so hard to nurture.

When Fidel Ramos tried to change the Constitution so he could seek a second term, Cory Aquino led marches against Charter change and memorably told him that “there’s life after the presidency.”

In 2001 she went to EDSA again to help throw out Joseph Estrada. But by that time there was a budding perception in certain quarters that Marcos was a unique case, and periodically throwing out Philippine leaders was a habit that could weaken an emerging democracy.

That perception had grown stronger by the time she was again called upon to lead in demanding the resignation of President Arroyo in 2005. Cory Aquino retreated, and has since rejected calls for a reconciliation with the President.

* * *

Reconciling with the Marcoses is out of the question. But Tita Cory did reconcile with Erap.

During her presidency, her spats with the press were short-lived. Occasionally she treated us to samples of her cooking.

When she felt sufficiently comfortable with us, and when her burly close-in security escorts knew the brats well enough to stop shoving us away from her with their elbows, she invited us to her family’s Hacienda Luisita.

I even got to see her bedroom at Malacañang one early morning, but this was when she was fuming and wanted to show that it was impossible for her to hide under her bed at the height of a coup, as written in The Star. That led to our paper’s first libel suit, filed by the president no less.

With Cory Aquino, what you see is what you get. When she doesn’t like someone, she shows it.

If people close to her were suspected of money-making backroom deals, influence peddling and the usual politics of patronage during her presidency, Cory Aquino managed to stay above the fray.

She has kept her personal integrity intact – a rare feat in this country – and in so doing, she brings out the best in those who have the privilege to know her.

It wasn’t just the press that trusted her. Filipinos trusted Corazon Aquino to do nothing that would demean the presidency.

She makes us feel good about being Filipino. She makes us proud to be Pinoy.