Ferdinand Marcos Jr.

Ferdinand Romualdez Marcos Jr., also known as Bongbong Marcos, is the 17th president of the Philippines. He took office on June 30, 2022, or 36 years after his father and namesake was ousted from the presidential palace.

He secured about 59% of the vote, becoming the first majority-elected president since the 1986 People Power Revolution. The victory was partly attributed to the Marcos family’s decades of attempts at revising history to present his father’s regime as the golden age of the Philippines.

Born on September 13, 1957, in Manila, Marcos is the son of the late dictator President Ferdinand E. Marcos and Imelda Romualdez Marcos. He is married to lawyer Marie Louise “Liza” Cacho Araneta, with whom he has three sons.

He completed his secondary education at Worth School in England and attended Oxford University, where he pursued a degree in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics. During the presidential campaign, Oxford belied Marcos’ claim in his biography that he completed his degree. Marcos later enrolled in the MBA program at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, but did not complete the degree.

During his father’s presidency, Marcos Jr. began his political career as vice governor of their home province of Ilocos Norte in 1980. He became governor three years later. After the family’s return from exile in 1991, he was elected as congressman of Ilocos Norte’s 2nd District, serving two terms. He then served as governor again for three terms, from 1998 to 2007.

He first ran for senator in 1995 but lost. In 2010, he tried again and won, and served until 2016. As his Senate term ended, he made a bid for the vice presidency but was unsuccessful. He filed a protracted electoral protest against Vice President Leni Robredo, which the Presidential Electoral Tribunal unanimously dismissed. In the 2022 presidential election, he defeated Robredo by a huge margin.

For the first one year and five months of his presidency, Marcos concurrently served as secretary of agriculture, amid persistent reports of agricultural smuggling and cartels. His tenure focused on stabilizing food prices and ensuring food security, but critics questioned his effectiveness​ as department chief.

Marcos shifted to traditional allies, primarily the United States, from the six years of his predecessor Rodrigo Duterte’s leaning towards China. Adopting a foreign policy based on international law, he has stood up to China and rallied international support to defend the Philippine sovereignty over the West Philippine Sea.

He has strengthened alliances with the United States, Japan, Australia, and Vietnam, and formed security cooperation with countries like Canada, France, the United Kingdom, Sweden, Netherlands, New Zealand, South Korea, and India.

He has become the subject of personal attacks and ouster calls from former president Duterte and his family and allies after his allied Congress removed the hundreds of millions of pesos in audit-free confidential and intelligence funds from the budgets of the Office of the Vice President and the Department of Education, two offices headed by Duterte’s daughter, Sara.