Benigno Simeón "Ninoy" Aquino Jr. (, locally [bɛˌniːɡ.no ʔɐˈxiː.no]; November 27, 1932 – August 21, 1983), was a Filipino politician and journalist who served as a senator of the Philippines (1967–1972) and governor of the province of Tarlac (1963–1967). Aquino was the husband of Corazon Aquino, who became the 11th president of the Philippines after his assassination, and father of Benigno Aquino III, who became the 15th president of the Philippines. Aquino, together with Gerry Roxas and Jovito R. Salonga, helped form the leadership of the Liberal Party-based coalition against ex-President Ferdinand Marcos. Aquino was a significant emotional leader, who, together with the intellectual leader Sen. Jose W. Diokno, led the overall opposition.
Early in his Senate career, Aquino vigorously attempted to investigate the Jabidah massacre in March 1968. Shortly after the imposition of martial law in 1972, Aquino was arrested along with other members of the opposition. He was incarcerated for seven years. He has been described as Marcos' "most famous political prisoner". He founded his own party, Lakas ng Bayan, and ran in the 1978 Philippine parliamentary election, but all the party's candidates lost in the election. In 1980, he was permitted by Marcos and his wife Imelda to travel to the United States for medical treatment following a heart attack. During the early 1980s, he became one of the most notable critics of the Marcos regime, and enjoyed popularity across the US due to the numerous rallies he attended at the time.
As the situation in the Philippines worsened, Aquino decided to return to face Marcos and restore democracy in the country, despite numerous threats against him. He was assassinated at the Manila International Airport on August 21, 1983, upon returning from his self-imposed exile. His death revitalized opposition to Marcos; it also catapulted his widow, Corazon, into the political limelight and prompted her to successfully run for a six-year term as president as a member of the United Nationalist Democratic Organization (UNIDO) party in the 1986 snap election.
Among other public structures, Manila International Airport has since been renamed Ninoy Aquino International Airport in his honor, and the anniversary of his death is a national holiday. Aquino has also been listed as a Motu Proprio human rights violations victim of the Martial Law era.
Benigno Simeón Aquino Jr. was born in Concepcion, Tarlac on November 27, 1932, to Benigno Aquino Sr., who was then a senator from the 3rd district and Senate majority leader, and Aurora (née Aquino) Aquino from a prosperous family of hacienderos, the original owners of Hacienda Tinang.
His grandfather, Servillano Aquino, was a general in the revolutionary army of Emilio Aguinaldo, the officially recognized first President of the Philippines.
He received his elementary education at the basic education department of De La Salle College and finished at the basic education department of Saint Joseph's College of Quezon City. He then graduated at the high school department of San Beda College. Aquino took his tertiary education at Ateneo de Manila University to obtain a Bachelor of Arts degree, but he interrupted his studies. According to one of his biographies, he considered himself to be an average student; his grade was not in the line of 90s nor did it fall into the 70s. At the age of 17, he was the youngest war correspondent to cover the Korean War for The Manila Times of Don Joaquín "Chino" Roces. Because of his journalistic feats, he received the Philippine Legion of Honor award from President Elpidio Quirino when aged 18. At 21, he became a close adviser to then Defense Secretary Ramon Magsaysay. Aquino took up law at the University of the Philippines Diliman, where he became a member of Upsilon Sigma Phi, the same fraternity as Ferdinand Marcos. He interrupted his studies again however to pursue a career in journalism. According to Máximo Soliven, Aquino "later 'explained' that he had decided to go to as many schools as possible, so that he could make as many new friends as possible." In early 1954, he was appointed by President Ramon Magsaysay, his wedding sponsor to his 1953 wedding at the Our Lady of Sorrows Church in Pasay with Corazon Cojuangco, to act as personal emissary to Luis Taruc, leader of the Hukbalahap rebel group. After four months of negotiations, he was credited for Taruc's unconditional surrender and was given a second Philippine Legion of Honor award with the degree of Commander on October 14, 1954.
Aquino gained an early familiarity with Philippine politics, as he was born into one of the Philippines' political and landholding clans. His grandfather served under President Aguinaldo, and his father held office under Presidents Quezon and Jose P. Laurel. As a consequence, he became mayor of Concepcion in 1955 at the age of 23. However, defeated candidate Nicolas Y. Feliciano instituted quo warranto proceedings against Aquino for being underaged at the time of his election. The Supreme Court would affirm the lower court's ruling unseating Aquino from his position.
He would later return to the political scene, being elected the nation's youngest vice governor at 27 (the record was later surpassed by Bongbong Marcos at 22 in 1980). Two years later, when his predecessor resigned, he became governor of Tarlac province in February 1961, being elected to the position in his own right in 1963. After the 1961 presidential election, Aquino was appointed in December 1961 by outgoing president Carlos P. Garcia to a committee overseeing the inauguration of Diosdado Macapagal as chaired by Finance Secretary Dominador Aytona and Senator Ferdinand Marcos. While initially a Nacionalista, same as his father, he would jump to the Liberal Party following Macapagal's election. He would later become the party's secretary-general in 1966.
In 1968, during his first year as senator, Aquino alleged that Marcos was on the road to establishing "a garrison state" by "ballooning the armed forces budget," saddling the defense establishment with "overstaying generals" and "militarizing our civilian government offices."
Aquino became known as a constant critic of the Marcos regime, as his flamboyant rhetoric had made him a darling of the media. His most polemical speech, "A Pantheon for Imelda", was delivered on February 10, 1969. He assailed the Cultural Center, the first project of First Lady Imelda Marcos as extravagant, and dubbed it "a monument to shame" and labelled its designer "a megalomaniac, with a penchant to captivate". By the end of the day, the country's broadsheets had blared that he labelled the President's wife, his cousin Paz's former ward, and a woman he had once courted, "the Philippines' Eva Peron". President Marcos is said to have been outraged and labelled Aquino "a congenital liar". The First Lady's friends angrily accused Aquino of being "ungallant". These so-called "fiscalization" tactics of Aquino quickly became his trademark in the Senate.
Aquino would also uncover details regarding the Jabidah Massacre and would link it as a plan by Marcos to ensure his grip on power, delivering a scathing privilege speech on the Senate floor on March 28, 1968.
It was not until the Plaza Miranda bombing on August 21, 1971, that the pattern of direct confrontation between Marcos and Aquino emerged. At 9:15 pm, at the kick-off rally of the Liberal Party, the candidates formed a line on a makeshift platform and were raising their hands as the crowd applauded. The band played, a fireworks display drew all eyes, when suddenly two loud explosions obviously were not part of the show. In an instant, the stage became a scene of wild carnage. The police later discovered two fragmentation grenades that had been thrown at the stage by "unknown persons". Eight people died, and 120 others were wounded, many critically.
Aquino, elected senator in 1967, was not a candidate in the 1971 midterm election hence was not in Plaza Miranda, but his absence caused some to assume that Aquino's friends in the New People's Army (NPA) tipped him off in advance. Unnamed sources accused Aquino of being involved. No one has ever been prosecuted for the attack. Many historians continue to suspect Marcos as the culprit behind the incident, as he is known to have used false flag attacks as a pretext for his declaration of martial law at that time. Historian Joseph Scalice, however, has argued that while the Marcos government was allied with the Partido Komunista ng Pilipinas (PKP) in carrying out bombings in the early 1970s, "the evidence of history now overwhelmingly suggests that the Communist Party of the Philippines, despite being allied with the Liberal Party, was responsible for this bombing, seeing it as a means of facilitating repression which they argued would hasten revolution."