Fidel Ramos

Biography

Fidel Valdez Ramos was born in 1928 in Lingayen, Pangasinan, the son of a legislator and later foreign secretary. He graduated from the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1950 and earned a master's degree in civil engineering at the University of Illinois.

He led a reconnaissance platoon in Korea, founded the Philippine Army's Special Forces, and served as a civic-action staff officer in South Vietnam. In 1972 his cousin Ferdinand Marcos made him chief of the Philippine Constabulary, a post he held under martial law; he later became vice chief of staff of the armed forces.

In February 1986 he broke with Marcos alongside Juan Ponce Enrile, a turning point of the People Power Revolution. Under Corazon Aquino he was armed forces chief of staff and then, from 1988 to 1991, secretary of national defense, putting down a series of coup attempts.

After losing the LDP nomination he founded the Lakas party and won the May 1992 presidential election with under a quarter of the vote. As president from 1992 to 1998 he liberalised the economy, ended the power crisis with private generating contracts, signed a peace agreement with the Moro National Liberation Front in 1996, legalised the Communist Party and hosted the 1996 APEC summit. He remained an elder statesman until his death in 2022.