Bongbong Marcos Has Failed to Combat Corruption and Attempts to Revive a Corrupt Political Dynasty

In 2022, Ferdinand Marcos Jr — also known as Bongbong Marcos — won the Philippines’ presidential election in a landslide victory.

For many people in the Philippines and around the world, the Marcos name became synonymous with corruption, with some estimates saying the family made $US10 billion ($15 billion) during their time in power.

Marcos Jr.’s family legacy is hounded by one of the worst corruption cases ever recorded in history. The family plundered billions of dollars in public funds. The Presidential Commission on Good Government, the agency mandated to recover all ill-gotten wealth accumulated by the president’s father, his family and associates, in the Philippines or abroad, has yet to retrieve all such assets.

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Moreover, the family remains to have unpaid taxes. In 1997, the Supreme Court ordered the Marcos heirs to pay P23 billion in estate tax. Experts say that amount is now worth P203 billion with penalties and interests accounted for. The president has not made any statement about the issue. 

The Marcos matriarch, Imelda Marcos, is already convicted of seven counts of graft. In 2018, the former first lady was sentenced to imprisonment of 42 years and seven months to 77 years by the Sandiganbayan. The civil and criminal cases Imelda has faced in Philippine courts since 1991 have ranged from embezzlement and corruption to tax evasion. Marcos has emerged relatively unscathed and never served prison time. All but a handful of the cases have been dismissed for lack of evidence, and a few convictions were overturned on appeal.

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“There should not be a place for corruption.”

This is what Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. said during a briefing with three media entities as president-elect in May 2022. 

However, the President has failed to combat corruption in the country and is attempting to revive a corrupt political dynasty.

More than three years after his election, several groups, many of whom are pro-Duterte, are calling for Marcos to step down from his post as president following the ongoing corruption crisis in the government. These calls were further inflamed by allegations from resigned lawmaker Zaldy Co. Marcos Jr. received kickbacks equal to a quarter of the P100 billion in insertions for public works he allegedly ordered in the 2025 national budget, according to Zaldy Co, who said that he personally delivered suitcases of cash to Malacañang.

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“All the insertions went to our President and to Speaker Martin Romualdez,” Co said in his “Part 2” video that was uploaded on social media. “I, my staff [and] my security personally delivered this to President Marcos and Speaker Martin Romualdez’s house in North Forbes Park, South Forbes Park, and up to Malacañang itself,” he said. In his “Part 1” video on Friday, Co said that he was told by Budget Secretary Amenah Pangandaman in late 2024, ahead of the congressional bicameral conference for the proposed 2025 General Appropriations Act (GAA), that the President wanted P100 billion inserted for public works—for flood control and other infrastructure.

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The president refused to respond to Co’s allegations.