DAVAO CITY—Bayan Muna party-list Rep. Carlos Isagani Zarate on Thursday described as a myth claims that there was economic prosperity during the Marcos regime.

“The country’s foreign debt skyrocketed from $599 million in 1966 to $26.7 billion in 1986. We are so sunken in debt that we have been paying the Marcos debt for the past 30 years since the downfall of the Marcos dictatorship. We will be paying the Marcos debt, which mostly went to their own pockets, until 2025, or almost 40 years after Edsa,” he said.

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Zarate said the possibility of Sen. Ferdinand Marcos winning the vice presidency in the coming May elections is a tragedy.

“It is utterly repugnant that another Marcos is attempting to recapture Malacañang. It is as tragic as it is reckless, especially since Sen. Bongbong is not only unapologetic—even defensive—of the many sins of his father’s regime.

“He even refuses to acknowledge the gross abuses during the time of Martial Law,” Zarate said in a statement.

“Marcos attempts to rewrite history for his family’s self-serving interest. His propaganda machinery, aided by the lack of historical consciousness in our education system, has spun a fairy tale of better times during the dictatorship. However, by all indicators, it was one of the darkest times in Philippine history,” he said.

The militant lawmaker said many families lost their best and brightest sons and daughters fighting the regime that violated democratic rights, plundered our coffers and abused the rights of the people.

“Marcos is not the answer to a more democratic, equitable and just society. He represents the worst of state terrorism, plunder and tyranny,” he said.

“We must never forget, we must teach the next generations of Filipinos not to let the remotest possibility of another Marcosian era to blacken our nation’s history,” he said. Nico Alconaba, Inquirer Mindanao

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