Fact or Lie: The Philippines as the ‘richest country in Asia’ during the Marcos administration?



The late President Ferdinand Marcos Sr./photo courtesy of Wiki and Quora



It has been circulating on social media about an article that the Philippines was the “richest country in Asia” during the term of the late President Ferdinand Marcos from 1965 to 1986.

But this claim was misleading as learned by KAMI. There had been reports that this claim was a big lie.



This claim was refuted by Rappler, in a report they posted a couple of weeks back.

According to Rappler, this claim all started from a Facebook page of Ka Rex Cayanong, in August 2018, urging his readers to let all Filipinos all over the world to know the truth.

That post reached 35,000 shares and gathered 34,000 reactions and still circulating social media as of this month. It really went viral for years now.



It was also mentioned in Cayanong’s article the lists of accomplishments of the late President Ferdinand Marcos, like the first airport and train in Asia were built during the Marcos regime.
However, data, as prepared by the World Bank, shows that the Philippines was never the Richest country in Asia during Ferdinand Marcos’ era. As per Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and GDP per capita, we were never even the richest country in Southeast Asia.

As the Philippines’ GDP per capita (average income per person) shows that we were only 3rd highest in Southeast Asia, next to Singapore and Malaysia when Marcos assumed presidency in 1965.



Later on, the Philippine’s ranking even fell further to 5th place, falling behind Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, and Indonesia by 1986.

It was actually the United Arab Emirates had the highest GDP per capita from 1965 to 1986 across Asia. while Japan had the highest average GDP during the same period as per World Bank report.

Marcos was the husband of former First Lady Imelda Marcos. He is the father of former Senator Bongbong Marcos and Senator Imee Marcos.


He was the President of the Philippines from 1965 to 1986. He declared martial law in 1972.


Source: KAMI


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