Diosdado Pangan Macapagal (September 28, 1910 – April 21, 1997) was the ninth President of the Philippines, serving from 1961 to 1965, and the sixth Vice-President, serving from 1957 to 1961. He also served as a member of the House of Representatives, and headed the Constitutional Convention of 1970. He is the father of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, who was the fourteenth President of the Philippines from 2001 to 2010.A native of Lubao, Pampanga, Macapagal graduated from the University of the Philippines and University of Santo Tomas, after which he worked as a lawyer for the government. He first won election in 1949 to the House of Representatives, representing a district in his home province of Pampanga. In 1957, he became Vice-President under the rule of President Carlos P. García, whom he defeated in the 1961 polls.As President, Macapagal worked to suppress graft and corruption and to stimulate the Philippine economy. He introduced the country's first land reform law, placed the peso on the free currency exchange market, and liberalized foreign exchange and import controls. Many of his reforms, however, were crippled by a Congress dominated by the rival Nacionalista Party. He is also known for shifting the country's observance of Independence Day from July 4 to June 12, commemorating the day President Emilio Aguinaldo unilaterally declared the independence of the First Philippine Republic from the Spanish Empire in 1898. He stood for re-election in 1965, and was defeated by Ferdinand Marcos, who subsequently ruled for 21 years.Under Marcos, Macapagal was elected president of the Constitutional Convention which would later draft what became the 1973 Constitution, though the manner in which the charter was ratified and modified led him to later question its legitimacy. He later died of heart failure, pneumonia and renal complications at the age of 86.
Active years end date
1961
1957
1965
1973
Birth date
1910-09-28
Birth year
1910
Death date
1997-04-21
Death year
1997
Office
2nd President of the 1971 Philippine Constitutional Convention
Vice-President of the Philippines
Member of the Philippine House of Representatives from Pampanga's First District
Order in office
6th
(5th President of the Third Republic)
9th President of the Philippines
Comment
0