Photography by MARK CHESTER ANG
Former President Fidel V. Ramos passed away today, July 31, his family announced in a statement. “The Ramos family is profoundly saddened to announce the passing of former President Fidel Valdez Ramos,” the family’s statement read. They asked for privacy “as the family takes time to grieve together.”
As promised, the Ramos family also released details of FVR’s wake starting on August 4 at Heritage Park, Taguig. Guests are encouraged to wear white.
To help manage the flow of people, the family designated certain dates and times for groups and sectors.
Thursday, August 4
7:00 am – 2:30 p.m. – Government officials
3:00 – 4:30 p.m. – Members of the Ramos Cabinet and RPDEV
5:00pm – Service/Mass
6:30 p.m. – 8 p.m. – Prepared tributes
10:00 p.m. – End of visiting hours
Friday, August 5
7:00 am – 2:30 p.m. – Government officials, members of the diplomatic corps, members of the business community, and members of civil society organizations
3:00 – 4:30 p.m. – Former Malacañang press corps, DND press corps and FOCAP
5:00pm – Service/Mass
6:30 pm – 8 p.m. – Prepared tributes
10:00 p.m. – End of visiting hours
Saturday, August 6
7:00 am – 2:30 p.m. – Veterans, military, law enforcement and the West Point society
3:00 – 4:30 p.m. Rotary Club of Manila
5:00 p.m. – Service/Mass
6:30 pm – 8 p.m. – Prepared tributes
10:00 p.m. – End of visiting hours
Sunday, August 7
7:00 am – 2:30 p.m. – Public viewing
3:00 – 4:30 p.m. “Ex-Men,” campaigners, Former OP executives, OPSOG, LAKAS founders and close-in staff
5:00 p.m. – Service/Mass
6:30 pm – 8 p.m. – Prepared tributes
10:00 p.m. – End of visiting hours
Monday, August 8
7:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m. – Public Viewing
5:00 p.m. – Service/Mass
6:30 p.m. – 8 p.m. – Prepared tributes
10:00 p.m. – End of visiting hours
Tuesday, August 9
10:00 a.m. – Inurnment at Libingan ng mga Bayani
In lieu of flowers, the family has requested that guests make a contribution instead to one of the charitable institution close to FVR’s heart:
- Armed Forces Research Institute of Medical Sciences
- Veterans Memorial Medical Center
- Philippine Red Cross
- Hero Foundation, Inc.
- ABS-CBN Lingod Kapamilya Foundation, Inc.
- Center for Health Improvement and Life Development (CHILD) Haus
- JG Patnubay Foundation
- Ramos Peace and Development Foundation, Inc. (RPDEV)
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In the following exclusive interview with Kap Maceda Aguila, PeopleAsia got a rare glimpse into the life of the former president, when he was named as the magazine’s Max V. Soliven Lifetime Achievement awardee in December 2017.
As President, soldier or private citizen, Fidel V. Ramos has dedicated his life to serving his country.
“See this? It’s a beret of the Special Action Force. I started it,” he declares proudly, adjusting the soft black hat on his crown.
PeopleAsia meets the former President at the spacious Ramos Peace and Development Foundation, Inc. (RPDEV) headquarters in the heart of Makati City. The institution positions itself as a “key resource for government and non-government organizations, sociopolitical and civic groups, public policy-markers, private-sector leaders and individual citizens who seek to achieve lasting peace, manage sustainable development, encourage democratic political systems and effective governance, or foster socioeconomic diplomacy.” Perhaps even more importantly RPDEV is a veritable shrine and testament to the life, work and thinking of one Fidel Valdez Ramos (FVR).
Into a large room we are escorted to find the man seated, peering at us through thick frames. He wears a red shirt emblazoned on the back with “Philippine Bench Press Team,” a pair of striped red jogging pants, and black socks on the feet that are perched on top of the long table in front of him. FVR apologizes and explains, with a grin, that it’s to help ward off the bouts of gout that occasionally bother his appendages.
He waves us in, and we navigate through the piles of paper and other documents on the carpeted floor to take a seat in front of him. The table is equally burdened with a sundry of stuff — mostly reference materials for a man obviously still in charge of the materials that RPDEV churns out.
He is still passionate about what he does — this soldier, an architect of EDSA, 12th President of the Republic of the Philippines, a husband, father, grandfather, golfer and more. You could choose which version of Eddie you want, with each equally gripping.
“A lot… EDSA…the peace and development aspect of that…non-violent regime change, accompanied by sustainable socioeconomic development,” he replies when asked for what he considers his greatest legacy. FVR is neither coy nor ambiguous about how he wants to be remembered, and asks us to watch with him a video produced by the Department of National Defense in 2011 entitled “For God and Country: Four Days of Heroism at EDSA.” He’s there in the video alongside People Power’s vital players. Together, they tell the story we had often taken for granted until very recently.
He intently considers the images and sound coming from the large television, then turns up the volume. “Our agreement with Enrile (Juan Ponce Enrile, who was then the Defense Secretary) was ‘You do the civilian, political; I do the military. I know it better than you, so just leave me alone, sir.’ Cory was the moral and political leader,” shares FVR.
Again, there’s clarity as to what he wants to be most remembered for — the 1986 EDSA Revolution. “Legacy, that’s my legacy to you. If you don’t like it, go home,” he declares, insisting that he wants a snap of that as background. “I hope you understand the odds…You go up against the Commander-in-Chief and General Ver, Chief of Staff. They had the tanks, they had the helicopters, they had the fighter bombers, they had the artillery, they had the Marines. We had nothing except for 300 people.”
FVR is 89 years old and shows no sign of slowing down. The sharp intellect endures and he eagerly taps into it — unfettered, it seems, by the exigencies of time or even politeness. He doesn’t have the inclination or patience to be sidetracked from what he believes is right, the truth and important.
Which is why his relationships with his successors have always been fodder for media. Even tough-talking President Rodrigo Duterte, who credits FVR for helping him win, has been on the receiving end. He had described the administration to the media as “losing badly” in Duterte’s first 100 days of office, and would have been better served “if he had hit the ground running instead of being stuck in unending controversies about extrajudicial killings of drug suspects and his using cusswords and insults instead of civilized language.” This is reproduced in the tome FVR XYZ Files: An Anthology of Controversies and Issues, Anecdotes About Fidel Valdez Ramos, collected and edited by Melandrew Velasco.
Later, he tells us, “Going to the top is optional, but going down is mandatory…This is the rule against all these dictators.”
He also decries the familiar cycle of discrediting and erasing previous administrations to get ahead and prop the present one up, yet acknowledges: “For us to progress faster and maintain a lead position, we must always succeed better than our predecessor…You must be better than the guy you replace. (But that’s just the) same between father and son.”
He offers us his famous coffee with a tablespoon of virgin coconut oil. “It boosts sexual activity; you better believe it, man!” he declares, smiling wide. “I’m drinking several of that every day.”
Whenever his gout permits, FVR likes going to the golf course. He hands us a reproduction of his April 16, 2015 scorecard from the Camp Aguinaldo Golf Club, where he tallied an 86 at 87 years of age. “Can you shoot your age? I’ve done it 11 times,” he beams and adds mischievously, “I’m the senior amateur champion for 85 and above. Alam mo kung bakit? Patay na yung iba e (You know why? The others are dead).” To be honest, it’s hard to tell when Mr. President is serious and when he jests.
Just as he is wont to do though, FVR proudly shows us the scar when one of his kidneys had been taken out due to an infection from tuberculosis in 1950, just after his graduation from the United States Military Academy in West Point. He had delivered an inspirational message in 2011 to honor kidney donors thus: “I lived and have lived a good and healthy life. I swim, jog, play golf and badminton, do pushups and crunches, and can even shoot some basketball with any of you. Living with a single kidney, you can even become President, as I did.”
FVR also lifts his shirt to point out where his pacemaker is implanted. About this, he had said, “I was operated on and given a heart pacemaker upon (doctors’) insistence, so I will be good for 50 more years… If you will get a pacemaker, do not get this one, which has a GPS link to my wife.”
It’s easy to infer that a keen sense of humor also helps FVR sustain what he calls his 25/8 work ethic, which he brought with him to Malacañang. “Your job means doing so many things at the same time. Your feet are 100 meters up in the air on a tightwire. That’s what it means to be President,” he insists.
Approaching his 90th birthday on March 18, FVR boasts he still meets the weekly deadline for his broadsheet column, for which he churns out 1,500 words a pop. “I wake up at four in the morning. Ganyan matanda e; di ka na makakatulog (That’s how old people are; you can’t sleep). Four or five hours are enough. I sleep at about 11:30 after the news. I try all the versions — GMA, ANC, CNN Philippines, BBC and CNN. I even watch Bloomberg.”
Sharp, honest, funny, wise, and with the benefit of a photographic memory, FVR is a living treasure trove for people who want to remember and, more importantly, the young who need to know. Thankfully, FVR loves to go on the road to share what continues to be vivid in his mind about 1986. Sadly, that event appears to get progressively distant and unclear to a growing number of Filipinos.
“We had a lecture series about EDSA — on its 30th anniversary in 2016,” he narrates. “Look at what’s happening in Tunisia — regime change, the president is dead, 300 people dead. Next was Egypt — 400 dead, and Hosni Mubarak’s in prison. Next, Libya – Muammar Gaddafi is dead, 1,000 dead. Ongoing, Syria; at that time 200,000 were dead.
“You should learn about what we did in the Philippines. Be sure you have a component in the military, make sure you employ psychological warfare tactics, make sure you have dedicated young people, make sure you have some members of the media to help you.”
The hero soldier, who helped take the Eerie Hill alongside American troops in the Korean War, fought in the Vietnam War, and waged countless campaigns against rebel groups here in the Philippines, still decries the needless spilling of blood. He says that he could have resolved the prolonged recent siege of Marawi by the ISIS-inspired Maute group sooner — just as he had done in the past when he and 400 troops helped defend the camp there. He underscores the importance of intelligence work in order to ascertain threats.
Expect FVR to keep serving up unsolicited advice. Citizen Eddie doesn’t mind or even need an official post as a soapbox. Still charismatic and infinitely quotable, FVR remains an enthusiastic and engaged part of our body politic — and he won’t have it any other way.
He writes on the foreword of FVR XYZ Files: “I am earnestly hoping that the ‘change’ we are all hoping for does not merely take place in the streets; that it does not merely instill fear in all of us, that discipline is coerced. Rather, I am hoping for real change to take place where it matters, and that is in our conviction as citizens of the Philippines.”
Fidel Valdez Ramos, with a lifetime of achievements and adventures behind him, is far from even considering calling it a day. “Who wants to slow down? The most glorious way of dying, as far as soldiers are concerned, is to die from an enemy’s bullet in combat. But equally glorious and noble is just to drop dead of old age after providing for a family, paying your taxes, and helping your community and your neighbor. That’s what I’m after now.”
