MANILA, Philippines – Filipinos mourned former President Corazon Aquino by displaying yellow ribbons and holding Masses as the nation prepared to bid farewell to the beloved democracy icon who swept away a dictator and fought off seven coup attempts.

Aquino, 76, died early Saturday after a yearlong battle with colon cancer, which had spread to other organs and left her bedridden since late June, her son, Sen. Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III, said.

Each of Aquino’s five children went to their mother’s bedside where they “were told to say everything we wanted to say” before she was given morphine, which made her unresponsive, her only son said.

Aquino rose to power after the 1983 assassination of her husband, opposition leader Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino Jr. The uprising she led in 1986 ended the repressive 20-year regime of Ferdinand Marcos and inspired nonviolent protests across the globe, including those that ended communist rule in eastern Europe.

“She was headstrong and single-minded in one goal, and that was to remove all vestiges of an entrenched dictatorship,” Raul C. Pangalangan, former dean of the College of Law at the University of the Philippines, said earlier this month. “We all owe her in a big way.”

But Aquino struggled in office to meet high public expectations. Her land redistribution program fell short of ending economic domination by the landed elite, including her own family. Her leadership, especially in social and economic reform, was often indecisive, leaving many of her closest allies disillusioned by the end of her term.

Still, the bespectacled, smiling woman in her trademark yellow dress remained beloved in the Philippines, where she was affectionately referred to as “Tita (Auntie) Cory.”
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