Ateneo de Manila University. Photo: Ramon FVelasquez, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ateneogradeschooljf1960_01.JPG)
Ateneo de Manila University. Photo: Ramon FVelasquez, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ateneogradeschooljf1960_01.JPG)
Herminio Sanchez Aquino, known as Hermie Aquino (1949–2021), was a Filipino businessman and politician. He represented Tarlac's 3rd district in the House of Representatives, served as vice governor of Tarlac, and ran as Raul Roco's vice-presidential running mate in 2004. He also led Aksyon Demokratiko, the party founded by Roco.
Background
Herminio Aquino was born on April 25, 1949, in Manila, Philippines, to Servillano "Mianong" Aquino and Belen Sanchez. He was born more than one year after his half-brother, former Speaker of the National Assembly Benigno S. Aquino Sr., had died in December 1947. Benigno Aquino Sr. had earlier represented Tarlac's 2nd district in the House of Representatives, and the Aquino family became one of the prominent political families of Tarlac province in Central Luzon.
His family's political life connected him with several later public figures. His nephew, Benigno "Ninoy" Aquino Jr., became a leading opposition politician before he was assassinated in 1983. Aquino's own career unfolded within the same family network, in which kinship ties often linked provincial office, national politics, and the national opposition to the Marcos government.
Education
Herminio Aquino graduated with honors with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics from the Ateneo de Manila University in 1969. The university traces its origins to 1859, when Spanish Jesuits took over the Escuela Municipal de Manila, a public primary school in Intramuros. The school became the Ateneo Municipal de Manila in 1865 when it was elevated to secondary education, adopted the name Ateneo de Manila in 1909, and became a university in 1959.
During Aquino's years there, the Ateneo followed the Jesuit tradition of liberal education, which emphasized the humanities and the harmonious development of moral and intellectual virtues. In 1969 Pacifico Ortiz, S.J., was installed as the first Filipino president of the university, marking a change in the institution's leadership during the year Aquino graduated.
Aquino's business career began in the early 1970s. He was senior consultant at Management and Investment Development Associates Incorporated from 1972 to 1985, vice president of Georgia Machineries Incorporated from 1974 to 1981, and vice president of Circa Nila Development Corporation from 1981 to 1985.
After the 1986 People Power Revolution, which ousted Ferdinand Marcos, his relative Corazon Aquino invited him to join the government. He served as deputy executive secretary and minister of the Ministry of Human Settlements from 1986 to 1987. The ministry had been created in 1978 with the goal of providing communities with basic needs and managing urban development, and the Aquino government later reorganized the country's housing agencies under the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council.
Aquino was elected representative of Tarlac's 3rd district in the House of Representatives, serving from 1987 to 1998. Because Philippine law limited a congressman to three consecutive terms, he ran for provincial vice governor under Margarita "Ting-Ting" Cojuangco, a sister-in-law of Corazon Aquino, and served as vice governor of Tarlac from 1998 to 2001. He ran again in 2001 with Cojuangco but lost to Lakas-NUCD candidates, and he then returned to private life.
Afterward he became chairman and president of Buenavista Management Corporation, which provides management consulting, financial advisory, and project packaging services. He was also chairman of Trackworks Incorporated, an advertising and retail company associated with Metro Rail Transit. In 2004 Raul Roco invited him to be his vice-presidential running mate, and Aquino placed third in the vice presidential race with 981,500 votes. Aksyon Demokratiko had been founded by Roco in 1997 after Roco left the Laban ng Demokratikong Pilipino. In 2013 Aquino ran for the House seat for Tarlac's 3rd district under the Liberal Party but lost. He remained chairman of Aksyon Demokratiko until his death in Tarlac on July 31, 2021.
Achievements
Won election as representative of Tarlac's 3rd district in the House of Representatives and served from 1987 to 1998, after which he was elected vice governor of Tarlac and served from 1998 to 2001.
Politics
Herminio Aquino was affiliated with Aksyon Demokratiko, a Philippine political party founded in 1997 by Raul Roco after Roco resigned from the Laban ng Demokratikong Pilipino to pursue a presidential candidacy. The party was recognized as a national political party in 1998 by the Commission on Elections, and it is commonly described as progressive and liberal-democratic in orientation. Aquino served as its chairman and, earlier, as its campaign manager and fund raiser. After Roco's death in 2005, he remained the party's head until his own death in 2021.
The party's platform, the Agenda of Hope, was Roco's program of governance for his 2004 presidential campaign, and Aksyon Demokratiko joined the Alyansa ng Pag-asa coalition in that election. Aquino's earlier political career followed the 1986 People Power Revolution, which ended the authoritarian rule of Ferdinand Marcos. In 2013 he ran for a House seat under the Liberal Party, reflecting the shifting coalitions of Philippine politics in that period.
Connections
Aquino was a member of the Aquino family of Tarlac. He was the uncle of Benigno "Ninoy" Aquino Jr., and he was the grand-uncle of Benigno "Noynoy" Aquino III, who later became president of the Philippines. He was the son of Servillano "Mianong" Aquino and Belen Sanchez, and the half-brother of Benigno S. Aquino Sr.
Father:
Servillano Aquino
Mother:
Belen Sanchez
Brother:
Benigno S. Aquino Sr.
Tarlac politician who represented the 2nd district in the House of Representatives; died on December 20, 1947.
nephew:
Benigno S. Aquino Jr.
Philippine politician who was assassinated in 1983.
References
Aksyon Demokratiko chairman Hermie Aquino dies at 72
Obituary reporting Aquino's death in 2021 and summarizing his business career, vice governorship, congressional service, and 2004 vice-presidential candidacy with Raul Roco.
