Former Philippine first lady Imelda Marcos is in hospital with pneumonia

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — Former Philippine first lady Imelda Marcos, the mother of the country’s current president and the widow of an ousted dictator, has been hospitalized with pneumonia. President Ferdinand Marcos Jr said on Tuesday that his 94-year-old mother is suffering from slight pneumonia and was put on antibiotics by her doctors. Marcos said his mother is “in good spirits, has no difficulty in breathing and is resting well.” Imelda Marcos’s lavish lifestyle amid her country’s appalling poverty came to symbolize her late husband’s authoritarian rule, which ended when a 1986 army-backed “people power” uprising toppled him and drove him and his family to U.S. exile. The Marcoses returned to the Philippines in 1991 and gradually regained political power.