LUIS BELTRAN

• Broadcast journalist and newspaper columnist.• First editor-in-chief of the Philippine Daily Inquirer.• Known for his outspokenness.• Ended up as a columnist of STAR.• A libel suit was filed against him and Star’s editor-

in-chief, Max Soliven on by President Aquino. • The court ruled in Aquino’s favor on October 22,

1992 sentencing him and his editor to 2 years of imprisonment and ordering them to pay 2 million pesos in moral damages.

• He died of a heart attack on September 1994.

CHRONICLEBy SUSAN HELLER ANDERSONSUSAN HELLER ANDERSONPublished: Tuesday, February 12, 1991

President CORAZON C. AQUINO of the Philippines President CORAZON C. AQUINO of the Philippines testified yesterday before a Manila court hearing her libel case against a popular newspaper columnist. Mrs. Aquino said in court that the columnist, LUIS BELTRAN , wrote a "blatant lie" and ridiculed her in a 1987 column for The Philippine Star. Mr. Beltran wrote that Mrs. Aquino had "hid under the bed" at the height of the fighting between Government and rebel troops during the August 1987 coup attempt. He has since said that he was merely using the phrase as a "figure of speech”. On the day the column appeared, Mrs. Aquino filed a lawsuit against Mr. Beltran demanding 4 million pesos in damages, the equivalent of $140,000. She also took reporters to her bedroom to prove that she could not hide under the bed because there was not enough space.