Former First Lady Imelda Marcos insisted yesterday that her husband, ex-dictator Ferdinand Marcos, was a hero and a saint, and not a thief, as he was described by a commissioner of a government agency that was tasked to recover an estimated $35 billion ill-gotten wealth.

"There is no Marcos ill-gotten wealth," she said in a photo-session that she granted to a select group of photographers.

"EDSA I (when Marcos was ousted by a people-backed military mutiny in 1986), was the most memorable moment of that presidency," she said as she showed off her posh condominium at Makati which was full of art objects, antiques, and memorabilia of her husband's 20 year rule.

"He was a hero. He controlled his men and told them not to fire at the crowd," said Imelda, as she tried to place Marcos in a pedestal of Filipino human rights advocators.

Imelda felt it right to reiterate the rightful place of Marcos after his ouster because many Filipinos still believe that the success of the people-backed military mutiny, known as the world's first peaceful revolution that changed a president, was an "act of God".

"The men who launched the mutiny could not even control their men," said Imelda in reference to then Defense Secretary Juan Ponce Enrile and former deputy chief of staff Lt. Gen. Fidel Ramos.

At the same time, Imelda insisted that the former first family was hostaged by the Americans, hinting that the hand of the US was behind the ouster of Marcos. She hinted that the so-called democracy at work during the people-backed military mutiny became possible with US-assistance.

"When we were taken by a plane from the residential palace, Marcos asked me to look at the window and find out if we were being brought out by a light plane," she recalled with moist eyes.

Three hours after their departure from Malacanang, the presidential palace, the former first family had a rude awakening, that they were out of the country, in Guam, a US territory.

The succeeding government, created the Presidential Commission on Good Government (PCGG) that was tasked to recover his alleged ill-gotten wealth, but it was hobbled from filing a corruption case against the former strongman because of his absence.

"We were never convicted for alleged ill gotten wealth," said Imelda. All the cases filed against his surviving family stemmed from allegations that the former first family was assumed to have ill gotten wealth.