A celebrity embalmer has confirmed that the former Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos was buried in Manila’s Heroes’ Cemetery last week, after his wax mask and small coffin raised suspicions of a deception.
Frank Malabed, who has preserved soldiers, politicians and at least one pornographic film actress during his 48-year career, denied that the coffin interred in a controversial ceremony last week was empty or contained a mannequin. He confirmed, however, that visible parts of the dictator were covered in cosmetic wax on the orders of Marcos’s widow, Imelda, who wished to conceal the shrivelling of his skin.
“The face the people saw was wax,” Mr Malabed, 66, told Agence France Presse. “But for the rest of the body there was no need for that because