5000 Piso Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos

Issued to mark the twenty-fifth anniversary of Ferdinand Marcos's political career, this coin was produced at a moment when the Philippines was deep into martial law — declared in 1972 and still firmly in place by 1977. The Bangko Sentral issued the piece as part of a broader series of commemorative gold coins that critics noted served the regime's international image as much as any monetary function.

Imelda's co-appearance on a circulating-denomination coin was itself a political statement; few modern heads of state had placed a spouse on legal tender gold coinage of this weight class.