MANILA, Aug. 16, 2016 — Allowing a hero’s burial for former President
Ferdinand Marcos will dishonor the efforts of those who fought the
dictatorship, including the mother of President Rodrigo Duterte, said
Catholic educators.
Contrary to Duterte’s claim that Marcos’ burial will bring “healing,”
the Catholic Educational Association of the Philippines (CEAP) said it
would mock many Filipinos’ sacrifices.
“Given the gravity of Mr. Marcos’ crimes against the people and
country, his burial at the Libingan will not heal or foster unity,” said
CEAP in an open letter to Duterte. Public outrage
“It will invalidate all that many heroes have spent their lives
fighting for—heroes such as your beloved mother, whom we honor and
remember as one of the strongest crusaders in the fight for democracy
and justice,” it added.
The CEAP was referring to Duterte’s mother, Soledad Duterte, who was a leading anti-Marcos figure in Davao.
Duterte’s plan to give the late dictator a hero’s burial at the Libingan ng mga Bayani on Sept. 18 triggered public outrage.
On Sunday, several groups, including Church people, braved bad
weather and staged a rally at the Luneta Park to express their objection
to the planned hero’s burial for Marcos.
The CEAP, composed of 1,425 member-schools, colleges and
universities, reiterated that Marcos does not belong in the heroes’
cemetery.
Not a hero
“He was not a hero,” stressed the group.
“We look forward to your promise of change being fulfilled, of old
wrongs being redressed. We ask that you take the biggest step in
rectifying one of the country’s oldest wrongs.”
“President Rody, we ask nothing that you have not already promised. Justice. Unity. Healing,” added CEAP.
The group also urged the President to grant Marcos’ deathbed wish to be buried next to his mother in Ilocos Norte.
“At his deathbed, Mr. Marcos himself asked that he be buried next to
his mother in Ilocos, where he is revered and loved,” the CEAP said.
“Fulfilling Mr. Marcos’s deathbed wish will give us all the unity and closure that this country desperately needs,” it said. (CBCPNews) http://www.cbcpnews.com/cbcpnews/?p=82434
Public opposition continues to build up as the Duterte
administration prepares to bury the remains of ousted dictator Ferdinand
Marcos at the Libingan ng mga Bayani (LNMB) on Sept. 18.
Various lawmakers, groups and even government agencies, such as the
National Historical Commission have spoken out against giving a hero’s
burial for Marcos, which they said equates to an exoneration of the
Marcos family’s crimes against the people, and brings them closer back
to power in Malacañang. This week, Inquirer.net reported that Malacañang
released a memo from Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana, dated Aug. 7,
ordering the Armed Forces of the Philippines to draft the plans for the
transport and interment ceremony of Marcos’ remains in the LNMB. The
memo referred to a verbal order given by Duterte on July 11. During his
electoral campaign, Duterte had said he will allow the burial of Marcos
at the Libingan ng mga Bayani.
In Congress, progressive lawmakers filed House resolution 197
opposing the move, calling it a “monumental historical distortion,” as
giving a hero’s burial for Marcos sends “the absurd message that the
Filipino people overthrew a ‘hero’ during People Power I and that the
international community’s sympathy for that uprising is wrong.”
“The Marcos dictatorship violently suppressed political dissent,
committed crimes against humanity, plundered the country’s resources,
and perpetuated US imperialism’s stranglehold on the nation,” said the
proposed House resolution, filed by seven Makabayan bloc lawmakers on
Aug. 11.
Marcos died in exile on Sept. 28, 1989 in Hawaii, where his family
was flown by the US government to escape the first People Power in 1986.
In September 1993, President Ramos allowed the repatriation of the
dictator’s remains, but refused to give him a hero’s burial.
Marcos’ remains has since been preserved and kept on display in a
refrigerated glass coffin in the Marcos Museum and Mausoleum in Batac
city, Ilocos Norte.
The proposed house resolution said the Marcos family signed an
agreement with the Ramos administration, which allowed the repatriation
of the ousted dictator, on the following conditions: it will be brought
home without fanfare; it will be buried in Ilocos Norte, and with
military honors only up to the rank of major.
The Makabayan proposed resolution cited the human rights violations
from 1976 to 1983, that “formed the apex of a pyramid of terror:” 3,257
killed, 35,000 tortured, 70,000 incarcerated, 737 Filipinos
“disappeared” from 1976 to 1983. During martial law, the word
“salvaging” came to mean summary execution, as mutilated bodies were
dumped in public areas. Up to 2,250 salvaged victims were documented,
“dumped on roadsides for public display to create widespread fear.”
The proposed resolution also cited how Marcos plunged the country
into a “cycle of ever-growing debt,” as foreign debt had ballooned, from
$1 billion in 1966 when Marcos took power, to $28 billion in 1986 at
the time he was ousted. Ibon Foundation said debts incurred under Marcos
alone will be shouldered by Filipino taxpayers up to 2025. On the other
hand, the late Solicitor General Frank Chavez estimated that Marcos had
up to $13.4 billion stashed in various Swiss banks.
“Marcos and his family have never acknowledged these grave violations
and have never apologized to the Filipino people up to the present,”
the resolution said.
During this year’s elections, martial law victims formed the Campaign
Against the Return of the Marcoses in Malacañang (Carmma) to thwart the
vice presidential bid of Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. The younger
Marcos lost to administration bet Leni Robredo by a small margin of
votes, and has recently petitioned for a recount.
This weekend, various groups are staging protests against the Marcos
burial: at the National Council of Churches in the Philippines in Quezon
City on Aug. 13, and in Luneta, Manila on Aug. 14. ‘Marcos’ bronze coffin insults martial law victims’
The Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan) scoffed at the reported bronze
casket being prepared for Marcos’ remains, in stark contrast to how
hundreds of martial law victims, the desaparecidos, were “abducted, murdered and buried in unmarked graves.”
“The wealth illegally amassed by the Marcoses will again be used to
‘honor’ the late dictator, in the same way it is used to whitewash his
sins. State honors and the Marcos family’s ostentatious display of
wealth are doubly insulting to the victims of the dictatorship,” said
the Bayan statement.
Solid bronze caskets cost up to $30,000, Bayan said.
The youth group Anakbayan called the impending burial a “travesty of
justice and distortion of history,” as they said the Marcos dictatorship
has yet to pay for the thousands of youth activists, “the cream of the
crop” who were killed for fighting martial law.
“It does not matter if the Libingan ng mga Bayani was originally a
cemetery for soldiers, one of Duterte’s justifications for burying
Marcos there as a soldier. Giving Marcos a hero’s burial sends a wrong
signal that crimes against humanity and plunder will be celebrated by
the state,” said Vencer Crisostomo, Anakbayan chairperson, in a
statement.
“We are reminding President Duterte not to use his office simply to
give favors to those who supported his electoral campaign. The Marcos
burial, in particular, should not be made just to repay political debts
to his close friend Bongbong Marcos,” Crisostomo said.
The Alliance of Concerned Teachers said a hero’s burial for Marcos
equals “rewriting history” and insults martial law victims and their
families.
“It took a people’s movement to topple the late fascist-dictator
Ferdinand Marcos. To honor his memory by burying him in the Libingan ng
mga Bayani sends a distorted message to our children that dictators and
plunderers can be called heroes and accorded honors,” said ACT national
chairperson Benjie Valbuena.
Revising history | Marcos burial at Libingan ng mga Bayani
When pressed about why he is allowing the burial of the late dictator
Ferdinand E. Marcos at the Libingan ng mga Bayani despite the numerous
protests, President Duterte justified his decision by saying: “He was a
president and a soldier. Simple.”
Well and good if the matter is as simple as that. If Marcos were any
other president or any other soldier, there could be no argument about
allowing his or her burial at Libingan ng Bayani. After all, that
cemetery has been reserved for them, and any soldier or veteran, whether
a private or a general, has the privilege of being buried there, if the
soldier or his or her family so wishes. I suppose the same is true for
dead presidents.
But the case of the late president Marcos is far more complicated
than what President Duterte makes it appear to be. By declaring martial
law and usurping all power to himself, the late dictator Marcos plunged
the nation in one of the, if not the darkest period in the country’s
history.
Thousands of people, in the prime of their lives, were victimized:
killed, forcibly disappeared, tortured, imprisoned, and forcibly
displaced. Gross violations of human rights under the Marcos
dictatorship are not myths or urban legends; these have been proven
multiple times by the testimonies of the living victims and the
relatives of the dead and the disappeared. Even the Federal District
Court of Hawaii found, beyond reasonable doubt, that indeed the late
dictator Marcos and his minions violated the rights of thousands of
Filipinos. The Federal court awarded $1.9 billion in damages to the
victims and their relatives.
Burying Marcos with full honors not only would rub salt to the wounds
of the victims and their relatives, it would disregard the fact that
thousands were victimized and worse, it practically would justify these
violations.
Added to this, the callous act of burying Marcos at the Libingan ng
mga Bayani would deny the fact that the Marcos dictatorship plunged the
country into deep political, economic, and social crisis. The country
experienced an oil crisis, rice crisis, sugar crisis, dollar crisis,
among others.
The late dictator’s son boasts of the infrastructure projects under
Marcos, without revealing that these buried the country into debt, which
the nation has been paying up to now. He boasts of the Marcos family’s
version of unity, while ignoring the fact that the late dictator used
the full machinery of the state to create an atmosphere of fear in the
hope of eradicating all forms of opposition to its rule. The Marcos
family boasts of eliminating the stranglehold of oligarchs on the
economy, but centralized all wealth and established a monopoly of
strategic, profitable businesses in the country.
The historical significance and political implications of the burial
of the dictator Marcos at the Libingan ng mga Bayani are not lost on the
Marcos family. This is why they have been spending to preserve his
remains for almost three decades already. They have the money to
construct a mansion to bury his remains. They could even buy a whole
memorial park to bury him there.
But they chose to wait. And burying the remains of the late dictator
Marcos with full military honors would just as well be the launching
pad for the return of the Marcos family to Malacañang through the son
Bongbong.
While justifying his decision to allow the burial of Marcos at the
Libingan ng mga Bayani with what appears to be simple logic and
legalities, the historical significance and political implications of
this decision are likewise not lost on the Duterte administration. For
one, President Duterte has, several times, publicly acknowledged his
friendship with the Marcos family. He boasted that his father served
under Marcos. During his campaign, Duterte declared that if he wins and
then fails to complete his term, he would be more than willing to leave
the reins of government to Bongbong. President Duterte has also
declared that he would appoint Bongbong to a Cabinet position once the
prohibition on losing candidates expires.
Just last Tuesday, in a tirade against Chief Justice Maria Lourdes
Sereno, President Duterte asked her if she would rather that he declares
martial law, because of his perception that Chief Justice Sereno was
blocking his anti-drug campaign by issuing a letter advising judges
named by the president in his list of government officials allegedly
involved in the illegal drugs trade not to surrender without a warrant.
Was the mention of declaring martial law a mere rhetorical question?
Last week, August 3, in a speech, President Duterte declared that his
administration intends to destroy oligarchs then singled out
businessman Roberto Ongpin. Is he emulating the purported campaign
against oligarchs by the late dictator Marcos?
What about Duterte’s controversial anti-drugs campaign that has
claimed the lives of hundreds of poor Filipinos, totally disregarding
the principles of due process and human rights? Does this not reflect
the mindset and ways of the late dictator Marcos?
Let us just hope that this is just a case of overreaction, and that
the similarities between what Marcos did and what Duterte has been doing
and appears to be intending to do stops here. But still, the
historical significance and political implications of the burial of
Marcos at the Libingan ng mga Bayani, with full honors, should not be
lost on the Filipino people. After all, it is the people who shape
history.
Martial law survivors urge high court to stop hero’s burial for Marcos
Florentino, her husband Ernesto and their only daughter Gemma, then
only eight years old, were dragged by soldiers from their home in
Tatalon, Quezon City on June 18, 1977. Florentino and Gemma were brought
to Camp Crame where they stayed in different detention cells for a
month. Ernesto was jailed at Camp Bagong Diwa and was released after
three months.
Their incarceration, however brief, left a scar on their lives.
After being released from detention, the family had to report weekly
to the military. This only stopped when Marcos was toppled through a
popular uprising in February 1986.
Tears formed in Florentino’s eyes when asked of her message to President Rodrigo Duterte.
“It’s so painful. It’s like erasing the sins of Marcos,” Florentino told Bulatlat in an interview.
Florentino who was among the thousands who filed the historic classic
suit against the Marcoses said burying Marcos would distort historical
facts, particularly the atrocities during the Marcos dictatorship.
“What about the thousands who were tortured, who were raped?”
Florentino said, adding that there were enormous pieces of evidence
proving human rights abuses during martial law.
“We’re still alive,” Florentino said. “We have not forgotten.” Implications
Neri Colmenares, president of the National Union of Peoples’ Lawyers
(NUPL) and was also detained during martial law, said the executive’s
plan would have legal implications on the cases filed against the
Marcoses.
Colmenares said the Marcoses would brag that the late dictator is a hero and would use it to their advantage. Legal grounds
In their petition for certiorari and prohibition, martial law
survivors maintained that the existing laws prohibit the burial of
Marcos at the Libingan ng mga Bayani.
Citing the Armed Forces of the Philippines regulations on allocation
of cemetery plots at the Libingan ng mga Bayani, petitioners said Marcos
is not qualified.
The petitioners said that the the Libingan ng mga Bayani was created
by virtue of Republic Act 289 and Sec. 1 provides that the purpose of
the construction of a national pantheon is “to perpetuate the memory of
all the Presidents of the Philippines, national heroes and patriots for
the inspiration and emulation of this generation and of generations
still unborn.”
“The burial of Ferdinand Marcos at the Libingan ng mga Bayani simply
mocks and taunts Section 1 of RA 289,” the petitioners said.
The petitioners noted that apart from the human rights violations
during the Marcos dictatorship, the fact remains undisputed that Marcos
and his family, during his term, acquired billions worth of ill-gotten
wealth.
“The crimes of Marcos against the Filipino people and even against humanity involved moral turpitude,” the petitioners said.
The petitioners maintained that the memorandum dated 07 August 2016
issued by Defense Secretary Delfin N. Lorenzana with the subject
“Interment of the late Former President Ferdinand Marcos Sr. at LNMB”
and the directive on the interment of Marcos issued by Rear Admiral
Ernesto C. Enriquez by command of General Ricardo R. Visaya are
“patently illegal and were made with grave abuse of discretion amounting
to lack or excess of jurisdiction.”
Other petitioners include National Artist for Literature Bienvenido
Lumbera, Makabayan president Satur Ocampo, Bayan chairperson Carol
Araullo, film director Bonifacio Ilagan and members of Samahan ng
Ex-Detainees Laban sa Aresto (SELDA).