There have been 119 extrajudicial killings (EJK) of activists, rights advocates, farmers and ordinary folk since Ferdinand Marcos Jr. became president in July 2022, Karapatan said.
In its International Human Rights Day statement today, December 10, the rights group also said another 76 individuals were victims of frustrated EJK; 14 victims of enforced disappearance; 43,582 victims of forced evacuation; 63,380 victims of indiscriminate firing; and 46,921 victims of bombings.
Amid this sordid record, Karapatan said that the Marcos Jr. government is implementing renewed attempts to deodorize itself amid reports of mounting violations of human rights and international humanitarian law perpetrated by the military and police.
Yet, even the Dahas Project of the Third World Studies Center has documented more than 800 drug-related killings since Marcos Jr. became president despite his claims of a “bloodless” war on drugs, Karapatan cited.
The group also condemned Marcos Jr.’s choice to launch his government’s Philippine Human Rights Action Plan today that, along with other executive orders and task forces formed to investigate specific rights violations, attempt to gloss over human rights violations under the current administration.
“[W]e denounce Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s attempts to window-dress the sordid human rights situation and demand justice and accountability from him and his henchmen,” Karapatan secretary general Cristina Palabay said.
Same as Duterte
Palabay said the Filipino people should not be blinded by Marcos Jr.’s attempts to blame the Rodrigo Duterte regime for the country’s bloody record, pointing out that the current government also violates human rights with impunity.
“The worsening violations of human rights and international humanitarian law under the current regime are the logical consequences of Marcos Jr.’s refusal to do away with any of the Duterte-era laws and policies that have engendered such violations, including those that pertain to the war on drugs,” Palabay said.
For example, she added, the Marcos government maintains the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) that continues to red- and terror-tag activists and threaten and intimidate them into joining staged surrenders.
“Those who refuse to become part of such a farce are made vulnerable to extrajudicial killing, enforced disappearance or unjust arrest and detention on trumped-up charges (under the Marcos government,” she said.
Marcos Jr. has weaponized to the hilt the Anti-Terrorism Act signed into law by Duterte, and an earlier law against terrorist financing, further suppressing dissent by linking activism to terrorism,” Palabay added.
Palabay said that the “twin terror laws” have so far victimized more than a hundred activists and ordinary civilians.
“His (Marcos Jr.) militarist policy in dealing with insurgency has turned vast areas of the countryside into war zones, where villagers are subjected to food and economic blockades and civilian authority is undermined by the military’s repressive presence,” Palabay explained.
“[N]o matter how much he tries to prettify his image by raking dirt on the Dutertes, Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s own hands are bloodied by human rights violations and violations of international humanitarian law perpetrated under his regime, which does the bidding of the US in undertaking counterinsurgency campaigns that desperately try to quell all forms of dissent,” Palabay added.
Just as dirty too
Like the Dutertes, Marcos Jr. also use the controversial confidential and intelligence funds (CIF) to violate the people’s rights and freedoms, Karapatan added.
“Marcos Jr. is merely following in Duterte’s footsteps when the Office of the President spent PhP4.56 billion in 2023, the biggest chunk in the PhP10-billion CIF for that year. CIF allocations infamously jumped 900% under Duterte compared to his predecessor, a pattern that Marcos continues to this day,” Karapatan said.
The spectacular exposés of Vice President Sara Duterte’s scam to siphon hundreds of millions of pesos of CIF and former president Duterte’s scheme of using his own CIF to reward his death squads for the killing of tens of thousands of drug suspects have outraged the people and spurred calls to have Sara Duterte impeached and Rodrigo Duterte arrested and stand trial before the International Criminal Court, the group added.
Karapatan said that it demands that former president Duterte be arrested, tried and imprisoned for the extrajudicial killing of up to 30,000 drug suspects.
“We likewise demand that his daughter Sara be impeached, removed from public office and charged criminally for stealing and misusing public funds,” it said.
Karapatan is said to lead a protest march from Liwasang Bonifacio to Mendiola in Manila later today. # (Raymund B. Villanueva)
