Martial law anniversary: Rights violations, impunity persist

MANILA, Philippines — Fifty-one years since the declaration of martial law, Filipinos continue to face the same forms of repression under the second Marcos administration, according to activists.

Progressive groups held a protest at Liwasang Bonifacio in Manila yesterday to mark the anniversary of the declaration of martial law in 1972, saying the climate of impunity that existed during the martial law era under the elder Ferdinand Marcos persists under the present administration.

Malacañang had nothing to say about the commemoration.

“It was a period of unmitigated tyranny and corruption in our history that we must never forget and, more importantly, must never allow to happen again,” said rights group Karapatan secretary-general Cristina Palabay.

“We find ourselves facing the same forms of repression with the enforcement of the counterterrorism laws that are essentially martial law instruments. These laws, much like the repressive Marcosian presidential decrees of the past, are being used to silence dissent and stifle protest,” she added.

Palabay cited the recent case of environmentalists Jonila Castro and Jhed Tamano, who accused the military of abduction and coercion.

Castro and Tamano would have been the ninth and 10th desaparecidos under the second Marcos administration had they not spoken in opposition to the police and military’s narrative during a press conference organized by the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC), she noted.

Desaparecidos refer to missing persons presumed to have been abducted or killed by the military or law enforcement.

Palabay said the NTF-ELCAC, created by the previous Duterte administration, is being used by the current administration to hunt activists,