Having known the Filipino photojournalist Alex Baluyut, who died yesterday aged 69, for nearly half a century, I feel that looking at his photos — how he documented the events that unfurled during his lifetime — reveals his own lifelong search for himself.

By documenting the rawest parts of human existence, including war, poverty, and the shifting tides of our history, he was reconciling his own place within those same struggles.

Whether on the frontlines of conflict in Mindanao or the troubled streets of Metro Manila, he wasn’t just looking for a story; he was searching for a sense of truth.

• READ MORE: Award-winning veteran photojournalist Alex Baluyut dies at 69

​I first knew Alex when he was a photographer for the Associated Press. In those days, film was expensive, but it was not a constraint for him.

Having the resources of a major agency gave him a distinct advantage over his colleagues. I noticed how he loved documenting every movement of a subject, while others were often content with a single “good shot” for the day’s coverage.

It surprised me when, after we were dismissed from the Times Journal for union work and were organising a new daily with the late Joe Burgos, Alex approached me and Chuchay Fernandez. He asked if he can join Pahayagang Malaya.

He didn’t focus on the economic difficulties of a struggling paper, but instead embraced the challenge of being part of the “Mosquito Press” during the darkest days of the Marcos martial law era, especially during the surge of outrage following the death of opposition leader Benigno Aquino.

​Risky coverage
Alex was not just focused on protest rallies, his main assignments then. Together, we planned risky coverage of the underground movement, which took us to dangerous locations, including Mindanao to cover the Moro secessionist rebellion.

During the 76-day war in Lanao del Sur, Alex was hesitant to leave even after we received reports of napalm bombing; he stayed until it became clear the site was impossible to reach.

On one occasion, we braved a torturous hike to reach a MILF (Moro Islamic Liberation Front) camp on the border of Lanao and Maguindanao to take the first-ever photos of their forces in formation at their own campsite.

Even then, I noticed a shift in Alex’s mood. His adrenaline was fueled by a drive to expose the plight of the aggrieved, a mission that eventually brought us to the countryside to cover the communist insurgency.

His photos were not always meant for the newspapers; they were documenting the struggle so that people might understand it. Eventually, the pressure of witnessing the stark truths of an armed struggle took its toll on him.

​Interestingly, the photos Alex provided me from his documentation of the underground movement did not show the stark reality of a rebellion, but rather the communities where he was immersed.

He was the best man at my wedding, and my only lament was that he failed to document the ceremony. Instead, he handed me and Merci a photo of a smiling Mangyan — a rare subject given his usual themes.

He told me it was his way of wishing us a happy life.

Mobile kitchen project
Alex also sought to chart a life beyond photojournalism. Driven by his love for cooking, he and some friends set up a small beer garden on the sidewalks of Ermita, which sparked his adventures in the restaurant business.

It was no surprise then that he eventually devoted his remaining years to serving the needy during calamities, co-founding the Art Relief Mobile Kitchen with his wife, Precious.

The news of Alex’s passing from cirrhosis of the liver stunned me, especially knowing the impact our late colleague Tony Nieva had on both of us. Tony also succumbed to the dreaded illness.He was our mentor in the struggle for press freedom and in documenting the lives of the downtrodden.

After Tony passed away, I rarely saw and worked with Alex, except for a few commissioned book projects.

Although I monitored his journey through social media and felt a sense of guilt for not joining his new advocacy, I am grateful to have been part of the life of a man who sought the truth in our ailing society and worked, in his own way, to lift the spirits of the marginalised.

Joel C. Paredes is a Filipino journalist and author who has contributed to BusinessMirror and other Philippine media outlets. He has written about local politics and Philippine history, including a 2010 collection of columns about the Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo administration.

A West Papuan leader has accused Indonesia of imposing a “martial law” on the Melanesian region in response to the kidnapping of a New Zealand pilot by rebels fighting Jakarta’s contested rule.

“It is clear that Indonesia is using the kidnap of New Zealand pilot Philip Mehrtens as a pretext to strengthen their colonial hold on West Papua,” said United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP) interim president Benny Wenda.

Mehrtens was taken hostage on February 7 in the Papuan Highlands and has featured in video demands for independence.

• READ MORE:  Search for NZ pilot taken hostage by Papua rebels extended, says Indonesia
• Other West Papua reports

“[Indonesian security forces] are creating and exploiting violence to further depopulate our villages and create easier access to our resources through corporate developments like the Trans Papua Highway.

“This is all part of a 60-year colonial land grab,” claimed Wenda in a statement.

He has appealed for international aid agencies to be allowed to treat victims of forced displacement.

He said that in Intan Jaya, Puncak Jaya, and Nduga, Indonesian soldiers were “roaming the countryside, conducting arbitrary house searches, beating Papuan civilians, and even murdering women and children”.

Papuan shot dead
Wenda said that near Wamena, a Papuan named Stefanus Wilil was shot dead at random while crossing a road.

Last month, a 12-year-old boy, Enius Tabuni, was killed by soldiers who then “mockingly videoed his dead body”.

“Merely days ago, a woman walking back to her village with her husband was stopped, beaten, and then he was shot dead.

“Women and young girls have been raped, churches have been burnt by soldiers, and 16 villages in the Intan Jaya Regency have been abandoned by terrified inhabitants.

“My people are living in mortal fear of the next beating, the next murder, the next massacre.

“Everyone is a target: whether it is because they have a beard or Rasta culture, wearing dirty clothes, or carrying an axe or shovel to tend their gardens — every Papuan is under automatic suspicion.

“Hundreds have been forced to flee their homes by roving military bands acting with total impunity.”

Taking refuge
Wenda said they were taking refuge in the forests, where they lacked food, water, and “basic medical facilities”.

“But even there they are not safe, with armed police occupying every corner of the Papuan countryside, transforming the land into a hunting ground for Indonesian troops.”

Wenda, who lives in exile, said there were parallels with his own childhood experience.

“Seeing my people abused in this way brings up memories of 1977-1982, when I was a child living in hiding in the bush,” he said.

“The Highland operations during this time have been described by the Asian Human Rights Commission as a ‘neglected genocide’.

“Indonesia killed us with guns and bombs dropped from helicopters, but also with malnutrition and crop destruction.

“Even as a child I knew that my life was worthless to the colonial forces. The genocide and ethnic cleansing of West Papua is still neglected, as the massacre of 10 Papuans in Wamena in February proves.”

Up to 100,000 displaced
According to UN figures, between 60,000 and 100,000 West Papuans have been displaced over the past four years.

Wenda said his movement’s peaceful demands to Indonesia were:

• Allow aid agencies to treat victims of forced displacement;
• Allow the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights into West Papua, as had been demanded by more than 84 countries;
• Allow international journalists to report on the situation in West Papua;
• Draw back Indonesian troops to allow civilians to return to their lives; and
• Release all political prisoners — including 80 activists who had been arrested for handing out leaflets demanding political activist Victor Yeimo be freed, Victor Yeimo himself, and three students detained without charge last year.

The Philippines Court of Appeals has denied the motion for reconsideration filed by Nobel Peace Prize laureate and Rappler CEO Maria Ressa and former Rappler researcher Reynaldo Santos Jr. over their cyber libel case.

In a 16-page decision dated October 10, the court’s fourth division denied the appeal.

Associate Justices Roberto Quiroz, Ramon Bato Jr., and Germano Francisco Legaspi signed the ruling. They were the same justices who signed the court decision, which earlier affirmed the conviction of Ressa and Santos.

• READ MORE: Cybercrime, criminal libel and the media: From ‘e-martial law’ to the Magna Carta in the Philippines — David Robie and Del Abcede
• Philippine Nobel laureate Maria Ressa appeals to Supreme Court
• Other Maria Ressa and Rappler reports

According to the court, the arguments raised by Ressa and Santos were already resolved.

“A careful and meticulous review of the motion for reconsideration reveals that the matters raised by the accused-appellants had already been exhaustively resolved and discussed in the assailed Decision,” the court said.

The court also claimed Ressa’s and Santos’ conviction is not meant to curtail freedom of speech.

“In conclusion, it [is] worthy and relevant to point out that the conviction of the accused-appellants for the crime of cyberlibel punishable under the Cybercrime Law is not geared towards the curtailment of the freedom of speech, or to produce an unseemingly chilling effect on the users of cyberspace that would possibly hinder free speech.”

‘Safeguard’ for free speech
On the contrary, the court said, the purpose of the law is to “safeguard the right of free speech, and to curb, if not totally prevent, the reckless and unlawful use of the computer systems as a means of committing the traditional criminal offences…”

In a statement, Nobel Peace laureate Ressa said she was “disappointed” but not surprised by the ruling.

Rappler’s video report on YouTube.

“The ongoing campaign of harassment and intimidation against me and Rappler continues, and the Philippines legal system is not doing enough to stop it. I am disappointed by today’s ruling but sadly not surprised,” Ressa said.

“This is a reminder of the importance of independent journalism holding power to account. Despite these sustained attacks from all sides, we continue to focus on what we do best — journalism.”

Santos, in a separate statement, said he still believed that the rule of law would prevail.

“The [Appeal Court’s] decision to deny our motion is not surprising, but it’s disheartening nevertheless. As we elevate our case to the SC, our fight against intimidation and suppression of freedom continues. We still believe that the rule of law will prevail.”

Theodore “Ted” Te, Rappler’s lawyer and former Supreme Court spokesperson, said they would now ask the Supreme Court to review and reverse Ressa’s conviction.

“The CA decision denying the MFR [motion for reconsideration] is disappointing. It ignored basic principles of constitutional and criminal law as well as the evidence presented. Maria and Rey will elevate these issues to the SC and we will ask the SC to review the decision and to reverse the decision,” Te said in a statement.

The decision
The Appeal Court also explained its findings on the arguments based on:

• Applications of the provisions of cyber libel under the cybercrime law
• Subject article should have been classified as qualifiedly privileged” in relation to Wilfredo Keng as a public figure

On the validity of the cybercrime law, the court cited a ruling which, according to them, decided the constitutionality of the law.

“We find it unnecessary to dwell on the issue raised by accused-appellants since the Supreme Court, in Jose Jesus M. Disini, Jr., et al., v. The Secretary of Justice, et al. (Disini Case), 5 had already ruled on its validity and constitutionality, with finality.”

The court also reiterated that the story in question was republished. The court said the argument that ex-post facto was applied on the theory that the correction of one letter is too unsubstantial and cannot be considered a republication is “unavailing.”

“As settled, the determination of republication is not hinged on whether the corrections made therein were substantial or not, as what matters is that the very exact libelous article was again published on a later date,” the appeals court said.

On the increase of penalty, the CA said the argument that Wilberto Tolentino v. People has no doctrinal value and cannot be used as a binding precedent as it was “an unsigned resolution, is misplaced.”

That case said the “prescriptive period for the crime of cyber libel is 15 years.”

Traditional, online publications
The appeals court also highlighted the difference between traditional and online publications: “As it is, in the instance of libel through traditional publication, the libelous article is only released and circulated once – which is on the day when it was published.”

Such was not the case for an online publication, the court said, where “the commission of such offence is continuous since such article remains therein in perpetuity unless taken down from all online platforms where it was published…”

On the argument about Keng, the CA said it was insufficient to consider him a public figure: “As previously settled, the claim that Wilfredo Keng is a renowned businessman, who was connected to several companies, is insufficient to classify him as a public figure.”

The term “public figure” in relation to libel refers more to a celebrity, it said, citing the Ciriaco “Boy” Guingguing v. Honorable Court of Appeals decision. The decision said a public figure is “anyone who has arrived at a position where public attention is focused upon him as a person.”

It also cited the Supreme Court decision on Alfonso Yuchengco v. The Manila Chronicle Publishing Corporation, et al., which resolved the argument whether a businessman can be considered a public figure. The court said that being a known businessman did not make Keng a public figure who had attained a position that gave the public “legitimate interest in his affairs and character.”

There was no proof, too, that “he voluntarily thrusted himself to the forefront of the particular public controversies that were raised in the defamatory article,” the CA added.

In 2020, Manila Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 46 convicted Ressa and Santos over cyber libel charges filed by Keng. The case tested the 8-year-old Philippine cybercrime law.

The Manila court interpreted the cyber libel law as having a 12-year proscription period, as opposed to only a year. The lower court also decided that republication was a separate offence.

Aside from affirming the Manila court’s ruling, the CA also imposed a longer prison sentence on Ressa and Santos, originally set for six months and one day as minimum to six years as maximum.

The appeals court added eight months and 20 days to the maximum imprisonment penalty.

Jairo Bolledo is a Rappler journalist. Republished with permission.

Upon assuming the Philippines presidency on 30 June 2022, Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr — the only son and namesake of the former dictator Ferdinand Marcos — delivered an inaugural address that did not mention press freedom.

Press freedom also went unmentioned when he delivered his first State of the Nation Address before the joint Senate and House of Representatives on 25 July 2022.

His silence on the issue was notable given that the former press secretary Trixie Cruz-Angeles, who stepped down on 4 October 2022 due to health reasons, had stressed that press freedom would be guaranteed under the Marcos Jr administration and that the administration would “work closely” with news media.

• READ MORE: Other Philippine media freedom reports

But as he pledged to protect press freedom on the campaign trail, certain journalists were pushed for getting too physically close to Marcos Jr.

It also remains to be seen whether his representatives will continue to evade critical questions during press briefings or if Marcos Jr will be more accommodating of interview requests. The normalisation of these practices would be a death knell for press freedom in the Philippines.

Media restrictions and abuse under Marcos Jr evoke memories of the Philippine media’s dark history under former Philippines president and dictator Ferdinand Marcos’ martial law from 1972–86.

The Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility identifies five similarities between the Marcos regime in the 1970s and the current Marcos Jr administration.

Distribution of propaganda
These are the distribution of propaganda through government agencies and social media, the ABS–CBN shutdown, attacks and threats against journalists, crony press and media selectivity and propaganda films.

There are chilling similarities between the two administrations despite Marcos Jr’s promise that he would not declare martial law.

For the current administration, “working closely” with journalists means putting them in touch with pro-Marcos Jr vloggers, content creators and influencers. Cruz-Angeles is prioritising the accreditation of pro-regime reporters to cover official functions.

But her claim that accreditation is open to those of all political beliefs rings untrue as pro-Marcos Jr vloggers recently established a new group (upon the suggestion of Cruz-Angeles herself) to help gain government accreditation.

Celebrity vlogger Toni Gonzaga was granted a one-on-one interview with Marcos Jr at the Malacañang Palace in September 2022, showing how the administration accommodates those who ask soft questions. That reminds many Filipinos of Marcos Jr’s non-participation in most presidential debates and interviews during the campaign, opting to accommodate events organised by his supporters.

During the 2022 election campaign, there were times when his handlers did not invite critical journalists, asking those invited to submit questions in advance to control the flow of press briefings.

By accrediting pro-administration, hyper-partisan non-journalists, the Marcos Jr administration gives them legitimacy as “truth seekers” even if there is evidence they proliferate disinformation. It is also a strategy to discredit critical journalists for peddling “fake news”.

Critical journalists harassed
Critical journalists and media organisations are harassed and intimidated under the Marcos Jr administration, just as they were under the 2016–2020 Duterte administration. Disinformation remains rampant even after the 2022 elections.

Red-tagging — the blacklisting of journalists and media outlets critical of the government — has continued.

Shortly after Marcos Jr assumed the presidency, the Court of Appeals upheld the “cyber libel” convictions of Nobel Prize laureate Maria Ressa and former Rappler writer Reynaldo Santos Jr.

While these convictions appeared to carry over the selective harassment and intimidation of the vengeful Duterte administration, the chilling effect on the media is real. Those targeted become grim reminders of what can happen if journalists and news media organisations incur the ire of the powers that be.

The date 21 September 2022 marked the 50 years since martial law was imposed. Marcos Jr repeatedly claims martial law was necessary to tackle communist and separatist threats, dismissing accusations that his father was a dictator.

Even the funding for the planned memorial for Martial Law victims was cut by 75 percent in the 2023 National Expenditure Programme.

Marcos Jr intends to rewrite history textbooks to include his family’s version of the truth. By silencing his critics, he can further engage in historical denialism. This is important not just to erase his father’s dictator image but to escape his family’s legal problems like the unpaid estate tax and his mother’s conviction for seven counts of graft.

Media repression ‘normalised’
Media repression continues to be normalised under the Marcos Jr regime. One of his allies in the House of Representatives blocked the return of ABS–CBN, whose franchise bid was denied in 2020. Rappler and its editorial staff, including Ressa, continue to face legal problems as well as the threat of closure.

The National Telecommunications Commission blocked 27 websites accused of having communist links in June 2022. It took a court order for the online publication Bulatlat Multimedia to be unblocked, while journalist Frenchie Mae Cumpio remains in detention on questionable charges after being red-tagged and subjected to death threats.

The murder of broadcaster Percy Lapid on 3 October 2022 — the second journalist to be killed under the new administration — also reflects the dire state of press freedom in the Philippines.

That Marcos Jr did not mention press freedom in his inaugural speech and first State of the Nation Address reflects his disregard for critical journalism.

Although it is still early days, his efforts to whitewash the dictatorship’s dark past and continue his predecessor’s media repression indicate that his pre-election promise of a “free press” is long abandoned.

Danilo Arana Arao is associate professor at the Department of Journalism, the University of the Philippines Diliman, special lecturer at the Department of Journalism, the Polytechnic University of the Philippines Santa Mesa, associate editor at Bulatlat Multimedia and editor at Media Asia. This article was first published in East Asia Forum.

Karl Patrick Suyat, 19, has no personal experience of the tyrannical rule of late dictator Ferdinand E. Marcos. But memories of the atrocities and human rights violations committed during those dark moments have transcended time.

The year 2022 marks the 50th anniversary of Marcos’ declaration of Martial Law. But this year also saw the return of the Marcoses to power — Ferdinand Marcos Jr. is now the President of the republic and spoke yesterday at the UN General Assembly.

Despite efforts of Martial Law survivors, human rights groups, and even academics to remind the Filipino people of the abuses of the Marcos family, Marcos Jr was still able to clinch the country’s top post.

• READ MORE: Networked propaganda: How the Marcoses are using social media to reclaim Malacañang
• Networked Propaganda: How the Marcoses are rewriting history
• Martial law brutality in ‘educational’ musical drama Katips touches raw nerve in NZ – David Robie
• Martial Law Day in the Philippines

Fueled by outrage and anguish, Suyat thought of a way to channel his energy and still fight back despite the Marcoses’ victory — he founded “Project Gunita” (remember) along with Josiah Quising and Sarah Gomez.

Project Gunita is a network of volunteers and members of various civil society organisations that aim to defend historical truth. They particularly push back against historical denialism and protect truths about the Martial Law years.

Through the project, the three founders and their members created a digital archive of all materials that contain information about Marcos’ Martial Law to preserve them.

Archiving is not new since other government offices and groups like the Bantayog ng mga Bayani Foundation and the Human Rights Violations Victims’ Memorial Commission, under the Commission on Human Rights, have made efforts to preserve Martial Law materials.

But Project Gunita is born out of the spirit of volunteerism and nationalism among young Filipinos.

From old newspapers, magazines, and books — Project Gunita members seek and buy materials, and then scan them to be preserved in the archives. The project’s archiving started right after Marcos Jr’s victory.

“Having read through the history of dictatorships, from Benito Mussolini to Adolf Hitler to Ferdinand Marcos himself, lagi’t-laging ang unang hinahabol, ang unang-unang tinatarget ng mga diktador ay ‘yong mga silid-aklatan, libraries, at ‘yong mga arkibo – the archives (always, the ones being targeted first by dictators are libraries and archives),” Suyat told Rappler.

Suyat believes that the Marcoses won’t be content with just distorting and whitewashing the atrocities of the Marcos administration. They would eventually go after the archives to erase the truth, Suyat added.

“The only question is when, it’s not a question of if, it’s a question of when. And I don’t want to wait until that time happens before we start to scramble around to save the archives.

“Habang may panahon pa (while we still have time), while we can still do it, ‘di ba? (right?) Bakit hindi natin gagawin? (Why don’t we do it?).”

Even before Marcos Jr’s victory, journalists have pointed out that his family not only revises history, but also introduces an alternative history that favours them. The Marcoses also rode on various disinformation networks to disseminate falsehoods.

A two-part investigative story by Rappler showed how the Marcoses used social media to reclaim power and rewrite history to hide their wrongdoings.

Passing the torch
The personal experiences of Project Gunita founders fanned their desire to continue the fight of the generation who came before them. Suyat, who grew up in a family of Martial Law survivors, feels it is his responsibility to protect their stories.

“I cannot allow their stories, as well as the stories of people I had gotten acquainted with later in life who are Martial Law survivors to be erased by historical denialism, that we all know is being perpetrated by the Marcos family,” Suyat told Rappler in a mix of English and Filipino.

Josiah Quising, a co-founder of Project Gunita and a lawyer, believes that these stories should be preserved because true justice for Martial Law victims has yet to be attained.

“It’s very frustrating ‘yong justice system sa Pilipinas and how, for decades, ay wala pa ring totoong hustisya sa mga nangyari during the Martial Law era,” Quising told Rappler. (It’s very frustrating, the justice system in the Philippines, and how, for decades, there has been no true justice for everything that happened during the Martial Law era.)

On the inauguration of Marcos Jr, Martial Law survivors led by playwright Boni Ilagan pledged to continue guarding against tyranny.

In the same event, they had a ceremonial passing of the torch, which symbolized the passing of hope and responsibility from Martial Law survivors to the younger generation.

Suyat and Quising believe that their generation is equally responsible for guarding the country’s freedom — at least in their own way. They strongly believe that since the government is now being led by the dictator’s son, they cannot expect it to preserve the memories of Martial Law, so they have to step in.

Preserving truths from generation to generation

“Wala ka namang naririnig.
‘Di ka naman nakikinig
Parang kuliling sa pandinig
Kayong nagtataka
Ha? Inosente lang ang nagtataka,”
Inosente lang ang nagtataka by Bobby Balingit

(You hear nothing. But you are not listening. Like a chime to the ear. You who wonder. What? Only the innocent wonder.)

This song comes to Kris Lanot Lacaba’s mind whenever he hears people deny the atrocities of Martial Law. His father, Pete Lacaba, a poet and journalist, was tortured and arrested under the Marcos regime.

As a son of a Martial Law survivor, Lacaba has heard stories of torture and violence straight from the victims themselves. He recalled that it was on the pavements of Camp Crame, where his father was imprisoned, that he learned how to walk.

Even though decades have passed since those dark periods, he still vividly remembers how his father became a victim of Marcos’ oppressive rule.

“Ang ginagawa ro’n, may dalawang kama tapos pinapahiga ‘yong tatay ko, ‘yong ulo niya sa isang kama, ‘yong paa niya sa isang kama. At ‘pag nahulog ‘yong kama niya ro’n eh gugulpihin pa siya lalo (What they did to my father was, there were two beds and they would tell my father to lie down, his head on one bed, and the other, on the other bed. If he fell, he would be beaten further),” Lacaba told Rappler.

Aside from his father, his uncles Eman Lacaba and Leo Alto were both killed during Martial Law. It is extremely hard for Lacaba to respond to people who deny that human rights violations happened under Martial Law.

Now that he has his own children, Lacaba passes on the stories of Martial Law to them so the memories would be preserved.

“Mahirap eh, bilang magulang. Paano ba natin ikukuwento ito? Pa’no ba natin ipapamahagi ‘yong karanasan ng magulang nila at ng mga lolo’t lola nila?” Lacaba said. (It’s hard as a parent. How do we tell this story to the kids? How do we tell the kids about the experiences of their parents and grandparents?)

He even thinks of ways to make the stories appropriate to his children.

“So kinukuwento namin sa mga bata, ‘no? Hinahanapan namin ng paraan na maging appropriate sa age din nila ‘yong mga kuwento.” (So we tell the stories to my children. We find ways to make the stories appropriate to their age.)

Aside from his kids, Lacaba says he would always accept invitations by schools and universities to share the Martial Law story of his family. He believes that in this way, he will not only share the truths he learned from his father, but get to listen to other stories, too.

After all, Lacaba believes, conversation about Martial Law should reach everyone.

Republished with permission.

Seven weeks ago the Philippines truth-telling martial law film Katips was basking in the limelight in the country’s national FAMAS academy movie awards, winning best picture and a total of six other awards.

Last week it began a four month “world tour” of 10 countries starting in the Middle East followed by Aotearoa New Zealand today – hosted simultaneously at AUT South campus and in Wellington and Christchurch.

The screening of Vincent Tañada’s harrowing – especially the graphic torture scenes – yet also joyful and poignant musical drama touched a raw nerve among many in the audience who shared tears and their experiences of living in fear, or in hiding, during the hate-filled Marcos dictatorship.

• READ MORE: Two films duel for last word on brutal Marcos dictatorship in Philippines

The martial law denunciations, arbitrary arrests, desaparecidos (“disappeared”), brutal tortures and murders by state assassins in the 1970s made the McCarthy era red-baiting witchhunts in the US seem like Sunday School picnics.

Amnesty International says more than 3200 people were killed, 35,000 tortured and 70,000 detained during the martial law period.

Tañada has brushed off claims that the film has a political objective in an attempt to sabotage the leadership of the dictator’s son, Ferdinand Bongbong Marcos Jr, who won the presidency in a landslide victory in the May elections to return the Marcos family to the Malacañang.

He has insisted in many interviews — and he repeated this in a live exchange with the audiences in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch — that the film is educational and his intention is to counter disinformation and to ensure history is remembered.

Telling youth about atrocities
Tañada, from one of the Philippines’ great political and legal families and grandson of former Senator Lorenzo Tañada, a celebrated human rights lawyer, says he wanted to tell the youth about the atrocities that happened during the imposition of martial law under Marcos.

He wanted to tell history to those who had forgotten and those who aren’t yet aware.

The Katips movie trailer.

“You know, as an artist it is also our objective not just to entertain people but more important than that, we are here to educate,” he says.

“We also want to educate the young people about the atrocities – the reality of martial law.

“History is slowly being forgotten. We have forgotten it during the last elections and I guess we also have the responsibility to educate and let the youth know what happened during those times.”

It is rare that such brutal torture scenes are seen on the big screen, and before the main screening at AUT the organisers — Banyuhay Aotearoa, Migrante Aotearoa and Auckland Philippine Solidarity — showed two shorts made by the University of the Philippines and Santo Tomas University of Manila featuring martial law survivors describing their horrifying treatment  during the Marcos years to contemporary students.

Some of the students broke down in tears while others, surprisingly, remained impassive, sometimes with an air of disbelief.

The film evolved from the 2016 stage musical Katips: Mga Bagong Katipunero – Katips: The New Freedom Fighters, which won Aliw Awards for best musical performance that year.

Freedom fighter love story
In a nutshell, Katips tells the love story of Greg, a medical student and leader of the National Unions of Students in the Philippines (NUSP), who with other freedom fighting protesters stage a demonstration against martial law on a mountainside called Mendiola.

His professor is abducted by the state Metropol police, murdered and his body dumped in a remote location.

The protesters begin a vigil and the police brutally suppress the protest and arrest and kidnap other freedom fighters. They are subjected to atrocious torture and their bodies dumped.

A safehouse branded “Katips House” takes in Lara, a New York actress and the daughter of the murdered professor who is visiting Manila but doesn’t yet know about the fate of her father. Lara and Greg form an unlikely relationship and their lives are thrown into upheaval when the safehouse “mother” Alet is abducted and tortured to death.

Greg and another protester, Ka Panyong, a writer for the underground newspaper Ang Bayan, are forced to flee into the jungle for the safety and become rebels. Both get shot while on the run, but manage to survive.

When Greg returns to Lara at the “Katips House” during the Edsa Revolution in 1986, he finds he has a son.

The film has a stirring end featuring the Bantayog ng mga Bayani, a memorial wall to the fallen heroes struggling against martial law– a fitting antidote to the Marcoses and their crass attempts to rewrite Philippine history.

Ironically, the same month that Katips was released in public cinemas, another film, the self-serving Maid of Malaçanang, was launched in a bid to perpetuate the Marcos myths.

• Katips – The Movie, director Vincent Tañada (2022)

The Philippine media described him as “Steady Eddie,” a warrior and survivor, and an accidental hero of the world-renowned People Power revolution who later became probably the country’s best president.

But Fidel V. Ramos, or FVR, was also a study of contradictions.

Also called Eddie by his friends, Ramos died on the last day of July, a month after the namesake son of dictator Ferdinand Marcos, who was ousted in the popular uprising in 1986 that Ramos led, took his oath as the new president in what observers believed was an election that was far from fair due to voting and election irregularities.

• READ MORE: Other reports on the Philippine elections

The former armed forces chief died at 94 from a heart condition and dementia, unimaginable to his admirers who saw him as “cool,” “steady,” athletic, maintaining his military bearing until his old age.

He was also a multi-tasking workaholic who played golf and jogged regularly while briefing journalists or preparing for his next travel to the communities under a rigorous schedule.

He succeeded Corazon “Cory” Aquino as president of the Philippines from 1992 to 1998 and was instrumental in boosting the Southeast Asian developing country’s growth through economic policies of deregulation, liberalisation and foreign investment, his Social Reform Agenda that reduced poverty and an anti-oligarch and anti-monopoly stance.

The only Protestant president of the predominantly Roman Catholic country was also known for his transition from a military general who fought leftist and right-wing dissidents and entering into peace agreements with Islamic separatist groups and Communist insurgents.

Contrast to ruthless military chief
His commendable turn as president after Aquino was a contrast to his past as a hardline, ruthless Marcos military commander who led a security force that rounded up dissidents and violated human rights.

His leadership also saw the harassment, incarceration and exile of Aquino’s husband Benigno, who was assassinated on his return to the country in 1983.

The confluence of events in the years that followed, until the 1986 uprising, was marked by Ramos’ decision to break away from Marcos and to support Aquino, who was cheated massively in the elections.

He and his military comrades, along with Catholic bishops, called on Filipinos to mount a peaceful revolution, making him a people power hero.

Pulitzer Prize-winning Filipino journalist Manny Mogato, who covered Ramos when he headed the Defence Department and the military, said in a social media post that the late president was “a man of action… he even (did) push-ups with 300 soldiers who took part in an attempt to overthrow Cory Aquino”.

Ramos neutralised rogue soldiers who attempted multiple coups against Aquino during her presidency.

Ramos attended the US military academy at West Point, fought in the Korean War in the 1950s as a platoon leader and led the Philippine contingent in the late 1960s in the Vietnam War.

‘Best president ever’
“Ramos was the best president the country ever had, guarded democracy, broke monopolies and made peace, ending right-wing rebellion, half finishing the Muslim secessionist war and almost reaching a peace deal with Maoist-led rebels,” Mogato said.

“FVR left behind a legacy of peace, stability and prosperity Filipinos now enjoy.”

Anastacio Corpuz, an 80-year-old war veteran, said he was saddened by Ramos’ passing, saying that he should have continued as a vocal authority and statesman.

“Through the years, he was always vocal against corruption in government and abuses by the political elite — including the new government under the dictator’s son,” he lamented.

“He will be greatly missed.”

Diana G. Mendoza filed this report for Pacific Island Times in Guam. Republished with permission.

On social media, Ferdinand Marcos Jr needed to have all pieces in place to stage a Malacañang comeback: he had a network of propagandist assets, popular myths that justified his family’s obscene wealth, and narratives that distorted the horrors of his father’s rule.

He had even asked Cambridge Analytica to rebrand his family’s image.

The living component among these pieces was Rodrigo Duterte — an ally who, when elected president, normalised Marcos’ machinery, painting over a picture of murders and plunder to show glory and heroism instead.

• READ MORE: New war: How the propaganda network shifted from targeting ‘addicts’ to activists
• Pro-Marcos, Duterte accounts step up attacks on journalists as 2022 polls near
• Networked propaganda: How the Marcoses are rewriting history
• Other Rodrigo Duterte reports

“I think that really, if we are to make a metaphor [to] describe the role of Duterte to Marcos’ win, it’s really Duterte being the sponsor or a ninong to Marcos Jr…. I think Duterte ultimately is the godfather of this all,” said Fatima Gaw, assistant professor at the University of the Philippines (UP) Diliman.

The alliance
Marcos’ disinformation machinery that was years in the making was complemented by his longtime ties to the Duterte family. Before “Uniteam,” there was “AlDub” or Alyansang Duterte-Bongbong.

Marcos courted Rodrigo Duterte in 2015, but Duterte chose Alan Peter Cayetano to be his running mate. Even then, calls for a Duterte-Marcos tandem persisted.

Gaw said Duterte played a part in driving interest for Marcos-related social media content and making it profitable. The first milestone for this interest, according to Gaw, was when Marcos filed his certificate of candidacy for vice-president in 2015.

They saw an influx of search demand for Marcos history on Google.

“There’s interest already back then but it was amplified and magnified by the alliance with Duterte. So every time there’s a pronouncement from Duterte about, for example, the burial of Marcos Sr. in the Libingan ng mga Bayani, that also spiked interest, and that interest is actually cumulative, it’s not like it’s a one-off thing,” Gaw said in a June interview with Rappler.

Using CrowdTangle, Rappler scanned posts in 2016 with the keyword “Marcos,” yielding over 62,000 results from pages with admins based in the Philippines. Spikes can be seen during key events like the EDSA anniversary, the Pilipinas 2016 debate, election day, and instances after Duterte’s moves to bury the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos at the Libingan ng mga Bayani.

On February 19, 2016, Duterte said that if elected president, he would allow the burial of the late dictator at the Libingan ng mga Bayani. On August 7, 2016, Duterte said that Marcos deserved to be buried at the Libingan ng mga Bayani for being a soldier and a former president.

The burial pushed through on November 18, 2016 and became a major event that allowed the massive whitewashing of the Martial Law period.

Made with flourish
Related content would then gain views, prompting platforms to recommend them and make them more visible, Gaw said. In a research she conducted in 2021 with De La Salle University (DLSU) communication professor Cheryll Soriano, they found that when searching “Marcos history” on YouTube, videos made by amateur content creators or people unaffiliated with professional groups were recommended more than news, institutional, and academic sources.

“A big part of Marcos’ success online and spreading his message and propaganda is because he leveraged both his political alliances with [the] Dutertes, as the front-facing tandem and political partnership. And on the backend, whatever ecosystem that the Duterte administration has established, is something that Marcos already can tap,” Gaw said.

In an upcoming study on social media and disinformation narratives authored by Aries Arugay and Justin Baquisal, they identified four thematic disinformation narratives in the last election campaign — authoritarian nostalgia/fantasy, conspiracy theories (Tallano gold, Yamashita treasure), “strongman”, and democratic disillusionment.

Arugay, a political science professor at UP Diliman, said these four narratives were the “raw materials” for further polarisation in the country.

“Para sa mga kabataan, ’yung mga 18-24, fantasy siya. Kasi naririnig natin ‘yun, ah kaya ko binoto si Bongbong Marcos kasi gusto kong maexperience ‘yung Martial Law,” Arugay said in an interview with Rappler in June.

(For the youth, those aged 18-24, it’s a fantasy. We hear that reasoning, that they voted for Bongbong Marcos because they want to experience Martial Law.)

Arugay described this as “unthinkable,” but pervasive false narratives that the Martial Law era was the golden age of Philippine economy, that no Filipino was poor during that time, that the Philippines was the richest country next to Japan, among many other claims, allowed for such a fantasy to thrive.

Institutionalising disinformation
While traditional propaganda required money and machinery, usually from a top-down system, Gaw said Duterte co-opted and hijacked the existing systems to manipulate the news cycle and online discourse to make a name for himself.

“I think what Duterte has done…is to institutionalise disinformation at the state level,” she said.

This meant that the amplification of Duterte’s messaging became incorporated in activities of the government, perpetuated by the Presidential Communications Operations Office, the Philippine National Police, and the government’s anti-communist task force or the NTF-ELCAC, among others.

Early on, Duterte’s administration legitimized partisan vloggers by hiring some of them in government. Other vloggers served as crisis managers for the PCOO, monitoring social media, alerting the agency about sentiments that were critical of the administration, and spreading positive news about the government.

Bloggers were organized by Pebbles Duque, niece of Health Secretary Francisco Duque III, who himself was criticised over the government’s pandemic response.

Mocha Uson, one of the most infamous pro-Duterte disinformation peddlers, was appointed PCOO assistant secretary earlier in his term. (She ended up campaigning for Isko Moreno in the last election.)

Now, we’re seeing a similar turn of events — Marcos appointed pro-Duterte vlogger Trixie Cruz-Angeles as his press secretary. Under Duterte’s administration, Angeles had been a social media strategist of the PCOO.

Following the Duterte administration’s lead, they are again eyeing the accreditation of vloggers to let them cover Malacañang briefings or press conferences.

“So in the Duterte campaign, of course there were donors, supporters paying for the disinformation actors and workers. Now it’s actually us, the Filipino people, funding disinformation, because it’s now part of the state. So I think that’s the legacy of the Duterte administration and what Marcos has done, is actually to just leverage on that,” Gaw said.

Targeting critics
What pieces of disinformation are Filipinos inadvertently funding? Gaw said that police pages are some of the most popular pages to spread disinformation on Facebook, and that they don’t necessarily talk about police work but instead the various agenda of the state, such as demonising communist groups, activist groups, and other progressive movements.

Emboldened by their chief Duterte, who would launch tirades against his critics during his speeches and insult, curse, and red-tag them, police pages and accounts spread false or misleading content that target activists and critics. They do this by posting them directly or by sharing them from dubious, anonymously-managed pages, a Rappler investigation found.

Facebook later took down a Philippine network that was linked to the military or police, for violating policies on coordinated inauthentic behavior.

The platform has also previously suspended Communications Undersecretary and NTF-ELCAC spokesperson Lorraine Badoy who has long been targeting and brazenly red-tagging individuals and organizations that are critical of the government. She faces several complaints before the Office of the Ombudsman accusing her of violating the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act and the Code of Conduct for public officials.

“PCOO as an office before wasn’t really a big office, they’re not popular, but all of a sudden they become so salient and so visible in media because they’re able to understand that half of the battle of governance is not just doing the operations of it but also the PR side of it,” Gaw said.

Facebook users recirculated a post Badoy made in January 2016, wherein she talked about the murders of Boyet and Primitivo Mijares under Martial Law. In that post, just six years ago, Badoy called Bongbong an “idiot, talentless son of the dead dickhead dictator.”

Badoy has since disowned such views. In a post on May 2022, Badoy said she only “believed all those lies I was taught in UP” and quoted Joseph Meynard Keynes: “When the facts change, I change my mind.”

Angeles also said the same in June 2022 when netizens surfaced her old tweets criticising the Marcos family. She said, “I changed my mind about it, aren’t we entitled to change our minds?”

But the facts haven’t changed. A 2003 Supreme Court decision declared $658 million worth of Marcos Swiss deposits as ill-gotten. Imelda Marcos’ motion for reconsideration was “denied with finality”.

According to Amnesty International, 70,000 were imprisoned, 34,000 were tortured, and 3,240 were killed under Martial Law.

The rise of alternative news sources
Outside government channels, Badoy co-hosts an SMNI programme named “Laban Kasama ng Bayan” with Jeffrey “Ka Eric” Celiz — who is supposedly a former rebel — where they talk about the communist movement. SMNI is the broadcasting arm of embattled preacher Apollo Quiboloy’s Kingdom of Jesus Christ church.

SMNI has been found to be at the core of the network of online assets who red-tag government critics and attack the media. The content that vloggers and influencers produce to defend Duterte’s administration now bleeds into newscasts by organisations with franchises granted by the government.

The first report of the Digital Public Pulse, a project co-led by Gaw, found that on YouTube, leading politician and government channels, including that of Marcos, directly reach their audiences without the mediation of the media.

“This shift to subscribing to influencers and vloggers as sources of news and information, and now subscribing to nontraditional or non-mainstream sources of information that are [still considered institutional] because they have franchises and they have licences to operate, it’s part of the trend of the growing distrust in mainstream media,” Gaw said.

She said that given the patronage relationship that religious organisations have with politicians, alternative news sources like SMNI and NET25 don’t necessarily practice objective, accountable, or responsible journalism because their interest is different from the usual journalistic organisation.

“I think that in general these two are politically tied and economically incentivised to perform the role that the administration and the incoming presidency of Marcos want them to play, and exactly, serving as an alternative source of information,” she said.

A day after he was proclaimed, Marcos held a press conference with only three reporters, who belonged to SMNI, GMA News, and NET25.

Rappler reviewed NET25’s Facebook posts and found that it has a history of attacking the press, Vice-President Leni Robredo, and her supporters. The network had also released inaccurate reports that put Robredo in a bad light.

Gaw said because these alternative news channels owned by religious institutions have a mutually-benefiting relationship with the government, they are given access to government officials and to stories that other journalists might not have access to. There is thus no incentive for them to report critically and perform the role of providing checks and balances.

“They would essentially be an extension of state propaganda,” Gaw said.

For Arugay, the Marcos campaign was able to take advantage of how the state influenced the standards of journalism.

“Part [of their strategy] is least exposure to unfriendlies, particularly media that’s critical. I think at the end they saw the power of critical media. And once they were able to get an opportunity, they wanted to turn things around. And this is where democracy suffers,” Arugay said.

Under Duterte, journalists and news organisations faced a slew of attacks that threatened their livelihood and freedom. Rappler was banned from covering Malacañang, faced trumped-up charges, then witnessed its CEO Maria Ressa being convicted of cyber libel.

Broadcasting giant ABS-CBN was shut down. Journalist Frenchie Mae Cumpio is in her second year in jail.

While the international community lauds the courageous and critical reporting of Philippine journalists, Filipinos are shutting them out.

All bases covered
While Duterte mostly used a Facebook strategy to win the election, Marcos went all out in 2022 — and it paid off.

“[The] strategy of the Marcos Jr. campaign became very complicated [compared with] the Duterte campaign because back then they were really, they just invested on Facebook. [That’s not the case here]…. No social media tech or platform was disregarded,” Arugay said.

At one point in 2021, YouTube became the most popular social media platform in the Philippines, beating Facebook. Whereas Facebook at least has a third-party fact-checking programme, YouTube barely has any strong policies against disinformation.

“I think with the Marcos campaign, they knew Facebook was a battleground, they deployed all their efforts there as well, but they knew they had to win YouTube. Because that’s where we can build more sophisticated lies and convoluted narratives than on Facebook,” Gaw said.

YouTube’s unclear policies allow lies to thrive
A study by FEU technical consultant Justin Muyot found that Marcos had the highest number of estimated “alternative videos” — those produced by content creators — on YouTube. These videos aimed to shame candidates critical of Marcos and his supporters, endear Marcos to the public, and sow discord between the other presidential candidates.

YouTube is also where hyperpartisan channels thrive by posing as news channels. These were found to be in one major community that includes SMNI and the People’s Television Network.

This legitimises them as a “surrogate to journalistic reporting”.

“That’s why you’re able to sell historical disinformation, you’re able to [have] false narratives about the achievements of the Marcoses, or Bongbong Marcos in particular. You’re able to launch counterattacks to criticisms of Marcos in a very coherent and coordinated way because you’re able to have that space, time, and the immersion required to buy into these narratives,” Gaw said.

Apart from YouTube, Gaw said that Marcos had a “more clear understanding of a cross-platform strategy” across social media.

On Twitter, freshly-made accounts were set up to trend pro-Marcos hashtags. The platform later suspended over 300 accounts from the Marcos supporter base for violating its platform manipulation and spam policy.

Ruining Robredo was a ‘coordinated effort’
Duterte and Marcos had a common target over the years: Robredo. She is another female who was constantly undermined by Duterte, along with Leila de Lima, a victim of character assassination who continues to suffer jail time because of it.

“It has been a coordinated effort of Duterte and Marcos to really undermine her, reap or cultivate hatred against her for whatever reason and to actually attach her to people and parties or groups who have political baggage, for example LP (Liberal Party) even if she’s not running for LP,” Gaw said.

The meta-partisan “news” ecosystem on YouTube, studied by researchers of the Philippine Media Monitoring Laboratory, was found to deliver propaganda using audio-visual and textual cues traditionally associated with broadcast news media.

They revealed patterns of “extreme bias and fabricated information,” repeating falsehoods that, among others, enforce negative views on Robredo’s ties with the Liberal Party and those that make her seem stupid.

Rappler found that the top misogynistic attack words used against Robredo on Facebook posts are “bobo,” “tanga,” “boba,” and “madumb,” all labeling her as stupid.

Fact-checking initiative Tsek.PH also found Robredo to be the top victim of disinformation based on their fact checks done in January 2022.

“By building years and years of lies and basically giving her, manufacturing her political baggage along the way, that made her campaign in [2022] very hard to win, very hard to convert new people because there’s already ambivalence against her,” Gaw said.

Arugay and Gaw both said that the media, academe, and civil society failed to act until it was too late. “The election result and [and where the] political landscape is at now is a product of that neglect,” Gaw said.

There is still a lack of a systemic approach on how to engage with disinformation, said Gaw, since much of it is still untraceable and underground. To add, Arugay said tech companies are to blame for their nature of prioritising profit.

“Just like in 2016, the disinformation network and architecture responsible for the 2022 electoral victory of Marcos Jr. will not die down. They will not fade.

“They will not wither away. They will just transition because the point is no longer to get him elected, the point is for him to govern or make sure that he is protected while in power,” Arugay said.

When the new administration comes in, it will be the public’s responsibility to hold elected officials accountable. But if this strategy — instilled by Duterte’s administration and continued by Marcos — continues, crucifying critics on social media and in real life, blaming past administrations and the opposition for the poor state of the country, and concocting narratives to fool Filipinos, what will reality in the Philippines look like down the line?

Loreben Tuquero is a journalist for Rappler. Republished with permission.

Migrants and overseas Filipinos in Aotearoa New Zealand today called on the governments of both Australia and New Zealand to halt all military and security aid to the Philippines in protest over last month’s “fraudulent” general election.

At simultaneous meetings in Auckland and Wellington, a new broad coalition of social justice and community campaigners endorsed a statement pledging: “Never forget, never again martial law!”

“Bongbong” Marcos Jr, the son of the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr, was elected President in a landslide ballot on May 9 and will take office at the end of this month.

• READ MORE: How Marcos could control hunt for his family’s wealth as president
• Marcos Jr’s camp still evades issue of unpaid estate tax
• Robredo is number one victim of red-tagging, says ex-AFP spokesperson
• Other Philippine election reports

His father ruled the Philippines with draconian leadership — including 14 years of martial law — between 1965 and 1986 until he was ousted by a People Power uprising.

Marcos Jr – along with his mother Imelda – has long tried to thwart efforts to recover billions of dollars plundered during his father’s autocratic rule.

“Police and military forces should be investigated for their participation in red-tagging, illegal arrests on trumped up charges, extrajudicial killings, and all forms of human rights abuses,” the statement said.

“We call on the International Criminal Court to pursue investigation and trial of outgoing President Rodrigo Duterte for massive human rights breaches in its drug war and systematic attacks against political activists, human rights advocates and anti-corruption crusaders.”

Call for ‘transparent government’
The statement called for “transparent government” and for all public funds to be accounted for.

“We specifically call for realignment of the national budget in favour of covid aid, public health and social services instead of wasting billions for the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) and other government machineries that aim to suppress critics of its corruption and human rights abuses.”

The statement urged the “dismantling” of NTF-ELCAC.

The Supreme Court of the Philippines was called on to “act on the petitions lodged by various persons and groups regarding the disqualification of Ferdinand Marcos Jr to run for office due to his conviction” for tax evasion.

The Bureau of Internal Revenue has confirmed that the court-ordered Marcos family’s tax bill remains unpaid and news reports say this is estimated to now total about 23 billion pesos (NZ$670 million).

The statement called on the Department of Justice and Supreme Court to provide for immediate and unconditional release of the unjustly jailed Senator Leila de Lima — an outspoken critic of Duterte — “following the recantation of the testimonies of three key witnesses”, and also freedom for more than 700 political prisoners “languishing in jail on trumped-up charges”.

The gathered Filipino community also sought an official Day of Remembrance and Tribute for all the victims of Marcos dictatorship to mark the 50th year commemoration of the declaration of martial law on 21 September 2022.

‘Truth army’ to monitor social media
“We call on all Filipinos to remain vigilant as a truth army, to tirelessly monitor and report social media platforms in serious breach of community standards, and to push for stronger laws in place for disinformation to be punished,” the statement said.

Filipinos in the two cities — Auckland and Wellington — pledged support for the Angat Buhay cause of defending Philippines “history, truth and democracy”.

Speakers included Filipino trade unionist Dennis Maga; Mikee Santos of Migrante Aotearoa; 1Sambayan Aotearoa convenor Romy Udanga; and speaking by Zoom from Manila, Senate candidate Luke Espiritu, who said the new Marcos regime would be able to achieve virtual “martial law” without declaring it.

“All Marcos needs to do is suppress dissent, and he has all the sophisticated technology available to do this that his father never had,” Espiritu said.

Northland Kakampink coordinator Faye Bañares said the new Angat Buhay NGO should not take over the responsibility of providing for the poor in the community, although the aim is to help them.

“The NGO should push the Philippine government to face their responsibility and be transparent about what they do,” she said.

Many speakers told how shocked they were in the general election over a “massive breakdown of vote counting machines and voter disenfranchisement” and the “incredibly rapid count of COMELEC transparency servers” to award the “unbelievable final tally” of 31 million votes in favour of Ferdinand Marcos Jr as president and Rodrigo Duterte’s daughter Sara as vice-president.

Social media troll farms
Denouncing the social media troll farms, the meeting critics said “all the worst lies, disinformation and red-tagging were committed against [outgoing vice-president] Leni Robredo, opposition candidates and parties who stood up against [Rodrigo] Duterte and the Marcos-Duterte tandem.”

In November 2021, the Philippines and New Zealand agreed to boost maritime security cooperation during the 6th Philippines-New Zealand Foreign Ministry Consultations hosted by the Philippines.

Both sides acknowledged the growing breadth and depth of Philippines-New Zealand bilateral cooperation, particularly in the areas of defence and security, health, trade and investments, development cooperation, people-to-people and cultural engagements.

Trade between both countries is worth about trade in goods and services is worth about NZ$1.15 billion.

Former political prisoner Cristina Bawagan still has the dress she wore the day she was arrested, tortured and sexually abused by soldiers during the late Philippines dictator Ferdinand Marcos’s brutal era of martial law.

Bawagan fears the horrors of Marcos’s rule would be diminished if his namesake son wins the presidency in Monday’s election, a victory that would cap a three-decade political fightback for a family driven out in a 1986 “people power” uprising.

Also known as “Bongbong”, Marcos Jr has benefited from what some political analysts describe as a decades-long public relations effort to alter perceptions of his family, accused of living lavishly at the helm of one of Asia’s most notorious kleptocracies.

• READ MORE: Other Philippines election reports
• More pictures from the NZ Kakampink rally for democracy today

As Philippine president, Marcos could control hunt for his family’s wealth

Rivals of the family say the presidential run is an attempt to rewrite history, and change a narrative of corruption and authoritarianism associated with his father’s era.

“This election is not just a fight for elected positions. It is also a fight against disinformation, fake news, and historical revisionism,” Vice-President Leni Robredo, Marcos’s main rival in the presidential race, told supporters in March.

TSEK.PH, a fact-checking initiative for the May 9 vote, reported that it had debunked scores of martial law-related disinformation it said was used to rehabilitate, erase or burnish the discreditable record of Marcos Sr.

No reply to questions
Marcos Jr.’s camp did not reply to written requests for comment on Bawagan’s story.

Marcos Jr., who last week called his late father a “political genius”, has previously denied claims of spreading misinformation and his spokesperson has said Marcos does not engage in negative campaigning.

Bawagan, 67, said martial law victims like her needed to share their stories to counter the portrayal of the elder Marcos’s regime as a peaceful, golden age for the Southeast Asian country.

“It is very important they see primary evidence that it really happened,” said Bawagan while showing the printed dress which had a tear below the neckline where her torturer passed a blade across her chest and fondled her breasts.

The elder Marcos ruled for two decades from 1965, almost half of it under martial law.

During that time, 70,000 people were imprisoned, 34,000 were tortured, and 3240 were killed, according to figures from Amnesty International — figures which Marcos Jr. questioned in a January interview.

Bawagan, an activist, was arrested on 27 May 1981 by soldiers in the province of Nueva Ecija for alleged subversion and brought to a “safehouse” where she was beaten as they tried to extract a confession from her.

“I would receive slaps on my face every time they were not satisfied with my answers and that was all the time,” Bawagan said. “They hit strongly at my thighs and clapped my ears. They tore my duster (dress) and fondled my breasts.”

“The hardest thing was when they put an object in my vagina. That was the worst part of it and all throughout I was screaming. No one seemed to hear,” said Bawagan, a mother of two.

‘No arrests’
In a conversation with Marcos Jr. that appeared on YouTube in 2018, Juan Ponce Enrile, who served as the late dictator’s defence minister, said not one person was arrested for their political and religious views, or for criticising the elder Marcos.

However, more than 11,000 victims of state brutality during Martial Law later received reparations using millions from Marcos’s Swiss bank deposits, part of the billions the family siphoned off from the country’s coffers that were recovered by the Philippine government.

Among them was Felix Dalisay, who was detained for 17 months from August 1973 after he was beaten and tortured by soldiers trying to force him to inform on other activists, causing him to suffer hearing loss.

“They kicked me even before I boarded the military jeep so I fell and hit my face on the ground,” Dalisay said, showing a scar on his right eye as he recounted the day he was arrested.

When they reached the military headquarters, Dalisay said he was brought to an interrogation room, where soldiers repeatedly clapped his ears, kicked and hit him, sometimes with a butt of a rifle, during questioning.

“They started by inserting bullets used in a .45 calibre gun between my fingers and they would squeeze my hand. That really hurt. If they were not satisfied with my answers, they would hit me,” Dalisay pointing to different parts of his body.

The return of a Marcos to the country’s seat of power is unthinkable for Dalisay, who turned 70 this month.

“Our blood is boiling at that thought,” said Dalisay.

“Marcos Sr declared martial law then they will say nobody was arrested, and tortured? We are here speaking while we are still alive.”

Republished with permission from Rappler.

The military’s brutality is a daily reality for all the people of Myanmar. As Myanmar’s army prepares to deploy and reinforce its bases with hundreds of extra troops, the country’s media workers remain exposed to Covid-19 and under extreme threat, writes Phil Thornton.

Myanmar’s military leaders used its armed forces to launch its coup and take control of the country from its elected government on 1 February 2021. In protest, millions of people took to the streets.

The military responded to these protests by sending armed soldiers and police into residential areas to arrest defiant civilians, workers, students, doctors and nurses.

In March, martial law was enforced in Yangon, snipers were used, and protesters were shot on sight.

• READ MORE: Other Myanmar coup articles

To restrict news coverage of their crimes and to impede the organisatiojn of protests, the military ordered telecommunication companies to restrict internet and mobile phone coverage. Independent media outlets had their licences withdrawn, offices were raided and trashed.

Journalists were targeted and hunted by soldiers and police. Obscure laws were added to the penal code and used to restrict freedom of speech and expression. State-controlled media published pages of arrest warrants and photographs of the wanted, including journalists.

To avoid arrest, independent journalists went underground or sought refuge with border based ethnic armed organisations.

Myanmar journalists are well aware that being “arrested” and held in detention by the military doesn’t come with respect for their legal or human rights. The military uses a wide range of obscure laws, some dating back to colonial times, to detain, intimidate and silence its critics — academics, medics, journalists, students and workers.

95 journalists arrested
Independent website, Reporting ASEAN, recorded that, as of August 18, 95 journalists had been arrested and 42 were being held in detention.

The Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP) estimated by August 29 that the military has now killed at least 1026 people, arrested 7627, issued warrants for 1984 and are still holding 6025 in detention.

They want names
Those arrested are taken to interrogation centres and held indefinitely without contact with family or legal representation. Torture is used to extort names and contacts from the detained to be added to the military’s long list of those to be hunted down and suppressed into silence.

One of those names on the military’s wanted list is that of journalist Nyan Linn Htet, now in hiding, after a warrant under Section 505 (a) was issued for his arrest.

Nyan Linn Htet, managing editor of Mekong News, in an interview with the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) explains the impact of being hunted has had on both him and his family.

“If I’m arrested it means I lose everything. When we had to run and go into hiding, we lost our home and our possessions. You lose your income. Your equipment. You never feel safe when hiding. Living like this affects all of us. If the military does not find me, they will pressure and threaten my family with arrest.”

Nyan Linn Htet said he is still working despite the risk of arrest.

“Losing a journalist is a big loss for our struggle for democracy. We’re only doing our job as reporters, but our news coverage exposes the military and its abuses – this is why we’re the enemy.”

Despite the danger to him and his family, Nyan Linn Htet worries about the safety of those who helped him avoid arrest.

‘Caught in hiding’
“If I’m caught in hiding, the SAC (military-appointed State Administration Council) will persecute the people who gave me a place to live. I’m afraid they [the military] will arrest those who helped me.”

His fears are well founded.

Journalist and political analyst Sithu Aung Myint was high on the military’s wanted list for his political commentary and published opposition to the coup.

On Sunday, August 15, the military raided the home of his colleague, BBC freelance producer, Htet Htet Khine, and arrested both of them.

A week later, in its Sunday, August 21, edition, the military-run newspaper, Global New Light of Myanmar, said Sithu Aung Myint had been charged with sedition, spreading “fake news” and being critical of the military coup leaders and its State Administration Council under Sections 505 (a) and 124 (a) of the Penal Code.

He could be sentenced to life in jail under Section 124 (a) of the penal code.

Htet Htet Khine was arrested for giving shelter to Sithu Aung Myint, and charged under section 17(1) of the Unlawful Association Act for working with the recently formed National Union Government’s radio station, Federal FM.

Held in interrogation centre
Friends and colleagues of Sithu Aung Myint and Htet Htet Khine told IFJ they are concerned both journalists were held at an interrogation centre for more than a week before having access to either legal help or contact with colleagues or family.

Nyan Linn Htet told IFJ he is aware his legal and human rights will not be respected if he is arrested.

“They will not let us get legal help until they’ve got what they want from us. The military amended 505 (a) of the Penal Code to prevent giving us bail. We know they will jail us even if we have legal representation.

“We know SAC is torturing journalists because of the work we do.”

Reports by local and international humanitarian groups have detailed the severe beatings — hours of maintaining stressed positions, use of sexual violence — and killing of people while held in detention.

Nyan Linn Htet said if arrested, he knows it will come with beatings. He admits that the thought of being tortured keeps him awake at night.

“They will jail me, but only after they torture me. I will not be released until I sign a statement that I will never criticise them. I’m not afraid of being arrested, but torture scares me. There are nights when I’m too afraid to sleep.”

International media drop Myanmar
He and other local journalists told the IFJ it was disappointing that international media has dropped Myanmar from its news agenda and moved on to cover other stories.

Nyan Linn Htets said despite access difficulties, the international media can use local reporters who are willing to help.

“We know the difficulties media has getting ground access to Myanmar. Covid-19 restrictions also make it impossible to legally cross borders from neighboring countries, but we are already here in the country and are capable of doing the job.”

Despite the fear of arrest and torture, he is still reporting and urged local journalists to keep doing the same.

“It’s important we use what we can to still work and report news events of interest to people. People are accessing news and information in many different ways now.”

The military, while trashing local and international laws and ignoring its constitution, is quick to use and amend laws to jail its opponents for being critical of the coup and for reporting military violence, abuse and corruption.

We have no rights
Nan Paw Gay, editor-in-chief at the Karen Information Center, says the military council has no respect for journalists or their right to publish information in the public interest.

“There is no freedom of the press. If journalists try to report news or seek information from the military’s opponents — CRPH, NUG, CDM, G-Z and PDF — the State Administration Council prosecutes them under Section 17/1 of the Illegal Association Act.

“Since the military launched its coup, sources we use have had their freedom of speech and expression made illegal and they now risk arrest for talking to us and… we can be arrested for speaking with them.

“Independent media groups have been outlawed and totally lost their right to speak freely or write about news events.”

Nan Paw Gay points out if journalists are “critical of the military, its appointed State Administration Council or its lack of a public health plan to tackle the covid-19 pandemic now ravaging the country, section 505 (a) is used to arrest journalists for spreading false news.”

Essentially torture is used to terrorise journalists, he says.

“When the military council arrests and detains journalists, the torture is both physical and psychological. Even before being detained threats are issued and then during the arrest the violence becomes real – shootings, people being kicked and dragged from homes by their hair and beaten.”

Women journalists tortured
Nan Paw Gay says women journalists are more likely to be “tortured using psychological abuse – kept in a dark room and constantly told that they will be killed tomorrow – to mess and generate fear with their thoughts. You can see the effects of the tortured on some journalists when they appear in court – shaking hands and body spasms.”

Military brutality is a daily reality for Myanmar’s people. At the time of writing, the army is preparing to deploy and reinforce its bases with hundreds of extra troops into areas of the Karen National Union-controlled territory and where anti-coup protesters, striking doctors and politicians have been offered refuge and safety.

A senior ethnic Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA) soldier told the IFJ that army drones and helicopters have been surveying the area in recent months.

“We know they’ve sent munitions and large troop numbers to our area… last time we had drones flying over our area, they later attacked villages and our positions with airstrikes. They’re already fighting in our Brigade 5 and 1 and have started in 6 and 2.”

Since the military launched its coup on February 1, there has been at least 500 armed battles between the KNU and the military regime and 70,000 Karen civilians have been displaced and are hiding in makeshift camps as a direct result of these attacks.

Fighter jets have flown into Karen National Union-controlled areas 27 times and dropped at least 47 bombs, killing 14 civilians and wounding 28.

Naw K’nyaw Paw, general secretary of the Karen Women Organisation, in an interview with Karen News, said villagers displaced by the Myanmar Army attacks are now in desperate need of humanitarian aid.

‘Shoot at villagers’
“They shoot at villagers if they see them on their farms, burning down their rice barns and killing the livestock left behind. The Burma Army also arrests people when they see them and use them as human shields to protect them when attacked by Karen soldiers.”

Naw K’nyaw Paw said accessing the displaced villagers is difficult, especially during the wet season.

“The only accessible way in is on foot, supplies have to be carried through jungle. Given the restrictions due to covid-19 as well as the increasing Burma Army military operations, villagers are unable to return to their homes and they will need food, clothing and medicine, especially the young and old.”

Nan Paw Gay says the military’s strategy to muzzle the media is a familiar tactic that has been used before.

“Stop international media getting access to conflict areas, shut down independent media, hunt local journalists and when there’s no one to left to report, launch attacks in ethnic regions, displacing thousands of villagers.”

Phil Thornton is a journalist and senior adviser to the International Federation of Journalists in South East Asia. This article was first published by the IFJ Asia-Pacific blog and is republished with the author’s permission. Thornton is also a contributor to Asia Pacific Report.

Indonesia is trying again to “divide and rule my people” by further carving Papua into three new provinces, warns interim president Benny Wenda of the United Liberation Movement of West Papua (ULMWP).

And he says that Jakarta is bringing in another 450 troops in to “violently enforce” its policies.

“Indonesian troops torture and stab our bodies, international corporations slice down our forests and mountains, and now the Indonesian government is trying to divide our unity,” Wenda said in a statement.

• READ MORE: Why Indonesia’s planned new Papuan provinces will cause division and destruction
• Other West Papua reports

“We are not three separate regions – we are West Papuans, one people with one soul and one mission: freedom.

“The people of West Papua have rejected these proposals, part of the renewal of the 2001 ‘Special Autonomy’ legislation.

“Over 600,000 of us have signed a petition rejecting ‘Special Autonomy’. Even the head of the Papuan People’s Assembly, an institution set up by Jakarta, has rejected the sham programme.

Wenda said ‘Special Autonomy’ was “a dead end”.

‘Indonesia has failed the world’
“It is Jakarta’s wish. A referendum and full independence is our wish. Indonesia has failed the world, and failed the people of West Papua,” he said.

To enforce this renewal of Special Autonomy, even more Indonesian troops were flooding into West Papua – 450 in the last month alone.

At least 6000 new troops were sent in 2019 and more than 1000 more in 2020.

“Indonesia is turning our land into a war zone, a martial law colony with military check points on every street corner,” Wenda said.

“Civilian rule in Indonesia is a myth: the military still holds power. Retired generals experienced in genocide in East Timor continue to call the shots.

“Indonesia has done this to us many times before. In 1963, they invaded our land. They held the fraudulent Act of No Choice in 1969, against the desires of all West Papuans.

“At every turn, they have treated us like a colonised people, less than human. We are called monkeys, spat at, forced off our land.”

Papuans rejected Indonesian law
From 1 December 2020, Papuans had rejected all Indonesian law and formed the ULMWP Provisional Government.

“We are no longer bowing down to Jakarta’s rule. I call on all my people to unite and refuse all Indonesian law. We are establishing our own sovereign government,” said Wenda.

“As the legitimate representative of the people of West Papua, the provisional government is peacefully demanding the following:

1.The withdrawal of all Indonesian troops from West Papua;
2. An end to all forms of racism and discrimination against Melanesian West Papuans;
3. Immediate access to West Papua for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, in accordance with the call of 83 international states;
4. Cancellation of ‘Special Autonomy’ and an immediate referendum on independence; and
5. For all international states and multinational corporations to cease any and all funding for Jakarta’s ‘Special Autonomy’.”

Wenda saidf the international community must help to force Indonesia to negotiate by withdrawing all support for the “failed ‘Special Autonomy’ project”.

“The world may be banned from seeing what is happening in West Papua. But we can see it,” Wenda said.

And we are going to peacefully continue our long struggle for freedom until the world finally hears our cry.

Teachers and students in the Philippines are angry over the decision to allow military forces to enter the top state university. The 1989 deal was put in place to protect students from the warrantless arrests and constant surveillance by police and military forces that were common during the 1970s era of martial law. Mel Sta Maria at Rappler analyses the crisis.

ANALYSIS: By Mel Sta Maria in Manila

Because of the controversy resulting from the unilateral termination by the Defence Department (DND) of the University of the Philippines (UP) and the DND’s accord limiting the entry of security personnel inside UP, Commission of Higher Education (CHED) chair J. Prospero de Vera was quoted in news reports as saying a “panel of education experts will define the meaning of academic freedom and the role of security forces in the protection of academic freedom and the welfare of students.”

CHED or a “panel of experts” will define academic freedom for the University of the Philippines?

This is the most intrusive, gross, and unconstitutional governmental action that can ever be done in regard to education.

• READ MORE: Philippines ends accord barring state forces from national university
• What you need to know about the 1989 military and campus accord
• WATCH: Philippines ends accord barring army from entering universities

No governmental agency should define how academic freedom should be operationalised in UP and, for that matter, in any educational institution, like Ateneo de Manila University, Far Eastern University, Polytechnic University of the Philippines, De La Salle University, Mindanao State University, University of San Carlos, University of Sto. Tomas, and others.

The 1987 Constitution provides that “academic freedom shall be enjoyed in all institutions of higher learning” (Article 14 Section 5[2]). The operative verb is “shall” – not may, could, or any other discretionary word.

“Shall” is a command which all must observe unqualifiedly. No exact definition was made for a very fundamental reason.

From the constitutional deliberations, Commissioner Adolf Azcuna (who later became a Supreme Court associate justice) said: “Since academic freedom is a dynamic concept, we want to expand the frontiers of freedom, especially in education, therefore, we shall leave it to the court to develop further the parameters of academic freedom.”

The intent of the framers
The intent of the framers was not for the executive department, especially the CHED, to come up with an academic freedom “definition”. The task has been exclusively and particularly given to the Supreme Court “to develop further parameters of academic freedom”.

The reason is so obvious. The executive and Congress are political departments often imbued by temporal, erratic, and slanted motivations. Education cannot be left to these people.

And the Supreme Court did its job by enunciating the pillars of academic freedom. All institutions of higher learning have exclusively the constitutional right to decide on the following:

1. who may teach;
2. what may be taught;
3. how it shall be taught; and who may be admitted to study. (Ateneo de Manila vs. Capulong et. al., GR No. 99327 May 27, 1993).

Significantly, the Supreme Court did not provide any specific definition but only enumerated these 4 pillars so that academic freedom shall truly be expansive and free pursuant to the spirit and aspiration of the constitutional mandate.

For the CHED or any “panel of experts” to make a definition and impose it on UP or other schools will “straightjacket” or constrict academic freedom, opening it up to further so-called qualifications in the future.

If that happens, it will usher in the beginning of more, though gradual, intrusions. I dread the day when the CHED and the DND, on the pretext of “security” reasons, will give outlines or syllabus to teachers for them to teach students – worst, for the CHED or the police to sit in in a class to monitor whether the “right” “patriotic” lessons are properly taught.

State indoctrination
This is state indoctrination. An atmosphere of prior restraint will be created – a repugnant situation.

The Supreme Court’s parameters are enough guidance. There is no need to add anything. Neither is clarification necessary. Let us leave it at that. Let the institutions of higher learning principally decide what kind of atmosphere their education will have.

Justice Frankfurter, the most revered US Supreme Court magistrate on the subject of academic freedom, said: “It is the business of a university to provide that atmosphere which is most conducive to speculations, experiment, and creation.”

And the University of the Philippines, to show fidelity to that “business of a university” to provide the right educational atmosphere to its professors and students, entered into the accord with the DND.

UP grounds are public places which can be entered into by anybody. But, if they can be freely roamed by state agents with ulterior motives to monitor, overtly or clandestinely, UP’s academic community, education will be inhibited. That is not acceptable. The exclusionary nature of the accord therefore was important.

Without it, there will be an atmosphere where professors and students may exhibit uncalled for reservations in their discussions and research, talking and investigating less freely lest they may be mistaken as seditionist or terrorist by state agents roaming around the campus.

This undue self-restraint will destroy that “marketplace of ideas” which an educational institution should be.

What about ‘mistaken incitement’?
What if law or political science professors engage their students to research, debate, defend, or debunk the propriety or the pros and cons of socialism, Marxism, or even liberation theology, and roaming state agents, not experts in these topics, hear the discussions?

It is possible that, mistakenly, these professors may be suspected of inciting students to commit terrorism and then apprehended.

“This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or exercise their revolutionary right to overthrow it.”

That quote is from Abraham Lincoln, one of the greatest United States presidents.

“A revolution, woven in the dim light of mystery, has kept me from you. Another revolution will return me to your arms, bring me back to life.”

This is one of the memorable quotes in El Filibusterismo, written by Jose Rizal.

What if a theatrical play created, written, produced, and directed by students were staged revolving around those statements? State agents without expertise on these matters may suspect these students of fomenting radical ideas and arrest them. The mere thought of such possibilities can restrain free expression, discussion, and analysis.

Accord termination ominous
The termination of the UP-DND accord is ominous especially in the light of the Anti-Terror-Law (ATL), where mere suspicion is the threshold for an arrest based on the vague provisions of the law.

Professors and students can be victimised by the ATL. For instance, government surveillance can be made on any suspected person except that “surveillance, interception, and recording of communications between lawyers and clients, doctors and patients, journalists and their sources, and confidential business correspondence shall not be authorized” (Section 16 of the ATL).

Professors and students are not exempted. Also, while “confidential business correspondence” is exempted, confidential educational correspondence between professors and students are not. These omissions portentously tell volumes on the vulnerability of professors and students.

With the UP-DND accord’s termination and the ATL’s implementation, the lure to control the conscience, the thought process, the learning, the outlook, the discernment of students, may just be too great for unscrupulous state officials to resist. This is disturbing.

Government officials should not tinker with academic freedom. Many Filipinos benefitted from its unadulterated concept. Many more have served the country well, performed their civic duties consistently, and gave hope to future generations.

A definition by a “panel of experts” will not only define for educational institutions what academic freedom is; more dangerously, it will effectively dictate to them what academic freedom is not; what it no longer means. That is destructive and constitutionally abhorrent.

Dr Mel Sta Maria is dean of the Far Eastern University (FEU) Institute of Law in the Philippines. He teaches law at FEU and the Ateneo School of Law, hosts shows on both radio and YouTube, and has authored several books on law, politics, and current events.

Filipinos under 48 today were not yet born when Martial Law was imposed on the Philippines by the late and unlamented dictator Ferdinand E. Marcos in 1972. But even to senior citizens like me, the memories are still crystal clear.

I was living in the province at that time, teaching journalism at Silliman University, Dumaguete City, the first journalism school outside Metro Manila.

I recall vividly that historic day Martial Law was announced – September 23, 1972, a Saturday. Dumaguete City woke up early as usual, expecting another of those unruffled, unhurried mornings that this “City of Gentle People” was famous for.

READ MORE: Breaking the news: Silencing the media under Martial Law

Then the six o’clock newscast over DYSR, the popular local radio station at that time located on campus, that hit like a thunderbolt: Martial Law Declared!

This was also the headline that Saturday morning of the local newspaper which my journalism faculty and I published, The Negros Express.

In the face of “anarchy and dissident threat to the existence of the Republic,” according to the newscast, President Ferdinand Marcos had declared martial law on September 21, for the first time in history. But Marcos had delayed the announcement by two days to give him time to round up the opposition leaders and prominent journalists.

Silliman University, thanks to DYSR, got the news ahead of the people in Manila and most parts of the country. DYSR was able to monitor Radio Australia which got its information from one of the international wire agencies in Manila before they were closed down by the military and before DYSR itself was closed down later that day.

Manila mass media were silent
On the morning DYSR monitored the Radio Australia newscast on martial law, the Manila mass media were silent. It was only towards noon that the government radio and television stations in Manila—the Voice of the Philippines (VOP, operated by the National Media Production Centre) and the stations of the Philippine Broadcasting Service—went on air with President Marcos’ Proclamation 1081, read by then Information Secretary Francisco Tatad.

The country was in a state of shock that day, ears glued to radio sets. Shock and disbelief later gave way to fear, as people heard over DZPI and VOP that hundreds of political leaders—led by Liberal Party Senators Benigno Aquino and Jose Diokno, Manila Times publisher Joaquin “Chino” Roces, Manila Chronicle publisher Eugenio Lopez Jr., and Philippines Free Press publisher Teodoro M. Locsin Jr.—were arrested.

When Martial Law was announced on September 23, some faculty members and many students of Dumaguete schools, majority from Silliman, were rounded up by the local Philippine Constabulary (PC) for interrogation and detention. Silliman University offices, like the School of Journalism and Communications and the office of the student paper, the Weekly Sillimanian, were raided by the Philippine Constabulary.

I remember that day very well. Shortly after the announcement, a group of PC officers came to my office, the School of Journalism. My secretary, face ashen white, came to my inner office to say, “Sir, the PC are here.”

I asked the officers what they were looking for. They did not look like they knew, but they were polite, opened a couple of cabinets and left promptly.

The following day, Sunday, the military knocked at the door of the Negros Express editor, Roberto Pontenila. They brought him to the PC stockade. Aside from Pontenila, two faculty and staff members and some 40 students (one of them Dionisio Baseleres, editor of the student paper, ended up in detention for one to six months, no charges filed.

All schools, including Silliman, were closed effective September 23, 1972, and nobody knew when they were going to reopen, if at all. The next few days were tense. No one in Silliman felt safe as the PC continued to pick up people for questioning, and to raid offices for presence of alleged subversive literature.

Students went into hiding
Students went into hiding and faculty and staff were burning whatever books and materials they had that only faintly smelled of subversion. The campus and the city were deathly quiet.

On October 14, President Marcos authorised all schools to reopen except the now infamous four—University of the Philippines units (including its Institute of Mass Communication), the Philippine College of Commerce, the Philippine Science High School and Silliman University.

UP was the centre of student activism in the Philippines. At the height of student activism, the UP activists barricaded the campus and set up a “Diliman Republic” that defied the Metropolitan Police for days.

The president of Philippine College of Commerce (PCC), Dr Nemesio Prudente, was noted for his staunchly nationalistic and radical political views and himself led student activism in his school. The Philippine Science High School was an acknowledged hotbed of activism.

Silliman campus activism had caught the attention of Malacanang Palace no less. President Ferdinand Marcos himself “scolded the university during a speech in Dumaguete, noting that members of the opposition, including Senator Jovito Salonga, Juan Liwag and Benigno Aquino Jr. were invited to speak on campus.”

He warned Silliman University, “do not engage in partisan politics because you are supposed to be an academic institution. You may regret it.”

Did we ever regret it.

‘The plunder of the nation’
“The plunder of the nation began the moment martial law was declared. Unprecedented looting of the country’s natural resources and wealth ensued. Marcos and his cronies exerted a vise over the national economy until it came under their total control. . . Every major economic activity was controlled by the First Family, their relatives, or cronies. This was the start of crony capitalism,” according to Ricardo Manapat in his meticulously researched 615-page book, Some Are Smarter Than Others (1991).

Award-winning American journalist Sterling Seagrave in another well researched 485-page book in 1988, The Marcos Dynasty, added: “Under Martial Law, the Philippines entered a grim period of human rights abuses. A new term, salvaging, came into use to cover the torture, disappearance, and death of ordinary citizens …

“Many of the horror stories were independently corroborated by diplomats, journalists, priests, scholars and international organisations such as Amnesty International. They are a litany of sadism, of dead rats being stuffed in mouths, of electric cattle prods jammed into vaginas, of mashed testicles, and prisoners being forced to eat their own ears.”

So on September 21, we celebrate the 48th anniversary of Martial Law, which the Marcoses would rather forget. But I cannot forget and I hope that the Filipino people will not forget, because he who does not remember his past is condemned to repeat it.

Dr Crispin Maslog is a former journalist with Agence France-Presse and retired journalism professor from Silliman University and UP Los Baños. He is also chair of the board of the Asian Media and Information Centre (AMIC), a research associate of the Pacific Media Centre and on the editorial board of Pacific Journalism Review.

The Catholic professionals group has filed an application in Papua New Guinea’s Supreme Court to intervene in last month’s challenge on the constitutional validity of the National Pandemic Act 2020, reports the PNG Post-Courier.

It has also called on Prime Minister James Marape’s government to repeal the law.

The Catholic Professionals Society (CPS) was opposed to the National Pandemic Act 2020 before its passing on June 12, 2020, to deal with the covid-19 coronavirus crisis calling for wider consultation given the constitutional and human rights implications of the law.

READ MORE: Al Jazeera coronavirus live updates – US caseload tops 6 million

According to president Paul Harricknen, CPS representatives also met with Health Minister Jelta Wong and Pandemic Controller David Manning on June 19, 2020, to express concerns about the law.

Opposition leader Belden Namah filed an application to challenge the constitutionality of the Act in the Supreme Court on August 5, 2020.

“We commend the opposition leader for seeking the Supreme Court interpretation of the law and its implications on “CPS filed its application on August 14, 2020, to intervene in the proceedings and to be heard along with Mr Namah’s application”, Harricknen said on Friday.

Alois Jerewai of Jerewai Lawyers had been engaged to represent CPS in the proceedings.

PM commended for action
“We commend the Prime Minister and his government too for the efforts taken to contain and work to prevent the spread of the covid-19 pandemic,” he said.

However, the NPA in its current form raised serious questions about its constitutional validity.

Harricknen said the law was brought into force and effect on June 17, 2020, under National Gazette No. G358.

“CPS analysis of the law with its lawyers finds it to be unconstitutional in its entirety when among other implications the NPA usurps the powers and functions of the National Parliament and it abrogates and divests the Parliament’s powers and functions to the executive government.

“In doing so, the NPA denies and deprives the Parliament of its powers on Emergencies under Part X of the Constitution (ss. 226-243), has implications on the oversight powers of the Parliamentary Accounts Committee (s. 239), excludes the application of Public Finances (Management) Act 1995, National Procurement Act 2018 and the Audit Act 1989 and impacts on the Constitutional rights and freedoms of people,” Harricknen said.

He said the law had the appearance of “martial law” law and a “police state”.

According to Harricknen, the Act under Section 3(2) extricated itself from the application of the Constitution, which was tantamount to altering the Constitution, contrary to Section 14 of the Constitution.

Defend constitutional supremacy
“The CPS challenge of the constitutional validity of the law is to defend and uphold constitutional supremacy.

“CPS has already written to Minister Wong on August 12, 2020, inviting the government to consider repealing the law,” he said.

He said the letter was copied to the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Justice and Attorney General Davis Steven and the Controller David Manning.

“If the government decides not to repeal the law then the Supreme Court will be asked to proceed to hear and decide on the constitutional validity of the law,” he said.

The Post-Courier did not report any government reaction.

The International Coalition for Human Rights in the Philippines (ICHRP) has strongly condemned the shoot-to-kill order by President Rodrigo Duterte this week as a ‘dangerous’ opening to target and kill anyone in a public space.

“We are raising the alarm in the international community on President Duterte’s directive to kill unruly violators of the coronavirus quarantine,” said coalition president Peter Murphy.

“This pronouncement is a dangerous order that allows authorities to target and kill anyone in a public space.

READ MORE: ‘Shoot them dead’ – Duterte orders troops to kill quarantine violators

“It is also a complete violation of the fundamental rights of Filipinos especially in this time of global pandemic.”

President Duterte addressed the nation hours after incidents of unrest and people massing up for food and relief in the country’s capital.

In his televised speech, his tirade of violent threats included: “I will not hesitate. My orders are sa pulis pati military…na pagka ginulo at nagkaroon ng okasyon na lumaban at ang buhay ninyo ay nalagay sa alanganin—shoot them dead,” (I will not hesitate. My orders to the police and military…if they caused any disorder, and they fight back and your lives are on the line—shoot them dead).

The same day, 21 citizens were arrested for going out of their homes and demanding the relief promised by the national government.

Residents rally for food, aid
Residents of an urban community in the biggest city in Metro Manila staged a rally asking for food and aid amid the government’s lockdown to contain the coronavirus, which in turn has left millions of Filipinos jobless and hungry.

“Our support goes to the poor Filipinos whose only crime is to be hungry and demand what is rightfully theirs,” said Murphy in a statement.

“The right to food and basic social services should be ensured especially in times like these. A video circulating in the social media shows citizens demanding food being violently dispersed by authorities.

“Naintindihan ninyo? Patay. Eh kaysa mag-gulo kayo diyan, eh ‘di ilibing ko na kayo (Do you understand? Dead. Instead of causing trouble, I’ll send you to the grave),” Duterte added in his recorded address.

Recently, the president was given special powers to distribute P200 billion (US$3.9 billion) to more than 18 million poor households. But after a week the aid remains unreleased.

“President Duterte’s criminal negligence coupled with brutal measures to address the pandemic is taking its toll on Filipinos. Millions of informal workers have been displaced and right abuses have been rampant all over the country,” said Murphy.

Enforcing social distancing
“The police and military who have been deployed to enforce social distancing are not trained for this task and have been the very perpetrators of human rights violations,” ICHRP stated.

The authorities have been detaining homeless people, putting curfew violators in cages and using torture methods to punish them, and even arresting citizens over “provoking” posts on social media.

Netizens showed their anger online over the president’s pronouncement to “shoot them dead” and called for him to be ousted. The #OustDuterte hashtag has been trending in the Philippines for two days now.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) states that “measures that limit individual rights and civil liberties must be necessary, reasonable, proportional, equitable, non-discriminatory, and in full compliance with national and international laws.”

• Prioritise lives, not violence, rights groups say
• Rappler’s coronavirus pandemic coverage

The Asia-Pacific Coalition for Human Rights in the Philippines (APCHRP) has condemned a recent spate of killings in Negros and all extrajudicial killings in the Philippines – with the latest happening last week.

Duterte’s plan for Negros has been the subject of speculation in response to the killings in Negros Oriental, where a total of 21 people – many of them farmers – were killed in less than two weeks July 18-27, reports Rappler.

The deaths include a lawyer, a barangay captain, a city councillor, a former mayor, and a one-year-old child.

READ MORE: 15 shot dead in Negros Oriental in 1 week

“We can see the pattern of human rights abuses in the Philippines is similar to the days of martial law under Marcos,” said the coalition in a statement.

People criticising the Duterte government were being branded as supporters or members of the New People’s Army (NPA).

“The pattern of killings and other human rights abuses is prevalent across the whole of the Philippines,” the statement said.

The latest extrajudicial killing happened on August 2 in Antipas, Cotabato, on Mindanao island in the southern Philippines.

Pastor killed
The victim was a pastor of the United Church of Christ in the Philippines (UCCP), Ernesto Estrella, 51, married, a resident of Davao City.

Estrella was visiting his relatives when he was shot point blank by two suspects who were riding on motorcycle.

On August 1, Duterte increased to 5 million pesos  (NZ$400,000) a reward for information leading to people being accused of responsibility for the deaths of four policemen in Negros.

Duterte’s pronouncement “puts anyone at risk of being killed”, said the coalition.

“Anybody could kill several persons, put a gun in their house or property and then claim that the victims are the killers of the four policemen in Negros.

“This will also spark more killings and unrest, which Duterte could use as a basis for declaring martial law in Negros or the whole of the Philippines.

“The Filipinos’ experience of martial law is horrendous. Martial Law is not the answer to the root causes of the armed conflict in the Philippines.”

Reform ‘not bullets’
Filipino farmers were demanding genuine agrarian reform “and not bullets”, the coalition said.

Filipino workers were demanding an increase in wages and an end to contractualisation.

Overseas Filipino workers were demanding job creation so that they were not forced to seek jobs outside the Philippines and away from their families.

“These demands are the core issues being discussed at the Peace Talks between the government of the Philippines (GRP) and the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP).

“But Duterte has killed the Peace Talks just when the substantive agenda on CASER (Comprehensive Agreement on Socio Economic Reforms) was on the negotiating table.

“It is clear that Duterte is on the side of those who refuse to address the root causes of armed conflict in the Philippines,” claimed the coalition.

Then coalition called on the Duterte government to:
• Stop extrajudicial killings
• End repression of human rights workers/defenders
• Lift martial law in Mindanao
• Resume peace talks between the government of the Philippines (GRP) and the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP)

Defence Secretary Delfin Lorenzana said he had so far made no recommendation for martial law, reports Rappler.

“As of now, absent any recommendation from the AFP and PNP forces, intel reports and local government unit recommendation, I am not yet recommending martial law in Negros,” he said.

• President Ferdinand Marcos declared martial law throughout the Philippines between 1972 and 1981 until he was forced into exile by the “people power” revolution in 1986.
• More Philippines stories

By Paterno Esmaquel II in Manila

Protesters have staged the most widespread barrage of protests yesterday against President Rodrigo Duterte, as Filipinos marked the 46th anniversary of the declaration of martial law under dictator Ferdinand Marcos.

A running list by Rappler shows rallies scheduled across 14 regions in the Philippines, including Metro Manila, and even overseas.

The protests come in the face of growing discontent under Duterte – prices of goods have been rising, thousands have died in a drug war that has failed to eradicate drugs, and critical voices such as Senator Antonio Trillanes IV and Australian nun Sister Patricia Fox face threats of either arrest or deportation.

READ MORE: Filipinos remember martial law: ‘Dictatorship is back’

Duterte’s public trust and satisfaction ratings also continue to fall.

Duterte – who earlier said the dictator’s daughter, Ilocos Norte Governor Imee Marcos, donated to his presidential campaign – wants the dictator’s son and namesake, former senator Ferdinand Marcos Jr, to be vice-president so that Marcos can succeed him.

Marcos has a pending protest against the election victory of Vice-President Leni Robredo, leader of the opposition.

Meanwhile, Marcos on Thursday evening, September 20, launched a new campaign to revise history through a “talk show” with former Senator Juan Ponce Enrile, architect and implementer of Martial Law as the elder Marcos’ defence minister.

‘No abuses’ claim
Marcos is selling the idea that no abuses happened under his father’s regime.

Protesters yesterday refused to take this sitting down.

Roads lead to Luneta
In Metro Manila, all roads lead to the iconic Rizal Park, also known as Luneta, for a protest mounted by various groups. Groups marching from San Agustin Church, De La Salle University, University of Santo Tomas, Polytechnic University of the Philippines, and University of the Philippines Diliman, among other assembly points, gathered at Rizal Park to fight the return of a dictatorship.

The Catholic Church, which was instrumental in toppling Marcos in 1986, is one of the groups that helped mount the September 21 rallies.

A Mass for Dignity and Peace was held at San Agustin Church in Intramuros, Manila, yesterday afternoon, followed by a march to Luneta with other religious denominations.

Protesters march from San Agustin Church to Luneta. Video: Rappler

Those who marched to Luneta included people of different political colours, from priests and nuns to leftist groups to Duterte critics such as former chief justice Maria Lourdes Sereno.

Different though they were, protesters had a similar cry: Resist a creeping dictatorship.

Ousted chief justice Sereno speaks at anti-Martial Law rally. Video: Rappler

Sereno was one of the loudest voices in Luneta on Friday.

‘Fighting for justice’
In a raised pitch and with impassioned gestures, Sereno said onstage: “Naghirap kami sa martial law, kaya’t nilalabanan namin, at itinataguyod ang katarungan at katuwiran para hindi na maulit ‘yan. Kaya mga mamamayan, lalong lalo na mga bata: Uulitin po ba natin? Papayagan ba natin ang martial law uli?”

(We suffered during martial law. That’s why we’re fighting for and upholding justice and righteousness to avoid a repeat of that. My fellow citizens, especially children, will we permit martial law to happen again?)

Sereno – who for years kept the “dignified silence” of the Supreme Court until Duterte had her ousted – found herself leading a chant before a crowd on Friday: “Never again to Martial Law!”

Below the stage where speakers like Sereno spoke, a tired Judy Taguiwalo, who marched from Mendiola to Luneta, was seated on a monobloc chair as she granted an interview.

Taguiwalo was an activist whom Duterte named social welfare secretary, only to be rejected by the Commission on Appointments in August 2017.

Taguiwalo, who suffered during the Martial Law years, also said “never again to Martial Law.”

“Nakulong ako sa panahon ng batas militar. Maraming namatay, na-torture,” she recalled. (I was imprisoned during the the period of military rule. Many people died and were tortured.)

Paterno Esmaquel II is a journalist with the online news website Rappler and these multimedia reports are drawn from the Rappler coverage.

• Never again: Martial law stories young people need to hear
• Only ‘death or isolation can stop me’, says Duterte critic Trillanes

Philippine state security forces have repeatedly blocked members of a fact-finding mission investigating human rights violations against peasant farmers and indigenous Lumads in Mindanao.

Since their arrival at the airports in Davao City, Lagindinangan and Butuan City yesterday, all the way to highly-militarised peasant and Lumad communities in Southern Mindanao, Northern Mindanao and the Caraga region, members of the three-team mission have been subjected to different forms of harassment and intimidation.

Suspected soldiers took pictures of the Caraga team members and “welcomed” them with a banner that read “Just do it right” upon their arrival at the airport in Butuan City.

The Southern Mindanao team members saw streamers in Tagum City that read, “OUT NOW IFFSM [International fact-finding Mission]; WE WANT PEACE.”

READ MORE: Manila brands volunteer teachers as ‘terrorists’, say Lumad advocates

Anakpawis Representative Ariel Casilao said the military was behind the streamers.

“The AFP [Armed Forces of the Philippines] has no credibility in talking peace. We thus revise the slogan; instead it should read: AFP OUT NOW; WE WANT PEACE,” he said.

The Northern Mindanao mission team was blocked three times by police and military forces from the airport in Lagindingan to Cagayan de Oro.

From the city to the mission site in Patpat village in Malaybalay, the team was blocked eight more times.

‘No wonder military don’t want us’
Rafael Mariano, former Agrarian Reform Secretary and head of the Northern Mindanao team, said, “We came here for a very urgent reason, we came here to verify mounting reports of rights abuses against peasant and Lumad communities perpetrated allegedly by military elements.

“No wonder the military people don’t want us here.”

President Rodrigo Duterte placed the whole island under martial law on May 24, 2017, after an attack in Marawi City.

Citing “continued threat of terrorism and rebellion,” Duterte asked Congress to extend martial law until December this year. Duterte’s supporters in Congress railroaded the extension.

Seventy-one full battalions of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) are operating in Mindanao, of which 41 are focused on counterinsurgency operations.

The Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) said at least 65 percent of the AFP’s combat troops are concentrated in Mindanao, where large-scale foreign plantations and mining concessions are to be found.

Human rights alliance Karapatan documented 126 victims of political killings as of December 2017, of whom 110 were farmers mostly coming from Mindanao.

In Southern Mindanao alone, 63 cases of extrajudicial killings have been recorded,

‘Bulldozing their way into vast lands’
“The unabated militarisation and Martial Law itself in Mindanao must be understood as a means for government, big landlords, oligarchs and multinational corporations to further bulldoze their way into the vast lands and resources of the island,” Mariano said.

“This is not the way to address the roots of the armed conflict. This is not the way to a just and lasting peace.”

The teams also reported to have been closely tailed by several vehicles from the airport to the orientation sites and to the villages where interviews with victims victims were to be held.

Undeterred, the teams were able to finally proceed to their respective mission areas.

“We managed to get past all the checkpoints so far after seemingly endless negotiations with the state forces but this is only the first day and the day is still long and so we must remain vigilant throughout the rest of the day and the entire duration of the three-day mission,” Mariano said.

Former congressmen Satur Ocampo and Fernando Hicap, and incumbent representatives of the Makabayan bloc, are among the delegates of the International Fact-Finding Mission to Defend Filipino Peasants’ Land and Human Rights Against Militarism and Plunder in Mindanao organised by KMP and the Mindanao for Civil Liberties.

Also joining the mission are the Asian Peasant Coalition, Pesticide Action Network – Asia Pacific, People’s Coalition for Food Sovereignty, Rural Missionaries of the Philippines, International League of Peoples Struggles (ILPS) Commission 6, Youth for Food Sovereignty (YFS), Karapatan, and Tanggol Magsasaka.

In the past two weeks, a group of Lumad educators have visited New Zealand to talk about the human rights violations in education as part of the Save Our Schools programme.

Ronalyn V. Olea is a reporter for Butlalat.

• Gallery: Lumad campaigners appeal for NZ support to defend schools
• ‘There is no legal basis to extend martial law in Mindanao’ – petitioners
• Flashback: A cloud over Bukidnon forestry aid project

Philippine Solicitor-General Jose Calida says nothing – not the Supreme Court (SC) and not even the Constitution – can stop President Rodrigo Duterte and Congress from further extending martial law.

“The Court cannot, in the absence of any express or implied prohibition in the 1987 Constitution, prevent the Congress from granting further extensions of the proclamation or suspension,” Calida said in his 99-page memorandum sent to the Supreme Court yesterday.

Calida said further extensions were possible “for as long as the Congress believes that the invasion or rebellion continues to exist, and the public safety requires it”.

READ MORE: Justice pushes for ‘broader criteria’ for declaring martial law

This is what the House minority bloc warned against.

In their petition seeking to nullify the re-extension of martial law in the southern island of Mindanao to the end of 2018, the lawmakers said the Philippines was heading towards a “martial law in perpetuity.”

Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said there was no need to fear this because the Constitution did not allow a perpetual martial law.

Calida does not share the same opinion.

“The period for which the Congress can extend the proclamation of martial law and suspension of the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus is a matter that the august body can itself define, unshackled by any predetermined length of time, contrary to the petitioners’ erroneous submission,” the Solicitor-General said.

If Calida’s line of argument is to be upheld, Edre Olalia of the National Union of People’s Lawyers (NUPL) said: “Congress can extend martial law until kingdom come and the SC cannot do anything but to genuflect and grovel. Preposterous!”

Supreme Court’s power of judicial review
Calida also insists in his memorandum that extending martial law is not within the Court’s power of judicial review.

“The determination of the length of the extension is a power vested only in the Congress. It involves the exercise of its wisdom. The issue is a political question that judicial review cannot delve into,” Calida said.

But oddly enough, when it came to addressing the fear of a perpetual martial law, Calida changed tone and said one of the constitutional safeguards against abuse of the executive was that the Supreme Court can always step in.

“The extension is subject to judicial scrutiny upon the exercise of any citizen of his or her right to question the sufficiency of its factual basis, as exemplified by the very action now before this Honourable Court,” Calida said.

The paragraph above contradicts Calida’s many statements within the same memorandum that insists SC does not enjoy that power.

For example, one of Calida’s main arguments is that “the extension may not be impugned on the ground of grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction”.

In fact, that argument is contained in his very first pleading to the SC, saying that proclamation is different from extension. SC had already ruled that it has the power to review martial law proclamations.

Political question
Petitioners said that one of the grounds to nullify the extension was that the Congress leadership approved it in undue haste.

In response, Calida said that the Congress’ approval is a perfect example of a political question. The doctrine of political question is invoked when the executive and the legislative resist being reviewed by the judiciary.

“The Congress has full discretionary authority to decide how to go about the debates and the voting. In other words, the issues that the petitioners raise are political and non-justiciable. The questions presented essentially go into the wisdom of the Congressional action,” Calida said.

Calida dedicated 3 pages of his memorandum to stressing that the judiciary cannot interfere in the business of the executive and legislative branches, if the business is a political question.

“This despite the fact that political question limitation has already been debunked and abandoned by Article VIII, Section 1 of the Constitution,” Olalia said.

Olalia was referring to the constitutional power given to the judiciary to review whether the two other branches of government exercised grave abuse of discretion.

A sub-committee at the House of Representatives is proposing to delete that provision once and for all, something that retired Supreme Court justice Vicente Mendoza warned against.

“It needs serious study because deletion of this phrase mght be used to render SC powerless,” Mendoza said.

• Pacific Media Centre reports: President Duterte placed Mindanao and its nearby islands under martial law on 23 May 2017 in response to the Battle of Marawi against Islamic State (ISIL), including Maute and Abu Sayyaf Salafi jihadist groupsNon-Muslim indigenous Lumad people of Mindanao have opposed martial rule and many human rights violations have been recorded by independent human rights organisations.Duterte has threatened to extend martial law across the whole country. The Philippine Congress on 17 December 2017 endorsed Duterte’s request to extend martial law until the end of 2018.
  

Lian Buan is a journalist writing for Rappler.

• Other Philippine reports

President Rodrigo Duterte says he will consider nationwide martial law if the New People’s Army steps up attacks.

When asked if he would expand martial law coverage nationwide, President Duterte said “all options are on the table”.

Speaking to reporters in Taguig City last week, the President said it would be the threat posed by the New People’s Army (NPA) more likely to push him to expand martial law’s geographic coverage.

READ MORE: Duterte thanks Congress for extending martial law in Mindanao

If the NPA – armed wing of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) – intensifies its recruitment of new members and steps up attacks such as they are about to topple the government, Duterte said he would consider nationwide martial law.

“If the NPA say they are recruiting in mass numbers and they create trouble and they are armed and about to destroy government, the government will not wait until the dying days of its existence,” said Duterte.

Ultimately, he said, any decision for him to proclaim martial law across the country is “up to the enemies of the state”.

He stressed, however, that he would listen to the military and police.

“To what extent, what level of atrocities, attacks, it is not for me to say that. It is for the Armed Forces and the police,” said the President.

During the joint session where Congress debated Duterte’s request to extend martial law in Mindanao by one year, Senate Minority Leader Franklin Drilon warned that the President’s recommendation sounds like a “prelude” to nationwide martial law.

Some lawmakers insist there is no legal basis for martial law extension, saying there is no state of rebellion or invasion of Mindanao.

Duterte, however, said frequent ambushes by the NPA and attacks by terrorists prove there is a state of rebellion in Mindanao.

“Count how many died there. Count how many died today all over Mindanao. My police are ambushed everyday, also my military. There is actually rebellion in Mindanao, it’s ongoing,” he said.

Congress voted overwhelmingly in favour of the martial law extension until December 31, 2018.

Pia Ranmada is a journalist for Rappler, the independent Indonesian and Philippines multimedia social action website.

Saying the Philippines needs to wage the long, hard fight against terrorism but cannot do it at the expense of rejecting all that it believes in, the lone dissenter in the Supreme Court ruling upholding the legality of martial law in Mindanao turned to Twitter this week to explain his vote.

Associate Justice Marvic Leonen said: “We all need to fight the long war against terrorism. This needs patience, community participation, precision and a sophisticated strategy that respects rights while at the same time using force decisively at the right time and in the right way.

“The terrorist wins when we suspend all that we believe in. The terrorist wins when we replace social justice with disempowering authoritarianism.”

The Maute Group and other extremists sowing mayhem in Marawi City should be known for what they, terrorists and not rebels with a definable cause, and therefore should be dealt with decisively by state forces – for which, he said, the military and security agencies were fully mandated and equipped to deal with. Martial law was not needed for this, Leonen said.

On Tuesday (July 4), the Supreme Court, voting 11-3-1, upheld the constitutionality of Proclamation 216 imposing martial law in Mindanao for 60 days, to allow the government to quell the Maute Group-led terrorists that laid siege to Marawi City.

Eleven justices upheld the proclamation; three upheld it, but wanted it limited only to Marawi; while one justice – Leonen – dissented.

Parts of Associate Justice Marvic Leonen’s dissenting opinion, as tweeted:
I honour the sacrifices of many by calling our enemy with their proper names: terrorists capable of committing atrocious acts. They are not rebels desirous of a viable political alternative that can be accepted by any of our societies. With their plans disrupted and with their bankrupt fanaticism for a nihilist apocalypse, they are reduced to a fighting force violently trying to escape. They are not a rebel group that can hope to achieve and hold any ground.

History teaches us that to rely on the iron fist of an authoritarian backed up by the police and the military to solve our deep-seated social problems that spawn terrorism is fallacy. The ghost of Marcos’ Martial Law lives within the words of our Constitution and rightly so. That ghost must be exorcised with passion by this Court whenever its resemblance reappears.

Never again should this court allow itself to step aside when the powerful invoke vague powers that feed on fear but could potentially undermine our most cherished rights. Never again should we fall victim to a false narrative that a vague declaration of martial law is good for us no matter the circumstances. We should have the courage to never again clothe authoritarianism in any disguise with the mantle of constitutionality.

We all need to fight the long war against terrorism. This needs patience, community participation, precision and a sophisticated strategy that respects rights while at the same time using force decisively at the right time and in the right way. The terrorist wins when we suspend all that we believe in. The terrorist wins when we replace social justice with disempowering authoritarianism.

We should temper our fears with reason. Otherwise, we succumb to the effects of the weapons of terror. We should dissent – even resist – when offered the farce that Martial Law is necessary because it is only an exclamation point.

For these reasons, I dissent.

Legal powers need
In my view, respondents have failed to show what additional legal powers will be added by Martial Law except perhaps to potentially put on the shoulders of the armed forces of the Philippines the responsibilities and burdens of the entire civilian government over the entire Mindanao region. I know that the Armed Forces of the Philippines to be more professional than this narrative.

With due respect to my colleagues, I cannot join them in their acceptance of the President’s categorisation of the events in Marawi as equivalent to the rebellion mentioned in Article VII Section 18. In conscience, I do not see the situation as providing for the kind of necessity for the imposition of Martial Law in Marawi as well as throughout the entire Philippines.

Rather, I read the situation as amounting to acts of terrorism which should be addressed in a decisive but more precise manner. The military can quell the violence. It can disrupt many of the planned atrocities that may yet to come. It can do so as it had on many occasions in the past with the current legal arsenal that it has.

The words we choose can have violent consequences.

Characterising or labeling events on the basis of the categories that law provides is quintessentially a legal act. It is not a power granted to the President alone even as commander-in-chief. It is the power wielded by this country’s judiciary with finality. Through that power entrusted to us by the sovereign Filipino people, we temper the potentials of force. We ensure the protection of rights which embed our societies values; the same values which the terrorist may want us to deny or destroy.

I acknowledge the hostilities in Marawi and the valiant efforts of our troops to quell the violence. I acknowledge the huge pain and sacrifice suffered by my many of our citizens as they bear the brunt of violent confrontations. I share the suffering of those who, in moments of callous reaction by members of a majority of our society influenced by a postcolonial culture of intolerance, have to live through the stigma of undeserved stereotypes. To be Muslim has never meant complicity with the misguided acts of fanatics who appropriate religion for irrational selfish ends.

We should dissent – even resist – when offered the farce that Martial Law is necessary because it is only an exclamation point.

#dissent

• Full text of lone dissenting opinion
• Lawmakers want report on security

The Philippines must ensure that human rights are respected and protected, following the President Rodrigo Duterte’s declaration of martial law yesterday in the southern island of Mindanao, says Amnesty International.

The authorities must also ensure a clear timetable for an end to martial law, which is now for 60 days, but may be extended by Congress.

Rappler reports that Congress is “unlikely” to revoke martial law.

READ MORE: Duterte says martial law due to ISIS threat

Congress, filled with President Duterte’s allies, has no intention of revoking the Chief Executive’s declaration of martial law, says Senate Majority Leader Vicente Sotto III, who added that Congress need not convene as they have no plans of withdrawing the proclamation.

“We have no intentions of revoking, therefore we need not meet jointly. Wala akong alam (I am not aware) of any intentions to revoke,” Sotto said yesterday in a text message.

Sotto said it was also the same view during the senators’ caucus yesterday.

President Duterte declared martial law in the Philippines island of Mindanao on Tuesday after fighting escalated in Marawi City between government forces and the rebel Maute group, which has pledged allegiance to the so-called Islamic State (IS).

Formed alliance
The group has reportedly formed an alliance with Abu Sayaff leader Isnilon Hapilon, who is also said to be the IS leader of in the Philippines.

Amnesty International said in a statement today that it is gravely concerned that the President had since used his powers to declare a suspension of the writ of habeas corpus.

“The writ of habeas corpus requires a person to be brought before a judge or court especially to secure their release, unless lawful grounds are shown for their detention,” the Amnesty statement said.

“This right is an essential safeguard against arbitrary deprivation of liberty, which under international human rights law is non-derogable, that is, it cannot be denied even in times of emergency.

“President Duterte must therefore repeal this suspension immediately.”

Under international human rights law, including treaties which the Philippines was a party to, the scope of martial law must be limited to the extent strictly required by the exigencies of the situation, said the Amnesty International statement.

This requirement related to the duration, geographical scope and any measures of derogation resorted to because of the emergency.

Call for restraint
Amnesty International also called on security forces to show utmost restraint and fully respect the country’s obligations under international human rights law.

“A state of martial law does not suspend other key human rights, including the right to life, the prohibition of torture and other ill-treatment, and the right to a fair trial,” Amnesty said

“Further, the authorities, including army commanders, must make it clear that military personnel of all ranks will not be exempted from prosecution for human rights violations committed when carrying out their duties.”

In Auckland tonight, Amnesty International Philippines campaigns manager Wilnor Papa said that over the years his organisation had expressed concerns over impunity for violations of international human rights law by Philippine security forces as well as human rights abuses by paramilitaries and militia, in particular in Mindanao.

He addressed a lively discussion about the country’s “war on drugs”, human rights violations and the developments on Mindanao this week.

The discussion themed “On the Frontline” at the University of Auckland was organised by the NZ Centre for Human Rights Law, Policy and Practice at the Auckland Law School, the AUT Law School and Amnesty International Aotearoa New Zealand.

During the decade-long imposition of martial law by former President Ferdinand Marcos in the 1970s, there were tens of thousands of victims of human rights violations, including arbitrary detention, torture, enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings.

• Philippines troops rescue 78 hostages from terrorists in Marawi hospital
• Duterte compares Mindanao martial law with Marcos as hostages taken
• More background

Pacific Media Centre News Desk

The martial law in Mindanao which President Rodrigo Duterte has declared will be no different from martial law during the time of Ferdinand Marcos, the President said before flying back to the Philippines, reports Rappler.

“Martial law is martial law ha. It will not be any different from what the President, Marcos did. I’d be harsh,” said Duterte, Rappler said citing the Facebook live video of Presidential Communications Assistant Secretary Mocha Uson.

He was speaking on board the presidential plane just before it took off for Moscow for Manila.

“I was asked how I would deal with terrorism. I said I’d be harsh. I told everyone, ‘do not force my hand into it,'” he added.

Reports from the Islamic city of Marawi in Lanao del Sur, Mindanao, said about 100 militia from the rebel Maute group had attacked the city and were reportedly holding hostage a priest, a college professor, and at least three other people following the ISIS-linked group’s raids that began yesterday.

Bishop Edwin dela Peña of the Prelature of Marawi revealed this today.

“They were taken hostage to an undisclosed location. We have not heard anything about them,” dela Peña said in an interview with radio dzBB.

Assistant Secretary Mocha Uson did not elaborate on the short video but did mention the likely timeframe of his martial law declaration.

“How long? Well, if it would take a year to do it then we’ll do it. If it’s over in a month I’d be happy,” he said.

The Constitution says it should not initially exceed 60 days – any extension has to be approved by Congress.

Presidential Spokesman Ernesto Abella himself earlier said it would last 60 days.

Section 18, Article VII of the 1987 Philippine Constitution says that the President, as commander-in-chief, may “in case of invasion or rebellion, when the public safety requires it” suspend the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus or place the country under martial law. The writ safeguards individual freedom against arbitrary state action.

Dark period
Duterte is the third Philippines president to declare martial law since 1972, when Marcos declared one – a dark chapter in Philippine history that was marked by abuse, violence and corruption.

On December 5, 2009, then president Gloria Macapagal Arroyo declared martial law in Maguindanao, also in the southern Philippines, through Proclamation 1959, following the massacre of 58 people – mostly members of the media – in the town of Ampatuan.

But it was short. Arroyo lifted it 7 days later on December 12, 2009 upon the recommendation of the Cabinet.

Duterte declared martial law Tuesday night after the Maute terrorist group seized the Islamic city of Marawi.

The Philippines military has been running a two-front anti-terror campaign in Mindanao – one against the Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) based in Western Mindanao in the islands of Sulu and Basilan, and another against the Maute and its Abu Sayyaf allies in the Lanao provinces in Northern Mindanao.

• Timeline for the attacks

Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte has said he would consider declaring martial law if the drug problem deteriorates, adding “no one can stop” him from making such a decision.

“I have to protect the Filipino people. It is my duty. And I tell you now, if I have to declare martial law, I will declare it,” Duterte told a gathering of businessmen in his hometown of Davao at the weekend.

“I don’t care about the Supreme Court. No one can stop me,” he said. “The right to preserve one’s life and my nation … transcends everything else, even the limitations.”

Under the 1987 Constitution of the Philippines, the president can declare martial law up to 60 days “in case of invasion or rebellion”.

The constitution makes no mention of drug violence as a justification for declaring it. Congress and the Supreme Court also have the power to review any such declaration.

But Duterte said that his duty “to preserve the Filipino people, and the youth of this land” is sufficient to suspend the writ of habeas corpus. 

“Not about invasion, insurrection. Not about danger. I will declare martial law to preserve my nation. Period,” he said.

Death toll continues to climb
It is not the first time that Duterte has openly discussed declaring martial law. Last Thursday he said the constitutional provision giving Congress and the Supreme Court power to review martial law declaration needed to be revised.

But he also said earlier in January that he had no plans of declaring martial law, saying it was “nonsense”, adding that it did not improve the lives of Filipinos when it was declared in the past.

In 1972, then President Ferdinand Marcos declared martial law, citing the threat of communist insurgency in the country.

In August of last year, President Duterte was angered when the Chief Justice sent him a letter questioning his decision to release the names of judges accused of links to the illegal drug trade.

“If this will continue and if you will try to stop me, then fine. Would you rather I declare martial law?” Duterte was quoted as saying.

Duterte won the May 2016 presidential election largely on a platform of fighting the illegal drug trade.

As of mid-December, less than six months into his presidency, more than 6000 people have been killed as part of that war on drugs. Dozens more have been reported killed since January 1, 2017.

Report from Al Jazeera English.

• Rodrigo Duterte – I once threw a man from a helicopter
• Philippines president Duterte marks six months in office – video

John Miller (1929-2016) died in Christchurch in November, aged 87. John and Leonida (Leony) have been members of the Philippines Solidarity Network of Aotearoa (PSNA) since 1994 (PSNA hasn’t published a newsletter since 2009, so we count anyone who was a member in 2009 as being a current member).

As Jim Consedine explained in his obituary for the Catholic Worker publication The Common Good, John Miller visited the Philippines in 1983, when it was being ground under the heel of the Marcos martial law dictatorship.

He married Leony, returned to New Zealand, and their daughter Cory was named after Cory Aquino, who became President when the world famous People Power movement swept the Marcos regime out of power and out of the country in 1986.

John remained passionately interested in the Philippines for the rest of his life and he always attended Christchurch public meetings addressed by Filipino speakers that PSNA toured through NZ on a regular basis.

The photo of John that accompanies this obituary was on his funeral programme. He was wearing a “Free All Political Prisoners” T shirt and it bore the names of the major human rights group Karapatan, and of SELDA, the group representing the victims and families of the Marcos martial law dictatorship.

I suspect he probably got it during PSNA’s 2004 NZ speaking tour by Marie Hilao-Enriquez, a leader of both Karapatan and SELDA and herself a martial law detainee.

Political prisoners
Unfortunately, neither political prisoners nor the vile Marcos family are consigned to the past in today’s Philippines.

They are both very much front and centre under the new President, Rodrigo Duterte.

This other photo was taken just last weekend by my wife Becky, who is currently in Manila on her annual Christmas visit to her family. It was taken at a rally to protest against this month’s burial of Ferdinand Marcos (who has been dead since 1989) in the National Heroes Cemetery in Manila.

The shirtless young man (a stranger to Becky, who took the photo) has names written on his back. They are of victims of the Marcos martial law dictatorship.

The top one says “Liliosa” – Liliosa Hilao, who was the most high profile female murder victim of that regime (in the early 1970s).

Liliosa was Becky’s maternal aunt and Marie Hilao-Enriquez’s sister. This stuff is still very current in the Philippines – it has never been resolved.

Anti-Bases Campaign
I also knew John in another capacity. Although he was never a member of the Anti-Bases Campaign, he came on ABC’s Waihopai spy base protests more than once.

He came with the Christchurch Catholic Worker contingent. ABC, although an avowedly secular group, has had a long and productive working relationship with Catholic Worker.

Three of its North Island members – Adrian Leason, Peter Murnane and Sam Land – were the famous Domebusters, who deflated one of the spy base’s domes in 2008 and were acquitted of all charges by a jury.

They are the stars of the excellent current documentary The 5th Eye. (If you haven’t seen it yet, join us at the upcoming Waihopai spy base protest. We’re showing it in Blenheim on January 28).

John was already an old man when he came on the Waihopai protests but he burned with youthful passion whenever he spoke there and even more so when he recited one of his own poems (Jim Consedine, who co-presided at John’s ecumenical funeral, jokingly said: “John had 400,000 poems”).

His whole demeanour and tone of voice changed when he launched forth – he became an orator, with a declamatory tone.

To mention John without mentioning religion is like mentioning Christchurch without mentioning earthquakes. It was central to his being.

Evangelical enthusiasm
His funeral was a Catholic/Methodist joint production (definitely a first for Becky and me and, I suspect, for a lot of the others attending). In her eulogy, Cory said she asked him once: “Dad, what do you do for fun? Dad replied “I go to church”.

“But what do you for fun, Dad?” Dad replied: “I pray”. At that point, Cory said, she gave up.

John was a passionate Christian pacifist and a man with great evangelical enthusiasm.

He was a neighbour of ours, living in the next street, and would regularly turn up unannounced (his record was five times in one day) to tell me about something he’d just read in the radical Christian press or to generally share the Good News.

As a friend said: “John doesn’t do small talk”. He regularly tried, and failed, to get me along to one of the various churches he regularly attended. (I’m a long lapsed Anglican and Presbyterian, married to a long lapsed Catholic).

At times he could be a nuisance (it is not an easy road being an unapologetically public religious practitioner in a heavily secular society), but his motives and commitment to peace and a truly radical Christianity could never be doubted.

I’ve met plenty of other Biblebashers, too many of them on my own doorstep, but John was one with a difference, he was a progressive Biblebasher, albeit one with a striking resemblance to an Old Testament prophet.

He and I were on the same side.

Rest in peace, you zealot for peace. My deepest condolences to Leony and Cory (whom I’ve known since she was a child).

Murray Horton is a social justice campaigner, organiser of the Anti-Bases Coalition (ABC) and Campaign Against Foreign Control (CAFCA), and a stalwart of the Philippines Solidarity Network of Aotearoa.

Communications professor Crispin C. Maslog has made a series of warnings about “Martial Law amnesia” in the Philippines in newspaper columns and now in a television programme, Balitanghali.

His latest criticisms in the programme titled “Deklarasyon ng Martial Law” (Declaration of Martial Law) are of the period 1972 to 1981 when many human rights violations were carried out after dictator Ferdinand Marcos declared Martial Law on 21 September 1972.

Marcos was ousted by a peaceful Filipino “People Power” mass revolution that began in 1983 and ended in 1986.

Some critics draw parallels with the presidency of Rodrigo Duterte, less than three months into a six-year term of office.

Balitanghali is the daily noontime newscast of GMA News TV anchored by Raffy Tima and Connie Sison.

Dr Maslog is a former journalist with Agence France-Presse and communication professor at Silliman University and University of the Philippines Los Baños.

He writes widely on media issues and contributes columns to Asia Pacific Report.

The interview is bilingual in Tagalog and English.

For more videos from Balitanghali, visit www.gmanetwork.com/balitanghali.

• A love-hate relationship with President Duterte
• Philippines president’s ‘hit man’ allegations
  

“Moving on without justice being served is not moving on—it’s giving up.”

This was the reminder of University of the Philippines professor and anti-Martial Law advocate Professor Crispin Maslog to University of Santo Tomas journalism students and faculty in a public forum held in Metro Manila at the weekend.

Dr Maslog, a former publisher of a weekly newspaper in Dumaguete that was closed down due to Martial Law between 1972 and 1981, urged millennials to open their eyes to the damages to the mass media the Marcos era had brought, even though they were not yet born at the time it happened.

“People without the knowledge of their past history, origin, and culture [are] like [trees] without roots,” Dr Maslog said, quoting Jamaican political leader and journalist Marcus Garvey.

“The mass media became very critical and Marcos clamped down on the mass media with his military forces,” he said.

“There were the years of protest, social unrest…The youth were taking to this stage to rally against corruption, that’s an old issue.”

Protesters and journalists were beaten and students were tortured, went missing, or found dead, Maslog added, citing Ricardo Manapat’s book on Martial Law.

The chairman of the Manila-based Asian Media Information and Communication Center also slammed the government for its poor education system and the mass media for misleading stories about Martial Law that caused ignorance of the people on the issue.

“It is not the students’ fault. It should be the government and the mass media that should be blamed for misleading information,” Dr Maslog said.

Likewise, Pacific Media Center director Professor David Robie emphasized truth as the core of journalism.

“Journalism is really about truth, any experience of truth, and establishing that truth,” Dr Robie said.

He was speaking about a digital strategy on human rights for journalists and cited the PMC’s own Asia Pacific Report of successful examples of independent campus based media.

Dr Robie added that it was important for journalists to achieve independence in their job of disseminating stories, noting that fact verification through multiple crosschecking and research is a fundamental part of a journalist’s job.

The forum titled Asia-Pacific Journalism for Filipinos Lessons by Seasoned Journalists and Journalism Educators was organised by the Faculty of Arts and Letters Department of Communication and Media Studies in partnership with the Journalism Graduate School, Research Center for Culture, Education and Social Issues-Research Interest Group on Communication.

Dr Robie also ran a workshop on Asia-Pacific reporting.

Maria Eden T. Dino reports for The Flame, official student publication of the University of Santo Tomas’ Faculty of Arts and Letters Department of Communication and Media Studies.

• Martial law amnesia
• Martial law and independent media forum

By a special correspondent in Manila

To mark the 44th anniversary of Martial Law in the Philippines today and to call to mind the atrocities it had inflicted on its victims, thousands of youth and students from across the country have joined street protests as part of the “Youth Action Day for Education, Peace, and Human Rights”.

In a news release, militant youth group Anakbayan said that thousands of university students walked out of their classes to join the protest actions.

Students from various universities in Metro Manila, Baguio City, Pampanga, Laguna, Cebu, Iloilo, Tacloban, Cagayan de Oro, Davao, and other major regional centers walk out of their classes to press their demands for free education, peace talks, and respect for human rights.

“We are here in the streets to urge President Rodrigo Duterte to bring his promised ‘change’ to the education sector by taking decisive actions against tuition hikes,” Anakbayan national chairperson Vencer Crisostomo said.

Among Metro Manila campuses that held walkouts were the Polytechnic University of the Philippines (PUP) main campus in Sta. Mesa, UP Diliman, UP Manila, as well as several private schools in the University Belt in Manila.

The protest action included a caravan, with the assembly point at the University of Santo Tomas area, which was set to proceed to historic Mendiola Bridge near the Malacañan Palace.

Anakbayan condemned the Marcos dictatorship not only for its corruption and human rights violations but also for initiating the deregulation of the education sector resulting in a 5,000-7,000 percent hike in tuition from P700-P2,600 (up to NZ$75) a semester in 1982 to P40,000-80,000 (NZ$1145 – $2290) this year.

Duterte encourages activities
Earlier in the day, Malacañang said that President Duterte encouraged activities to mark the event as long as the protesters won’t cause inconvenience to the public.

“We understand some groups would mark the anniversary through public assembly,” Presidential Communications Secretary Martin Andanar said in a statement.

“The President encourages various activities to commemorate the occasion as long as they are peaceful and no public inconvenience or destruction of properties may ensue,” he added.

Andanar, meanwhile, reminded that September 21 was a regular working day.

At the University of Santo Tomas at the weekend, veteran communications professor Crispin Maslog gave a compelling presentation on “Martial law for the millenials”, showing some highlights of the injustices and atrocities under the dictator Ferdinand Marcos under Martial Law between 1972 and 1981.

He noted that of more than 400 people present, mostly student journalists and faculty, only half a dozen had been alive at the time of Martial Law.

Visiting professor David Robie, director of New Zealand’s Pacific Media Centre, also gave a lecture on a “digital publishing strategy for human rights” featuring Asia Pacific Report.

GMA News Network

• Students urged never to forget Martial Law atrocities
• Crispin Maslog: A love-hate relationship with President Duterte
• Philippines president ‘hit man’s’ allegations

Let me start by saying I was not your best fan during the elections. I normally do not engage in election campaigning as a private citizen—except during the heady days of People Power I in 1986 that toppled martial law—but I was so alarmed by your persona and pronouncements as a candidate that I had to put in my two cents’ worth to campaign against you in social media.

I was scared by the image of a president sitting in Malacañang, mouthing profanities and with his mistress as first lady.

But it seems you were able to connect with people, macho image, tough talk and all. And after your election, you showed your soft side and a hint of humility, weeping at your parents’ tomb and asking for national healing.

Now that the people have spoken, we have to accept the verdict. The voice of the people, as they say, is the voice of God. This is the beauty of a democracy.

Allow me now, as a senior citizen who has voted in nine presidential elections, to offer you my unsolicited opinion on some issues.

Your most controversial campaign promise was to eliminate crime in six months. You and I know, of course, that this will not happen, no matter how many thousands you execute extrajudicially in the first month.

So how will you deal with the people’s disappointment when after six months there will still be criminals in the streets?

Reasonable time
But as a reasonable man, I am willing to give you six years. I think most people will agree that that is a reasonable time to do something about crime. We will not expect miracles in six months, but we will expect a reduction in crime in six years, as you step down from office.

I saw your high school buddy, Jess Dureza, now your appointed adviser on the peace process, reassuring the TV-viewing public on May 25 that most of what you said during the campaign was just election hyperbole and not meant to be taken literally.

I’d like to believe him, not only because Jess has been my friend since he was a young journalist in Davao listening to my lectures on community journalism, but also because I really hope you were not serious about extrajudicial killings and that you will behave in a presidential manner once you assume office.

On the positive side, I like many of the things you said and intend to do during your presidency: Greatly minimise if not eliminate (because it is impossible) graft and corruption especially in the Bureaus of Customs, Internal Revenue, and Correction, and minimise if not eliminate red tape in government at the national and local levels. Push the pace of government, including infrastructure.

I love your plan to push the freedom of information bill through a recalcitrant Congress. And I was delirious when you said you’d tell the telcos to shape up or face competition.

We have to boost our internet speed, which is faster only than the internet speed of Afghanistan! Second slowest in Asia, imagine that!

Re your Cabinet, however, you are just like P-Noy. While he had his KKK—kamag-anak, kabarilan, kaibigan—you have your own kaklase, kaibigan, kainuman.

Trusted people
My point here is that you are entitled to have people you know and trust around you, in much the same way P-Noy did.

But I object to two of your choices: Mark Villar will be a magnet for criticism. His family is engaged in the real estate and construction business. No matter how you or he justifies it, there is conflict of interest because the Department of Public Works and Highways constructs the infrastructure which benefits housing and real estate.

Remember, this was the issue against Mark’s father that made him lose the 2010 presidential election. I hope you will reconsider and avoid controversies that will follow this appointment.

And there’s Salvador Panelo, who in 2014 was hired as defence lawyer of Andal Ampatuan Jr., the alleged mastermind of the infamous Maguindanao massacre. He has been quoted as saying that the Ampatuans were just “framed to seize political power”.

Panelo will be haunted by this case every time he faces members of the media, whose brothers and sisters in arms were victims of the Maguindanao massacre. Why don’t you appoint Dureza as your communication/press secretary and spokesperson instead?

But I admire your appointed Cabinet secretary, Leoncio “Jun” Evasco, who, incidentally, was a neighbor of ours in Maribojoc, Bohol, where I was born.

I also object vehemently to your decision to allow the late unlamented dictator Ferdinand Marcos to be buried in the Libingan ng mga Bayani—the burial ground for heroes, in case you haven’t noticed.

Marcos was not a hero. He was a hated dictator who ruled the Philippines with an iron hand for 14 years, caused the arrest and torture of thousands of our young Filipino patriots, suppressed our free press, destroyed our democratic institutions, and plundered the Philippine economy with the help of his cronies.

More thoughts
There are many more things I want to tell you, President-elect Rody, but space is limited. Here are a few more thoughts.

You don’t have to answer all the questions reporters ask you. They just want to bait you to say something nasty, so they can write a story with a big headline the next day.

Please control your temper. Don’t waste your time and energy insulting the Catholic Church and threatening those who criticise what you do, like Senator-elect Leila de Lima. You have enough enemies already. You will lose your focus on the immense task of governing the country if you are sensitive to criticism.

To quote the great US President, Abraham Lincoln:

“If I were to try… to answer all the attacks made on me, this shop might as well be closed for any other business. I do the very best I know how—the very best I can; and I mean to keep doing so until the end. If the end brings me out all right, what’s said against me won’t amount to anything. If the end brings me out wrong, ten angels swearing I was right would make no difference.”

I wish you all the luck in the world.

Crispin C. Maslog is a former journalist with Agence France-Presse and communication professor at Silliman University and UP Los Baños. This article was first published on the Philippine Daily Inquirer’s online edition. Dr Maslog will be in New Zealand next month speaking at the Fourth World Journalism Education Congress (WJEC) conference.

• Duterte challenged – end human rights violations, say campaigners

While I was grappling with the horrible impositions of Martial Law when I was editor-in-chief of Philippine Panorama, I had to run to some safe, soul-restorative place on weekends outside the city. It was at the home of Cris and his wife scientist, Flor, on the University of the Philippines Los Baños (UPLB) campus that I found comfort and assurance that all will be well, that the tyrant Ferdinand Marcos and his family will be driven away from the land, and that democracy will be restored.

His article should remind us that Martial Law should never happen again – and the

perpetrators not be returned to seats of power. – Domini M. Torrevillas, The Philippine Star

By CRISPIN C. MASLOG in Manila

Somehow, today’s university student generation is not to blame for its Martial Law amnesia. These people were not yet born at the time Martial Law was proclaimed 44 years ago!

We, the older folks, are to blame. We did not teach them history properly – and I mean by we, mainly the Philippine government and the mass media who suffered the most under the Martial Law regime of Ferdinand Marcos.

Now that the surviving members of the Marcos family are active in politics again and pushing a revisionist version of Martial Law history, we are worried, to say the least.

So when I told students at Silliman’s College of Mass Communication recently about the abuses during Martial Law proclaimed by Marcos in 1972, they were aghast at what they heard. I told the group that before Martial Law was proclaimed in 1972, the Philippines went through hard times under Marcos’ two four-year terms from 1965 to 1973 – the years of discontent.

There was a dramatic increase in poverty during Marcos’ two elective terms, resulting in social unrest.

Yet Marcos wanted to extend his term, which he could not do legally because he was limited by the Constitution to two presidential terms ending in 1972. So he decided to suspend the Constitution and declare Martial Law on Sept. 21, 1972.

The first few years under Martial Law were peaceful and orderly. The average person liked that people were disciplined. But people were disciplined because they were afraid.

More corrupt
And soon after 1972, Marcos and his family became more corrupt because no one, especially the mass media, was free to criticise them. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. The next 14 years witnessed corruption unparalleled in Philippine history.

Instead of improving, the Philippine economy took a nosedive during the 14 years of Martial Law because of cronyism and economic plunder. Cronyism was an “economic system” where every major economic activity was controlled by the First Family, their relatives, or cronies.

This phenomenon was documented meticulously by Ricardo Manapat in his 615-page book, Some Are Smarter Than Others: The History of Marcos’ Crony Capitalism (Aletheia Publications, NY, 1991). The New York Times has reviewed the book as “impressively documented”.

Answering criticisms about relatives who became millionaires overnight during Martial Law, Madame Imelda is quoted to have replied: “My dear, there are always people who are just a little faster, more brilliant, more aggressive.”

The Manapat book is based on 11 years of research and writing and is the authoritative source of information on the economic plunder of the Philippines under Marcos. The title of the book is based on a famous quote from Madame Imelda.

The major cronies, as documented in Manapat’s book, were: Roberto Benedicto who controlled the sugar industry, Danding Cojuangco who monopolised the coconut industry, Antonio Floirendo who cornered the banana industry, and Hans Menzi who lorded over the mining and paper industries.

Cronyism meant giving loans to friends that had little or no collateral, whose corporations were undercapitalised. Marcos, family and his cronies used the national coffers, the resources of private banks, and even international loans from multinational banks for their business. Aid money from the US and Japan were placed at the disposal of Marcos’ money-making network.

Squandered loans
Until today we are still paying for these loans squandered by the Marcos regime.

The corruption reached such a massive scale that it took its toll on the Philippine economy and the lives of the average Filipino. By 1986, just before People Power I, the number of Filipinos living below the poverty line doubled from 18 million in 1965 to 35 million.

The history of this economic plunder is one of the blind spots in the minds of the Filipino millenials today.  It worries me and my generation no end, that the son of Ferdinand Marcos is running for vice-president of the land, and be just a heartbeat away from the presidency.

If that happens, philosopher George Santayana may again be proven right when he said long ago that a people who do not remember their past are condemned to repeat it.

Domini M. Torrevillas is a columnist on The Philippine Star. One of her From The Stands columns this month was devoted to this article by Professor Maslog and is republished here with the permission of the author. The Philippines presidential election is due on Monday, May 9.

• Martial Law under Marcos at Rappler

On March 2, 1962, General Ne Win led a coup in Myanmar (then known as Burma) and established a military dictatorship which lasted until 2010.

Slightly more than a decade later, on September 21, 1972, Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos declared martial law which allowed him to remain in power until 1986.

And just a few years before that, on September 30, 1965, a mutiny led to the killing of some generals which provoked the Indonesian military to retaliate by arresting and killing communists and suspected sympathisers of communist groups across the country.

In Myanmar, the Philippines, and Indonesia, these were historic events which made a lasting political impact. For local scholars and activists, these were the days when democracy died in their countries.

The 1962 coup in Burma gave the military absolute power to rule over the whole country. While it didn’t end the ethnic civil wars which are still raging up to this day, it made the junta the most powerful political force in the country.

A student uprising in 1988 challenged the junta but it was violently suppressed. Elections were held in 1990 but the junta ignored the results and arrested leaders of the winning party, the National League for Democracy (NLD).

It was only in 2010 when significant political reforms were instituted which led to the release of political prisoners, the lifting of media censorship, and the holding of an and open and free election.

Major defeat
The military is still influential in the bureaucracy but its party experienced a major defeat in last year’s election, which saw the NLD win a supermajority. Some observers noted that after 54 years, democracy was restored in Myanmar when the NLD assumed control of the government.

While there are various reasons why Myanmar remained an underdeveloped nation in the past half century, many are blaming the “death of democracy” in 1962 as the crucial turning point in the country’s history.

Historian Thant Myint-U, who is also executive director of Yangon Heritage Trust, wrote a Facebook post which quickly became popular about the significance of the 1962 coup. The historian wrote:

“Burma was then one of the better off countries in the region, with a per capita income three times greater than Indonesia, twice that of Thailand and nearly equal to South Korea. Over the coming decades, the Burmese people would receive little in return for having to surrender their basic freedoms.”

This argument is also invoked by pro-democracy forces when they accuse the junta of subverting not only Myanmar’s democracy but also the country’s development.

Interestingly, Filipinos also attribute the country’s lack of development to the brutal reign of a military-backed government. Marcos placed the country under military administration in 1972, purportedly to thwart a communist takeover.

But his political rivals believed it was only a ruse to extend his term which was supposed to end in 1973. During martial law, opposition leaders were detained, media censorship was enforced, and the people’s civil liberties were taken away.

‘Sick man of Asia’
When Marcos was ousted by a peaceful uprising in 1986, the Philippines was already known as the “sick man of Asia” because of widespread poverty in the country. Marcos and his cronies were accused of plundering the nation’s coffers while the majority of Filipinos lived a life of penury.

Marcos declared September 21 as National Thanksgiving Day. But for most Filipinos, it was the day when democracy died in the Philippines. A presidential and legislative election is due this year on May 9.

The events that led to the communist purge in Indonesia are not widely known and discussed because the government is unwilling to determine what really happened during those critical months when almost a million people died across the country. What is clear is that it led to the rise of General Suharto, who went on to rule Indonesia until 1998 when he was ousted.

Suharto is often compared to Marcos because both relied on the military for political support, both were accused of taking part in unprecedented corruption and committing human rights abuses during their term; both were unseated by a mass uprising.

It was only after Suharto’s fall from power when survivors and other witnesses were able to testify about the 1965 mass killings. Indonesia’s democracy suffered during the reign of Suharto and the collapse began during the failed coup attempt on September 30, 1965.

Remembering the day when democracy died proved useful in mobilizing the people to take action in order to expel or challenge the anti-democratic elements in society. It is also an effective information campaign to keep the democratic struggle relevant.

In the case of Myanmar, it sustains the narrative to push the country’s transition to modern democracy. In the Philippines, it is once more a potent political issue because the son of Marcos is running for vice president in the May 2016 elections. In Indonesia, survivors and relatives of the 1965 anti-communist hysteria continue to seek justice and apology from the state.

Ruling parties accused
Elsewhere in the region, civil society groups are accusing the incumbent ruling parties of killing democracy as part of a campaign to build a strong political movement. Thai activists are calling for the restoration of civilian rule after the army grabbed power in May 2014.

In Malaysia, various groups formed a coalition to demand the resignation of Prime Minister Najib Razak who is battling corruption charges. Najib is also accused of stifling the people’s right to free speech.

Democracy has died several times in Southeast Asia and its death has often inspired many people to join forces in order to bring it back to life. At times, it has taken many years and decades before democracy has been restored. But what is important is that the democratic ideal has become the true, unifying goal in the region.

Mong Palatino is a regular blogger and Global Voices regional editor for Southeast Asia and Oceania. This article was first published in The Diplomat and is republished here with permission.

• The Philippines faces presidential and legislative elections on May 9.