(Mindanao Examiner Photo – Mark Navales)
It is 24 months now since the Maguindanao massacre where at least 32 journalists were among 57 people brutally murdered.
Luha at Hustisya: Mindanao Examiner
Dalawang taon na ang nakalipas matapos ng nakapangingilabot na pangyayari – 57 katao ang walang awang pinaslang sa lalawigan ng Maguindanao at 32 sa mga ito ay pawang mga mamamahayag at inosenteng nilalang – at hanggang ngayon ay may isa pang nawawala at hindi matagpuan ang bangkay at maging sa dakong doon ay hustisya pa rin ang hinihingi.
Pinatay sila ng walang kalaban-laban. Brutal na pinaslang sa kabila ng matinding pagmamakaawa – pamilya, anak, ama, ina, kapatid at iba pang mga mahal sa buhay ang kanilang sinasambit hanggang sa huling hininga, ngunit walang bakas ng awa at sa halip ay mistulang mga mababangis na hayup sa kagubatan ang nasa kanilang harapan habang winawasiwas ang mga armas at gulok.
Marami ang nawawalan ng pag-asa sa hustisyang dalawang taon ng minimithi, ngunit sa bawat araw na lumipas ay lalong umiigting ang pagnanasa na makamit ang pag-asa para sa isang bukas na may pangako ng bagong pagsikat ng haring araw at makamtan ang minimithing parusa para sa mga hayup na tumigpas sa pangarap ng mga nasawi at naulila.
Hindi titigil ang midya. Hindi titigil ang mga naulila. Hindi titigil ang mga taong nagmamalasakit. Hindi titigil ang tawag sa hustisya hanggang sa ito’y makamit.
Sa ikalawang taon ng pagdadalamhati at pagdurusa, luha at hinagpis ang nadarama, ngunit ito rin ang apoy na nagsisilbing liwanag sa mahabang daan sa paroroonan.
Hustisya ang tanging hiling para sa lahat! (mindanaoexaminer@gmail.com)
SELF-FULFILLING PROPHECY: Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility
Second year commemoration of the Ampatuan Massacre
Referring to extra judicial killings and the killing of journalists in the Philippines
Despite that pledge, six journalists have been killed since then, or a total of ten since the Ampatuan Massacre of November 23, 2009 claimed the lives of 58 men and women, of whom 32 were journalists and media workers.
In addition to the killings that have continued in the Aquino administration, a number of community journalists have also been threatened, sued for libel on the flimsiest grounds, barred from attending interviews and press conferences, and physically assaulted. In a recent incident, unidentified persons also burned a Catholic Church-owned radio station in Occidental Mindoro. All are indicative of a state of mind among those who want to silence the press that could, in the present circumstances, lead to murder.
And yet, except for increasing the budget of the Witness Protection Program, the Aquino administration has taken almost none of the steps agreed upon in the August, 2010 meeting between media advocacy and journalists’ organizations and his communication group and the department of justice as necessary to stop the killings.
Among these steps were Malacanang support for changes in the rules of court to speed up the judicial process, and the inclusion of media representatives in the formation of Quick Response Teams to immediately investigate the killing of journalists and assure the preservation of evidence in the crime site.
After his pledge in his 2010 SONA to prosecute murderers, Mr. Aquino has been surprisingly silent when it comes to the killing of journalists, despite the possibility that a statement from him each time a journalist is murdered declaring his displeasure over the failure of the police to prevent it, and ordering immediate police action, could prod the police to greater efficiency and warn the would–be killers of journalists that things have changed since the Arroyo regime, and they will now be prosecuted.
Even more meaningfully, Mr. Aquino has also refused to dismantle private armies, despite their role in the November 23 massacre and in a number of other cases of journalists’ murders in other parts of the country.
Only by demonstrating that the killers and would- be killers of journalists can no longer get away with murder can the killings stop, and begin the process of dismantling the culture of impunity. That only ten cases have resulted in convictions since 1986, out of 124 cases of journalists killed for their work, encourages the continuing killing of journalists in the Philippines
That awareness did not prevent the international press, free expression and media advocacy groups from being shocked when the Ampatuan Massacre occurred. They have declared November 23, 2009 the International Day to End Impunity to emphasize the global significance of what happened in the Philippines
And yet, if we’re to judge from his inaction, Mr. Aquino seems to be as unconcerned over the killing of journalists in the Philippines
Speaking at a round table discussion on the Ampatuan Massacre and the Culture of Impunity last November 14, an Assistant Secretary from the Presidential Communication Operations Office (PCOO) declared that “we (the government) can’t really put an end to impunity.”
Is it perhaps that self-fulfilling prophecy, which has already declared the administration’s surrender even before the battle has begun, that’s driving the Aquino administration’s inability and unwillingness to take the steps necessary to dismantle the culture of impunity so as to stop the killings that since 1986 have widowed and orphaned hundreds of Filipinos? (staff@cmfr-phil.org)
A TURNING POINT AND A TEST: Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility
Statement of the Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility (www.cmfr-phil.org) on the second anniversary of the November 23, 2009 Ampatuan Massacre
The international press freedom and media advocacy groups may have designated November 23rd as the International Day to End Impunity. But here in the Philippines, on this, the second anniversary of the foul deed now known as the Ampatuan Massacre, the glacial progress of the trial of those accused of planning and carrying it out has become so much a cause for distress because the possibility that it may drag on for years bodes ill for press freedom, human rights and the quest for justice in Philippine society.
A year ago the pace of the judicial proceedings had already set off alarm bells among journalists’ and media advocacy groups, the kin of those killed, and anyone else who still cared about the future of the free press and democracy in this country.
The Massacre was after all a brutal attack on the free press as an institution necessary in any country with any pretense at democracy, and on the people’s right to choose their leaders. By murdering 58 men and women, among whom were the lawyers, relatives and allies of a candidate for provincial governor, and 32 journalists and media workers, the killers set back press freedom and free elections by so many years, and earned for the country the dubious distinction of being the site, not only of the worst attack on the press in history, but also of a fraudulent democracy.
Both political and media killings have a long and brutal history in this country. Politicians, their allies and their campaign workers are killed so routinely in the Philippines that every election is always declared peaceful, no matter the casualties. On the other hand, the Massacre was a crime waiting to happen. The persistence of warlordism, the antipathy of local tyrants towards the press, and the many weaknesses of the justice system made it inevitable.
The Massacre, however, was also a turning point, and a test of the will and capacity of the Philippine State not only to assure the safety of its citizens, but also of its ability to provide them justice.
The journalists and media advocacy groups knew a year ago, and know it even more now, that unless the Massacre trial is credibly concluded, with the killers and masterminds convicted and sentenced to the prison terms they so richly deserve, not only will the killing of journalists and those of human rights workers, political activists, environmental advocates, judges, lawyers, students, farmers and workers continue; the killings will even escalate.
That distinct possibility makes the Massacre trial so crucial to the life and future of this country. And yet, judging by its laid-back response to, among others, the suggestions for reforms in the rules of court media groups andthe Free Legal Assistance Group of lawyers have proposed, the Philippine government does not seem to be in any hurry to address the urgent concerns—for press freedom, democracy, and the country as a whole—the Massacre has triggered.
This simply won’t do. The Aquino government must not only take the steps necessary to speed up this trial; it must also demonstrate, when journalists are killed, that it has put in place the means to punish the killers and masterminds. To do nothing or little can only lead to more deaths, adding to the six already killed in the line of duty since Mr. Benigno Aquino III took office. (staff@cmfr-phil.org)
STATEMENT on the INTERNATIONAL DAY TO END IMPUNITY: Alliance against Impunity in Mindanao
Today on International Day to End Impunity, we remember the martyred journalists, lawyers, political supporters and mere passersby who were brutally murdered on that fateful day of November 23, 2009.
Today, we continue the call for justice for the victims of the Ampatuan massacre, as we heighten our demand to end the state of impunity that has been characterized by more than a thousand extrajudicial killings, disappearances, and torture.
We have thought that the shock of November 23 would have shamed the Philippine government and its perpetrators in the military, police, and their paramilitary machinery. But apart from using it as an electoral campaign leverage to draw a sharp contrast from Gloria Macapagal Arroyo as the patron of the Ampatuans, the Aquino government emerges today as the same perpetrator of impunity with the countless cases of extrajudicial killings to its credit.
Two years since November 23, 2009, we find ourselves assailing the same impunity that continues against human rights defenders and journalists. There have been at least 55 documented cases of political killings according to records of Karapatan, and 13 media killings according to the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines
The killings include Father Fausto Tentorio, an Italian missionary in Arakan for the lumads; the killings of environmental advocates Gerry Ortega in Palawan and Dr. Leonardo Co in Luzon; and the continuing cases of media killings such as that of Alfredo Velarde in General Santos City. In Southern Mindanao, there have been killings of peasant leaders such as Rudy Dejos in Davao del Sur, and even of children such as Sunshine Jabinez in Pantukan, Compostela Valley
These killings betray the present administration’s statements that it seeks to solve extrajudicial killings. In fact, President Aquino had declared the deployment of military and paramilitary troops to help protect mining investments in Mindanao ; these same state security forces who are responsible for previous harassments against Fr. Tentorio and other human rights defenders.
The military has taken the track of deploying ‘peace and development’ teams under the seemingly-innocuous cloak of Oplan Bayanihan but which has been exposed as a mere rehash of the deadly Oplan Bantay Laya responsible for more than 1,000 extrajudicial killings under the Arroyo administration.
The Aquino government has never learned from the Ampatuan massacre. It continues to promote paramilitary recruitment in communities and has not uprooted state-sponsored death squads. This shows that there is no “daang matuwid,” but rather a bloody trail of human rights violations.
Today is not merely a day of remembering. We call for more vigilance among the people to protect our fundamental civil, political, and economic rights.
We demand from the Aquino administration to pursue the ends of justice and speedy trial on the Ampatuan trial. We hope the prosecution of Gloria Arroyo would point to her accountability in the Ampatuan massacre, as part of a trade-off for her rigged presidential victory in 2004 through the Ampatuan machinery.
We demand President Aquino to account for the 71 cases of extrajudicial killings – a record that has since surpassed human rights statistics in the first few months of the Arroyo government. We call on this government to put a decisive end to Oplan Bayanihan before another United Nations Rapporteur would expose it as the same internal security plan at the fountainhead of this impunity.
As we say never forget, we also say never again!
BISHOP FELIXBERTO CALANG
Convenor
Convening organizations – Barug Katungod Mindanao, Union of Peoples’ Lawyers in Mindanao, Integrated Bar of the Philippines Davao Chapter, Sisters’ Association in Mindanao, National Union of Journalists of the Philippines Davao Chapter, Davao Fil-Chi Heritage, BAYAN Southern Mindanao, HUSTISYA Southern Mindanao, concerned Davao
ON THE 2nd YEAR COMMEMORATION OF THE AMPATUAN MASSACRE: NUJP-Davao
Two years after the gruesome Ampatuan Massacre which killed 58 individuals in a single attack, 32 of whom were our colleagues in the media, one colleague still missing up to now, and we are here, still, in a far cry toward the end of the reigning state of impunity in the country.
It is just fitting that international media groups have declared November 23 as a “Day to End Impunity.”
Nowhere else in the world had the media been attacked this horribly in a single incident than what we had in Sitio Masalay, Ampatuan town in Maguindanao province, two years ago. We shouted we have had enough when the massacre happened. But the killings did not stop.
Thirteen more colleagues were killed after the massacre, in the wake of the slow pace of justice system which churned sadly, on the side of the killers. For it is clear that what we have after two years is just the arraignment of only two of the principal suspects in the Ampatuan Massacre. There are 196 suspects but 103 of whom are still at large.
Meanwhile, the hearings are stuck on the accused trying to evade punishment, as most hearings on the case are all about petitions for bail of the accused.
The stark condition of media practitioners in the country remains a testament to the enormous monster of impunity reigning in our midst.
This monster is cloaked by an inefficient and largely discriminatory justice system against the powerless. This monster feeds on a system that breeds warlords who ride roughshod over the rights of ordinary people and would not hesitate to strike out at anyone who dare go against their wicked ways. Thus, as natural consequence, any media practitioner who just does the job religiously – siding with the people’s right to know and perform the role as a watch dog – becomes the easy prey. We in Davao
Many times over we had seen it struck our midst. Fallen, not too long ago, was colleague Jesiderio “Jessie” Camangyan, a poor radio announcer who was shot to death in the middle of a fiesta program of a remote village in the far away town of Manay in Davao Oriental, a bastion of loggers whom the victim assiduously criticized in his on-air commentaries prior his death.
As media rights advocates and the NUJP struggled to pursue the case, brought to the fore the witnesses and made sure that they are fully protected, we met an inefficient police, a snail-paced justice system not immune from the highhanded influence and control of the powerful who were masterminds of the killing.
The same happened to Nestor Bedolido, another colleague in Davao del Sur who was killed a few days after Camangyan’s murder.
While we are confronted with a low conviction rate of perpetrators of these journalist killings, we continue to see one colleague fallen after another, if not subjected to harassments of various forms – either receiving death threats, their radio stations or media offices attacked, their houses lobbed grenades, ambushed, if not, being unduly held by men in uniforms during coverage.
The figures tell us that 13 more media practitioners were killed after the Ampatuan Massacre, four of whom were slain in the twilight time of Arroyo’s rule, while nine were yet again made victims of journalist killings under the supposedly new administration of the current president who professes protection of media rights and welfare. Media workers join in the expanding list of activists, human rights defenders who are killed under the Aquino administration.
In such a short time, there are already 55 victims of extrajudicial killings, a figure near to the statistics of the Ampatuan Massacre, an indication that nothing has changed in the respect for human rights in our country.
No doubt, this tells us that media practitioners in the country are as much the victims to a way of governance that has far too long undermined freedom and the democratic space supposedly called for by its Constitution. Freedom of the Press is a misnomer, while media persons are being killed, while they are economically disenfranchised, such as the situation of many of our colleagues.
Poor and underpaid as they are and lacking security of tenure, media workers are forced to work under unfavorable conditions. This has been made worse by the fact that worst violators of the media’s political and economic rights remain unsanctioned.
We see this happening in the current struggle of media workers of Bombo Radyo and Radio Mindanao Network (RMN) in Davao
Colleagues in RMN-Davao have persevered after their Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) negotiation deadlocked. And they have enjoyed relative success in crafting an agreement that would provide them some benefits.
Indeed for as long as the current justice system continues to be a system that only serves the interest of the elite, for as long as corporate greed and corporate interest rule over the people’s right to know, for as long as the current state unleashes violence in response to dissent and criticism, then the media’s rights and freedoms remain to be imperiled.
Indeed, the working press can only fully enjoy its basic rights if it struggles to have those rights respected. The rights cannot be freely given in a silver platter by the present dispensation.
History has taught us hard lessons that it took many massacres, grave abuses and hard struggle before the 1954 Universal Declaration on Human Rights was formulated, and the 1987 Philippine Constitution was passed.
There are many a hundred reasons why the media should be at the forefront of the struggle to end the state of impunity in the country.
We demand, no less, that perpetrators of killings and other forms of attacks against the media be held accountable. We believe that only if they are brought to justice can we remove the cloak of impunity that they have long snuggled in. We want, no less, a justice system cleaned up so that it can serve the people’s long clamor for justice, well.
We want that the media be given adequate protection, their rights, safety and economic welfare ensured their dignity, foremost respected. We want no less, a government ruled by leaders who do not cringe at criticisms, but should be accepting of the fact that the way of life in a democracy is to be at the receiving end of the people’s constant demand for accountability.
Until then, we shall continue to march for the struggle for rights and welfare, for respect of the dignity of the working press.
ONWARD THE MARCH OF THE FILIPINO WORKING PRESS WITH THE PEOPLE AGAINST IMPUNITY! (nujpdavao@gmail.com)
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