In commemoration of the 39th anniversary of the declaration of martial law, the Families of Victims of Involuntary Disappearance (FIND) in cooperation with the Office of the Minority Leader of the House of Representatives opens today a two-day photo exhibit in the north wing lobby of the House to give face to enforced disappearance.
"By baring the face of this odious offense that martial law spawned, we hope to stir an amalgam of compassion, courage and love of country among the viewers even as we call for an end to impunity," FIND Co-chairperson Nilda L. Sevilla said.
"We urge the Aquino government to immediately enact a law penalizing enforced disappearance and help the families of desaparecidos bring the perpetrators to justice." Sevilla added.
On 21 September 1972, then President Ferdinand E. Marcos, signed Presidential Proclamation 1081 placing the entire country under martial law to crush lawless elements and insurgents.
"The repressive regime indeed stoked the flames of resistance with its unconscionable rampant commission of arbitrary arrest, illegal detention, enforced disappearance, torture and extrajudicial killing," FIND Honorary Chairperson and House Minority Leader Edcel C. Lagman said.
Lagman's younger brother, Atty. Hermon C. Lagman, a militant labor and human rights lawyer during martial law was forcibly disappeared together with labor organizer Victor Reyes by alleged military intelligence agents on 11 May 1977 in Quezon City.
Martial law opened the floodgates to abominable violation of human rights that rendered civilians helpless and beyond the protection of the law.
The alarming commission of enforced disappearances drove the families and relatives of the victims to unite and organize FIND in 1985, at the height of peoples' resistance to the Marcos dictatorship.
"What is more alarming is the persistence of enforced disappearance from the Marcos regime to the present Aquino administration under which ten cases have already been reported," FIND Search and Documentation Program Coordinator Camilo Manio lamented.
He disclosed that out of the 2,174 reported victims from 1971 to 2011 the organization has documented 1,829 of whom 1,139 are still missing.
President Aquino's father Ninoy an archrival of Marcos is one of the 18,848 victims of human rights violations under the martial law. He was found guilty and convicted of murder, subversion and illegal possession of firearms by a military court but was released and allowed to go to the United States for medical treatment along with his family.
Corazon Estojero whose husband Edgardo, a labor leader who disappeared during the Cory Aquino administration, said that the families of the disappeared feel that being the son of martial law human rights violation victim, the incumbent President would be supported of them. She is puzzled why the chief executive has not yet endorsed the anti-enforced disappearance bill as a priority administration measure and the Philippines is not yet a signatory to the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons form Enforced Disappearance.
According to Estojero, Chairperson of FIND-NCR, FIND members in its ten chapters nationwide will remain steadfast in fighting for justice for their missing loved ones.
"hindi kami magsasawa. Hindi kami mapapagod magkampanya at mag-lobby para maisabatas ang anti-enforced disappearance bill at ratipikahan ng Pilipinas ang Convention hanggang tunay at ganap silang maipatupad sa Pilipinas at tuluyan nang walain ang sapilitang pagwawala," Armando L. Paragat, FIND National and International Advocacy Program Coordinator, stressed.
We support the immediate enactment of the proposed Anti-Enforced or Involuntary Disappearance Act of 2011 and the signing and ratification by the Philippine Government of the United Nations International Convention for the Protection of all Persons from Enforced Disappearance (ICPAPED).
