Marcos Jnr., who was democratically elected in May with a massive majority, has defended his father and refused to apologize for his actions. What Rosales and other survivors fear is that the lessons of that era are in danger of being forgotten. According to Amnesty International, at least 50,000 people were arrested and detained under martial law from 1972 to 1975 alone, among them church workers, human rights activists, legal aid lawyers, labor leaders and journalists. They are commemorated by the government-funded Human Rights Violations Victims’ Memorial Commission.īut the true number of victims could be far higher. There were also 2,326 killings and disappearances between 19, before Marcos Snr. The Philippines has officially recognized that 11,103 people were tortured and abused during the martial law period. Now, at 83-years-old, she counts herself as lucky for having survived, and has dedicated her life to human rights activism and making sure such atrocities never happen again. In her worst experience, her torturers clipped wires to her arms and feet and gave her electric shocks that made her body convulse. Her captors poured burning candle wax over her arms partially suffocated her with a belt and subjected her to waterboarding for hours on end. Human rights activist Loretta Ann Rosales sits behind a grainy military mugshot of her taken after she got arrested in 1976. They held exhibitions, documentary screenings and seminars to recount the stories of abuse that took place after martial law was imposed on September 21, 1972, and announced to the public two days later. went on a six-day charm offensive, attending the United Nations General Assembly and meeting the World Bank and business groups, back in the Southeast Asian island nation thousands of people gathered to remember the victims who had suffered under his father’s watch. placed his country under martial law, kick-starting a notorious 14-year period in which thousands of people were killed, tortured and imprisoned.Īs Marcos Jnr. It was that it also came 50 years – almost to the very day – after Marcos Snr. met US President Joe Biden in New York last week, there was an uncomfortable sense of deja vu for some older Filipinos.īut it was not so much that the visit came 40 years after Marcos’ father and namesake was welcomed to Washington by President Ronald Reagan. When Philippine President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jnr.
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