57 INDIVIDUALS (32 of whom were journalists) perished on November 23, 2009 in Ampatuan, Maguindanao province in Mindanao.
A 58th victim, journalist Reynaldo Momay remains missing.
Now, two years after the gruesome incident, for the victims’ families and friends the pain lingers on — the thirst for justice remains unquenched.
Amid the threat of explosives from those who wanted to prevent people from visiting the site, mourners came in droves, fearless in commemorating the second anniversary of what a 2009 US embassy cable (via a release from WikiLeaks) described as a mass murder which “stands out in barbarism.”
Justice Secretary Leila De Lima said that “government prosecutors are doing everything to hold liable those who were responsible for the gruesome killings,” and that they are “targeting to convict all the accused before the end of the term of President Benigno Aquino III in 2016.”
This was to dispute private prosecutor and lawyer for the relatives of the victims, Harry Roque’s estimate of 55,000 years.
Roque’s computation was “based on probabilities that a case with a single suspect and complainant takes five years in the Philippines.”
Currently, there are 196 defendants, each facing 57 cases.
“That’s 11,172 cases. And international studies say that it takes five years to try a single case in the Philippines. So that’s 55,000 years,” Roque said.
Among the principal accused in the multiple murder case are former Maguindanao Gov. Andal Ampatuan Sr.; suspended Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) Gov. Zaldy Ampatuan; former acting Maguindanao Gov. Sajid Ampatuan; former Datu Unsay, Maguindanao Mayor Andal Ampatuan Jr.; Akmad Ampatuan; Anwar Ampatuan; and 196 others.
But of the prime suspects, only Ampatuan Sr. and Ampatuan Jr. have been arraigned.
Meanwhile, relatives of the victims have filed a P15-million damage suit against former President and now Pampanga representative Gloria Macapagal Arroyo (GMA) “for arming and supporting the alleged murderers,” to carry out the massacre on November 23, 2009 and “for the ties she cultivated with the powerful Ampatuan clan.”
Roque said that the families of the victims believe that the massacre could have been prevented, if it weren’t for GMA’s actions. They cited the supposed relationship between GMA and the Ampatuans during the 2004 elections.
Despite the general pessimism, US Ambassador to the Philippines Harry Thomas Jr. “welcomed President Aquino’s pledge to bring the perpetrators of this heinous crime to justice.”
“The prosecution of this case is seen by many around the world as demonstrative of the Philippines’ commitment to upholding the rule of law and protecting human rights,” he said.
“Know that on this day and every day, we continue to remember the victims of that merciless act committed in Maguindanao on November 23, 2009, and to call for those guilty of this crime to be brought to justice,” he added.
While the Maguindanao murder case remains a herculean task to solve and the stigma of distrust for the government still hangs in the air, perhaps a change of mindset would help move the wheels of justice, even if little by little.
At this juncture, most still perceive the government’s actions as mere drops of water on an unyielding rock.
But as the great Lao-Tzu once analyzed, “Water will wear away rock, which is rigid and cannot yield. As a rule, whatever is fluid, soft, and yielding will overcome whatever is rigid and hard. This is another paradox: what is soft is strong.”
After all, no one thought that the day of GMA’s arrest would ever come – but it did.
While a dose of skepticism keeps things in perspective, it would be difficult for any government to work for the greater good, if the greater good refuses to believe that it is capable of doing so.
(www.asianjournal.com)
(LA Weekend Nov.26-29, 2011 Sec.A pg.12)