Thousands of protesters took to the streets on Monday, September 21, to mark the 48th anniversary of the declaration of martial law by the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos and to condemn the Duterte administration’s “de facto martial rule”.

“UP Never Forgets and Stands United Against Tyranny” is a one-day event organized by different non-governmental organizations. It included movements such as the Youth Assembly at the Commission on Human Rights grounds and the protest held at the streets of UP Diliman.

Martial law was announced on the 21st of September 1972, under the 20-year term of late Ferdinand Marcos’ as president of the Philippines committing countless human rights violations and taking the lives of many.

At 9 am, several youth groups and progressive organizations gathered at the Bantayog ng mga Bayani for a wreath-laying ceremony dedicated to the martyrs and victims of human rights violations under the Marcos dictatorship and the current administration.

After the ceremony, a youth assembly followed at 2 pm outside the Commission on Human Rights (CHR) office along Commonwealth Avenue. The groups later marched to Quezon Hall at the University of the Philippines-Diliman for the multisectoral main program at 4 pm.

The groups observed strict health protocols such as the wearing of face masks to prevent the spread of COVID-19. Printed photos of Marcos lining the streets of Quezon Hall also served as markers to enforce physical distancing.

The groups urged the public to remember the abuses committed during the dark chapter of Philippine history under Marcos’ reign of terror and to denounce the similar assaults on human rights under the Duterte administration. 

They also condemned acts of historical revisionism, the killings of peasants in the countryside, the extrajudicial killings under the newly passed Anti-Terror Law, the recent Lumad killings, and the bombing of Lumad schools in Mindanao.

“Sa panahon ni Duterte, inuna nito ang militaristiko pamamaraan…Si Duterte ay bumuo ng isang puzzle piece, isang puzzle na hindi deklaradong martial law sa ilalim ng terror law, “ said Raoul Manuel, a representative of Youth Act Now Against Tyranny.  

(During Duterte’s time, it prioritized militaristic methods. Duterte developed a puzzle piece, a puzzle that was not declared martial law under terror law.)

They clamored for the release of scientists and political prisoners Delai Padilla and Rey Casambre and the implementation of health-oriented solutions to the pandemic.

They also paid tribute to activists Edgar Jopson and Liliosa Hilao, who were slain under the Marcos dictatorship, and the late Randy Echanis and Zara Alvarez, who were victims of red-tagging and extrajudicial killings under the current administration.

The program culminated with the burning of an effigy portraying Duterte as the coronavirus, symbolizing the administration’s poor response to the public health crisis plaguing the Philippines.

Demonstrations were also held in various parts of the country.

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Gillian Angnged
Regina Elaine Vendivil
News staffers