The Supreme Court (SC) is set to decide today on whether to finally allow the burial of the late former president Ferdinand Marcos in the Libingan ng mga Bayani as it tackles petitions of martial law victims to block it.
A high court insider said the case is included in the agenda of the justices in their regular session, as the status quo ante order they issued last month stopping the Marcos burial lapses today.
President Duterte had directed the burial of the former president in the heroes’ cemetery, but the SC ordered it halted amid petitions against it.
The high court heard the oral arguments of both the petitioners and the government last month.
Anticipating the SC ruling’s release, Marcos’ eldest daughter and Ilocos Norte Gov. Imee Marcos led supporters yesterday in a prayer vigil outside the SC compound on Padre Faura Street in Manila.
The event concluded the “Kailian (Ilocano word for town mates) March” of Marcos loyalists, who walked their way to Manila from Ilocos Norte starting last Friday.
Passing through Ilocos Sur, La Union, Pangasinan, Pampanga and Bulacan, they gathered supporters along the way.
In an interview, Imee appealed for national unity by allowing her father to be buried at the heroes’ cemetery.
“I think there’s nothing wrong in expressing our firm stand that Apo Marcos should now be buried in the Libingan ng mga Bayani along with soldiers, late former presidents and all those awarded with medals,” she told reporters in Filipino.
She asked Filipinos to just support the decision of President Duterte.
“To all those opposing (the Marcos burial), let’s give this one to the President and to us Ilocanos as one way to forge national unity... We can expect that all wounds will heal once my father is buried in the Libingan,” she said.
Seeking forgiveness, she told reporters, “I hope you set aside your grievances. All of us have anger and bitterness in our hearts, but we should set that aside because, as the pope said, ‘when we forgive, you will be free and happy’.”
But a prominent opponent who was detained during the Maros regime, Satur Ocampo, dismissed the appeal.
“It’s unfair that they are asking people to forgive and forget without them making a formal acknowledgment of the crimes of the Marcoses to the people,” Ocampo told AFP.
The high tribunal initially issued the order last Aug. 23, effective for 20 days until Sept. 12.
But at the conclusion of oral arguments last Sept. 7, the SC extended the order – directed at Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana and Armed Forces chief of staff Gen. Ricardo Visaya – until Oct. 18 to allow the resolution of the case on merits.
The six petitions were filed by groups of martial law victims led by former Bayan Muna party-list representative Satur Ocampo, Albay Rep. Edcel Lagman and former Commission on Human Rights (CHR) chair Etta Rosales; a group led by former senator Heherson Alvarez; a group of University of the Philippines students; and former Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao human rights chair Algamar Latiph.
The petitioners argued that the planned burial of the late dictator is “illegal and contrary to law, public policy, morals and justice.”
They said allowing the burial of the former leader in the heroes’ cemetery would violate Republic Acts Nos. 289 and 10368 or the Human Rights Victims Reparation and Recognition Acts.
They argued that the burial would also violate constitutional provision on state policies.
But Solicitor General Jose Calida said the interment would not necessarily rewrite the nation’s history and make Marcos a hero, as he asked the SC to dismiss the petitions.
Calida argued that Marcos, being a former president and duly recognized soldier and war veteran, should be entitled to interment at the Libingan.
He said the Libingan is not exclusive to heroes as the national pantheon under Republic Act No. 289 was never really built.
Calida explained that the decision of Duterte is not really to honor Marcos as a hero, but rather “to accord him simple mortuary rites befitting a former president, commander-in-chief and soldier.”
He stressed that it was a campaign promise of the President, who won in the elections with over 16 million votes.
The top government counsel invoked the President’s authority under the Constitution and Revised Administrative Code to decide on a political question that does not involve any justifiable issue for the high court to resolve.
He said the controversy is “beyond ambit of judicial review” and warned that granting the petitions would be tantamount to an “intrusion upon executive power.”
Calida pointed out that the late former president Corazon Aquino and former president Fidel Ramos used such residual power on this controversy during their respective terms, recalling that the latter overturned the decision of the former and allowed Marcos’ remains to return to the country from Hawaii, where he died in 1989.
Forfeited privilege
In the first session of oral argument, Senior Associate Justice Antonio Carpio said Marcos lost his privilege to be buried at the Libingan when he was “dishonorably discharged” and ousted by the historic EDSA people power revolution in 1986.The National Historical Commission and Commission on Human Rights have also submitted to the SC their positions on the issue supporting the petitioners.
Burial as payback
Meanwhile, a group of 14 individual petitioners led by former CHR chair and activist Rosales claimed Duterte’s campaign promise and directive to bury Marcos in the Libingan was actually a payback to the Marcoses’ financial support for Duterte’s candidacy.“We express our gravest concern at the public admission made last week by President Rodrigo Duterte that he received money from Imee Marcos as support for his electoral campaign,” Rosales’ group said in a statement distributed to media yesterday.
The group said the supposed financial support was not declared in Duterte’s Statement of Contributions and Expenditures submitted to the Commission on Elections.
This, the group said, has cast “an entirely new light” on the Duterte administration’s repeated assertions that the Libingan burial for Marcos was in fulfillment of a campaign promise.
“It now appears that Marcos’ burial at the Libingan is the payback for the payment he admitted receiving from Ms. Marcos,” the group stated. “And that campaign promise was not one made generally to the electorate, but specifically to Imee and the Marcos family, exchange for monetary support for his presidential bid.”
The post SC Rules on FM Burial Today; Imee Seeks Forgiveness appeared first on Philippine Star.
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