Thread: PHILIPPINES: Tribute to victims, one year after Maguindanao massacre

Ampatuan On My Mind | Prachatai English

Ampatuan On My Mind

Tue, 23/11/2010 - 08:27 JOSE JAIME ‘Nonoy’ ESPINA

(On November 23, 2009, a convoy on its way to file the certificate of candidacy of a gubernatorial candidate of Maguindanao province in the southern Philippine island of Mindanao was stopped on the highway in the town of Ampatuan by about a hundred gunmen. The convoy, which included 32 journalists and media workers, female relatives of the candidate, as well as six motorists who just happened to be tailing the convoy, were taken into the hills and murdered. Now called the Ampatuan massacre, for the town where it happened, it was the worst single incident of electoral violence in recent Philippine history and the worst single attack on the press ever recorded.)

These will forever be seared in my memory.


A policeman stands guard over the site where 58 persons, including 32 media workers, were massacred on November 23, 2009. The Ampatuan massacre was the worst incident of electoral violence in recent Philippine history and the worst single attack on the press ever recorded. (photo by Nonoy Espina)

A hilltop in the middle of breathtakingly beautiful landscape, desecrated by the red smear of blood and the stench of violent death; the wails of grieving wives, mothers, sons, daughters, husbands, fathers, brothers, sisters; the faces of battle-hardened soldiers quivering in disbelief at a brutality they had never encountered and never imagined even in the viciousness of combat; and the constant roar of a backhoe as its arm descends into the pit again and again, re-emerging to disgorge body after body, the pain and terror of the final moment on earth plainly visible in twisted limbs and faces, or what are left of them, despite the horrible mutilation and the ravages of decomposition.

Maguindanao, second poorest province in the Philippines, whose rulers ensconced themselves in palatial mansions next door to the ramshackle huts of their subjects, and moved around in kilometre-long convoys of gleaming SUVs and pickup trucks and armoured cars laden with armed retainers and bristling with heavy machineguns.

Maguindanao, where the law was not words etched in a worthless document called the Constitution but sprung immutable from the mouths of the rulers whose utterances could, and did, mean life or death, as it did for the unfortunate 58.

Madness, they said, when word of the carnage filtered out from the rolling hills and farmlands of Ampatuan.

They were wrong.

It was not madness at all.

It was the law meting out punishment on those who dared challenge it. As for those whose only fault was to be there when it happened, well, that was their fault. They shouldn’t have been there at all.

But the truth is, Maguindanao is not an island, not a republic unto itself. Maguindanao is in every corner of the Philippines where the expediency that passes for governance in my benighted country has allowed the growth of warlord clans who amass power – both armed and political – and wealth – mostly illegal – in exchange for pledging their loyalty and their capacity to woo, buy, rob and coerce votes for whoever is president at the moment.

Maguindanao is wherever the 141 Filipino journalists murdered since 1986 were robbed of their lives and their voices, and the people of their truth, because the rulers have declared that ignorance is bliss and no one who dares pierce the darkness with the torch of scrutiny shall live to tell the tale of the sordid secrets hidden there.

Maguindanao is everywhere people cower in fear and silence, trapped in powerlessness and poverty in the shadows of the lords’ mansions.

And the 58 of Sitio Masalay are not mere luckless souls, they are you, me, us until we all say, “Enough!”

NOTES (from the International Federation of Journalists):

• The Philippines is distinct from other countries in the Asia-Pacific region in that most killings of journalists are carried out by hired killers in targeted attacks.

• 141 journalists and media workers have been killed in the Philippines since 1986.

• At least 75 journalists and media workers were killed during the 9-year tenure of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo (January 2001- June 2010), not including the victims of the Ampatuan massacre.

• 4 journalists have been murdered in 2010. Three of the four murders occurred in the period between presidential elections in May and the inauguration of President Benigno Aquino III on June 30.

• Only 4 convictions for the murders of journalists in the Philippines have been achieved for the 140 killings since 1986.

• A total of 196 suspects, mostly police officers and members of local militias, and including members of Maguindanao’s Ampatuan clan, for which the town where the massacre happened, are facing trial for the carnage.

• Andal Ampatuan Jr is the main defendant in the trials, accused of organising the massacre. He is the son of clan patriarch Andal Ampatuan Sr., former governor of Maguindanao and also one of the accused.

• The Ampatuan family was among the closest allies of Arroyo.

• The trials finally started in Manila in September 2010.

• Outside of Iraq, the Philippines has recorded the most killings of media personnel this century. Unlike Iraq, the Philippines is not at war. All the journalists killed are victims of targeted assassinations.

• The NUJP supports the education of more than 80 children of murdered journalists.

###
JOSE JAIME ‘Nonoy’ ESPINA
• Nonoy is a fellow at the Southeast Asian Centre for e-Media
• He is also vice chairman of the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines and executive editor of the independent Philippine news site dateline.ph

Oh man, what a country...

great place just don't be a jurno there.

Originally Posted by Pol the Pot

Oh man, what a country...

Lovely countryside though!

Originally Posted by StrontiumDog

Maguindanao, second poorest province in the Philippines, whose rulers ensconced themselves in palatial mansions next door to the ramshackle huts of their subjects, and moved around in kilometre-long convoys of gleaming SUVs and pickup trucks

This reminds me of somewhere...wait for it... no sorry it's slipped my memory.

Just got back from a trip to the Philippines, nice place, but shocked at the amount of security everywhere. Couldn't even go to a mall without the car being searched and getting patted down by a shotgun toting security guard.

Originally Posted by Pol the Pot

Oh man, what a country...

Generally great people, but at the end of my visa/year there I left for good for 2 reasons, first the food, and then the 2nd nature of violence. The clincher was when the cop I was with pulled his gun and took up firing position at a taxi driver that declined to take us back to the station because he was already on the job delivering a package. It was then that I decided I really don't want to marry his daughter.

Those complaining about Thai violence really shouldn't stray that far East.

I gave it a shot for just over half a year, working in Manila. Never again.

Andal Ampatuan Jr. Look at his face and make a wish that justice overtakes this monster and the rest of his family.

BBC News - Long wait for justice after Philippines massacre

23 November 2010 Last updated at 05:09 GMT

Long wait for justice after Philippines massacre

By Kate McGeown
BBC News, Maguindanao, southern Philippines


Grace Morales lost her husband and sister in the Maguindanao massacre. "When my kids ask what happened to their father, I can't answer," she says.

Related stories

• Ampatuans in new atrocity claims
• Clan 'behind Philippine massacre'
• The rise of the Ampatuans

A year ago in the southern Philippines 57 people were brutally murdered and their bodies dumped in a mass grave. While some key suspects are now on trial, more than 100 remain on the run.

Grace Morales goes to the cemetery near her home at least once a week. The graves she is looking for are right at the back, in a separate section roped off from the rest.

Her husband and sister were among 57 people killed a year ago, in the largest massacre in recent Philippine history.

"At first I didn't believe it - I just didn't," she says, welling up with emotion.

Rossel Morales and Marites Cablita are buried next to each other, along with 10 others - all of them friends, all journalists who found themselves in the wrong place at the wrong time, caught up in a row between two powerful clans.

The Ampatuan family had been running the province of Maguindanao as a virtual fiefdom for about 20 years - occupying almost all the political posts in the area.

But in the elections for provincial governor, a rival emerged from another influential clan, the Mangudadatus.

To stamp out this threat, the Ampatuans allegedly decided to kill their opponents.

It is a charge the family vehemently denies, but what is certain is that when the Mangudadatus set out to register their candidate for the poll - taking more than 30 reporters with them - they were stopped by a group of gunmen.

The bodies of the entire convoy were found later that day on a nearby hill.



Click to play
Esmael Mangudadatu: 'I keep praying that God will curse them'

A year on, there is little physical evidence that such brutal murders ever happened. The mass grave where the killers buried their victims is overgrown with grass, and the only reminder is a small piece of police tape tied to one of the trees.

The emotional scars, though, will take a lot longer to heal.

"When my kids ask what happened to their father, I can't answer. I just let my tears flow and keep silent," says Grace Morales.

Esmael Mangudadatu, the man whom the Ampatuans were allegedly trying to target, was not in the convoy on that fateful day.

In the months that followed, he campaigned for and won the election.

But victory came at a heavy price; his wife and two sisters were among those killed. He had sent them and other female relatives to file his papers in the belief that their lives would be spared.

The Ampatuans are "like monsters. I can't forgive them, I keep praying that God will curse them", he says.

A year on, Governor Mangudadatu still has concerns about his security - only about a third of the 197 people charged over the massacre have been arrested.


A journalist visits the massacre site - 32 of those killed were journalists

The rest, many of them members of the Ampatuan family or their 2,000-strong private army, are still on the run.

"Locating them is very hard," says the military commander for the area, Colonel Mario Mendoza.

"We're a new unit, we need to pay informants to identify them for us - we don't know them personally."

Ampatuan influence "I'm begging the president, begging officials in government to help us get these people," says Governor Mangudadatu.

He is not entirely confident of the abilities of the police and army to round up the suspects.

Many of those on the wanted list were members of the police. Can current police officers really be relied upon to arrest them?

One suspect, Jimmy Ampatuan, even managed to win a local election last month, while technically on the run. He was finally arrested after the poll.

Another problem for Governor Mangudadatu is that more than 20 Ampatuans are still in positions of power - some of them replacing other family members now in jail - and he has to work with them on a regular basis.

"Not all of them are bad. Some are co-operating with me," he says, "but some are not."

Painfully slow process While the hunt continues for many of the accused, the key suspects, at least, are behind bars. They are on, or awaiting, trial in Manila - hundreds of miles away from Maguindanao.

Attention is currently focused on the trial of Andal Ampatuan Jr, who is accused of personally killing many of the victims, as well as ordering his henchmen to kill others.

He has yet to take the stand, but his lawyer Sigfried Fortun says he is planning to put up a strong defence.


Key suspects in the massacre are awaiting trial but the legal process is expected to take years

"The Ampatuan family controls 33 out of 36 municipalities, or thereabouts," says Mr Fortun.

"Why would anybody who controls 85% of the votes of the province have anything to do with the killing of a political opponent, from which any blame would definitely rebound on to him?"

Andal Jr's father and brother will be tried separately, as will other family members, and some 700 people are due to give evidence. With the court sitting just once a week, it is likely to be a painfully slow process.

A senior congressman, Senator Joker Arroyo, told the media that, at this rate, the process would take an estimated 200 years.

Meanwhile there are allegations that some of the witnesses and relatives of the victims have been offered bribes, and several would-be witnesses have been killed in as yet unexplained circumstances.

The Philippine judicial system is under scrutiny as never before, and President Aquino has personally pledged to make sure justice is done.

For Grace Morales, left to bring up her children and those of her sister alone - and using any spare money to fly to Manila to attend the trial - justice cannot come soon enough.

In one of the articles Strontium Dog linked to above it says that the Ampatuans have been involved in extra- judicial killings for 20 years.

That means all the past couple of presidents up to the Aquinos have relied on them to get the votes.

Jesus bloody Christ!

Originally Posted by drawp

Just got back from a trip to the Philippines, nice place, but shocked at the amount of security everywhere

#

Had a mate who lived there for around 10 years, he bought a bar and a taxi business with his second Phillippino wife. Employed armed guards who were with him and her 24/7, great beach though and cheap to live, English good and plenty of fanny!

He eventually returned to the UK when his money ran out and he wasn't the least bothered about the money as he knew he had a fatal heart problem which killed him about 12 months after he rturned to the UK.

The moral of the story I suppose...if you're sure your going to croke early then live the life, shag yourself silly, eat drink and be merry as you can't take it with you!

P.S. I have to admit he was quite a strange guy.

i'm planning on retiring there and truth be known the volience is kept mostly amongst the locals can get hairy at times that's part of the appeal.the best part is you don't have to put up with drunkin white idiots as much as in thailand.

Originally Posted by bobo746

i'm planning on retiring there and truth be known the volience is kept mostly amongst the locals can get hairy at times that's part of the appeal.the best part is you don't have to put up with drunkin white idiots as much as in thailand.

Good luck and as far as drunken white idiots are concered, yes there's less there not least because it's not as accessible to the package holiday arseholes.

But saying that the crime there (especially robbery) is certainly NOt confined to just the locals and I sincerely wish you good luck with your retirement there.

Right, the violence isn't just kept amongst the locals, I guess some of the more violent stuff is (like in this case), but even as a foreigner I was shadowed by bouncers at just about every club I went to. I asked one of the bouncers as he followed me to the bathroom as to why and he said that it's quite common for foreigners to get robbed or assaulted, even in public places.

it's all good lived there before just gotta keep your head down eyes and ears open and mouth shut.

Originally Posted by bobo746

it's all good lived there before just gotta keep your head down eyes and ears open and mouth shut.

Good advice, it doesn't pay to be anything other than Mr Grey in the P.I.
I could have put up with the shite food but the violence was too much for me, maybe if I didn't have littlun I could deal with it but I did so left after six months.
Great people all the same though.

yeah mate got a couple of mates living in the barrio thats where i will heading my ex mum in-law lives close by. me and her get on great we drink beers together my daughter was born there also,so i got extended family there should be all good.(my daughter reckons i'm not allowed to hook up with anything younger than her (24) don't like hers odds)

Philippines vows justice for victims of Maguidanao massacre - Monsters and Critics

Philippines vows justice for victims of Maguidanao massacre

Jun 2, 2011, 6:59 GMT

Manila - The Philippine government on Thursday vowed to ensure that the people behind the 2009 killing of at least 57 people, the country's worst political massacre, would be punished.

Presidential spokesman Edwin Lacierda said the administration of President Benigno Aquino III was closely monitoring the trial of the suspects in the November 23, 2009 massacre in Ampatuan town, Maguidanao province.

'The assurance of our justice system is that by means of the presentation of witnesses and evidence, no crime will go unpunished,' he said.

'The cry of the victims and their families for justice and accountability will not fall on deaf ears,' he added. 'This must be our shared commitment and our common expectation.'

Members of the powerful Ampatuan political clan allegedly planned the murders to stop a rival family from challenging their decade-old rule in Maguindanao.

On Wednesday, clan patriarch Datu Andal Ampatuan Senior pleaded not guilty to masterminding the murders. His son Datu Andal Junior was arraigned in January 2010 for allegedly leading more than 100 gunmen in the murders.

Lacierda vowed that the government would take all steps to prevent coddling of the suspects, who were allegedly receiving special treatment from prison guards.

He also reiterated the government's call for the Supreme Court to allow live media coverage of the trial. 'The light of the law, the true and full details of the case, deserve to reach every home in the nation,' he said.

The victims were mostly relatives of a rival political family and members of the media who were travelling in a convoy. A 58th victim, a photographer, remains missing.

The massacre shocked the Philippines and the international community which criticised then president Gloria Macapagal Arroyo for failing to stop a wave of political killings in the country.

Originally Posted by StrontiumDog

The assurance of our justice system is that by means of the presentation of witnesses and evidence, no crime will go unpunished,' he said.

Famous last words.

Philippines: Families of 58 Killed in Massacre Protest Suspect’s Furlough

Families of 58 people killed in the nation’s worst political massacre have slammed a court decision allowing one of the principal suspects to temporarily leave jail to attend his daughter’s wedding.


Of the victims killed in 2009, at least 32 were journalists and media workers, in what is believed to be single biggest one-day massacre of press people around the world. Almost 100 people have been jailed and charged with murder, but none have been convicted.

The journalists tagged along with a convoy of a local Muslim political clan challenging the Ampataun family for control of the southern province of Maguindanao.

The group was ambushed by members of the Ampatuan family and their henchmen who tried to hide the bodies in a mass grave on a remote hill. The violence exposed bitter rivalries among Muslim clans jostling for control of the south, a mineral-rich area that has for decades been locked in insurgency.

Among those jailed is Zaldy Ampatuan, one of the men who allegedly engineered the massacre.

On Sunday, he was granted a furlough to attend his daughter’s wedding.

“I don’t really understand as to why we have this kind of justice system,” Reynafe Momay-Castillo, a daughter of photojournalist Reynaldo Momay who was one of the victims, said from Canada where she works as a nurse.

She demanded an explanation from Judge Jocelyn Solis-Reyes of suburban Quezon City, north of Manila, about why Ampatuan was allowed out.

“Do you think we no longer follow the case after almost a decade? Do you think we forgot all about the killing of our loved ones? Personally, I may not be in the Philippines to attend the hearings but I’m still following through,” she said.
“I still seek and will continue to seek justice for my father. You owe us an explanation,” she added.


Zaldy Ampatuan, with his father, the late Andal Ampatuan Sr., and his brother Andal Ampatuan Jr., are among the main suspects in the massacre, which has come to be known locally as the Maguindanao Massacre of 2009.


A copy of the court order obtained by BenarNews said the wedding was a “significant milestone to be cherished and remembered.”


“It is a momentous family occasion which must be witnessed and attended by the couple’s loved-ones, especially the accused who will personally bring his eldest daughter to the altar,” according to the document signed by Reyes-Solis and dated Aug. 17.


Chief Inspector Xavier Solda, spokesman of the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology, confirmed that Ampatuan was allowed out of jail for three hours on Tuesday to attend the ceremony at a five-star hotel in Manila.


On Wednesday, the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines (NUJP) protested what it perceived a special privilege granted to Ampatuan. Its statement noted the crime for which he is being tried for was of “such heinous nature” that it forced then-President Gloria Arroyo to move against the clan.


“Almost nine years after the rampage that claimed the lives of 58 persons, 32 of them media workers, no one has yet been convicted. Yet a principal accused, Sajid Ampatuan, was granted bail,” the NUJP said.


“That and now this, we feel, gives us and the victims' families more than enough cause to worry about whether we can truly expect justice for this most grievous of crimes,” it said.


Press monitors around the world had called the massacre “the single deadliest event for journalists” in recent history.


https://www.benarnews.org/english/ne...018120732.html

^I remember this case. It was a blood feud - Ampatuan family versus the Mangudadatu family. The M family members were going to file for candidacy in the local elections (running against the Ampatuans) when they got ambushed. Several journalists who were there to cover the event also got killed. A sad day, but the issue seems to have been brushed under the table. Like in other 3rd world countries, money talks...

Can't believe it's been 9 years...