GMA is P-Noy's smokescreen for rights violations under his administration - Karapatan

By KARAPATAN
December 10, 2011

QUEZON CITY  –  “President Noynoy Aquino conveniently uses GMA as a shield by endlessly harping on her crimes and wrongdoings as a subterfuge to evade taking responsibility for human rights violations committed by his administration and its inability to solve any of the country’s basic problems. No amount of political manipulation or attempt to project himself as a protagonist in the quest for justice against GMA can dispel the truth that he continues Arroyo’s legacy of state terror through Oplan Bayanihan.”

Jigs Clamor, Deputy Secretary General of Karapatan, made the statement as human rights and people’s organizations led by Karapatan and Bayan marched today from Blumentritt to Mendiola to commemorate International Human Rights Day.

“GMA has been a convenient smokescreen to blur the spotlight on P-Noy.  For instance, Malacañang benefits from all the fuss about Arroyo’s transfer to the presidential suite of the veteran’s hospital because it hides the fact that his government has been sorely remiss in promptly prosecuting and putting Arroyo to jail,” Clamor explained.

Karapatan stressed that Noynoy Aquino has to stop hiding behind Gloria and face his own accountabilities to the people, especially the human rights violations committed by his security forces.

In its 2011 Year-End Human Rights Report, Karapatan documented 64 cases of extrajudicial killings, 343 illegal arrests, 51 detainees tortured, 4376 victims of forced evacuation and 6108 made homeless through demolition in urban poor communities.  All these just in 16 months of Noynoy Aquino’s incumbency.

The violations result from the Aquino government’s counter-insurgency Operational Plan (Oplan) Bayanihan, which is patterned after the U.S. COIN Guide and partially funded by American military aid. It speaks of “peace and development” but employs terror upon the people through gross rights violations and intensified militarization of rural and urban communities.

Karapatan said that all over the country, military operations victimize men and women among the workers, peasants, indigenous peoples, Moro people and those who assert their right to land and ancestral domain, and fight to protect the country’s natural resources from extractive industries such as mining.

“The days leading to the commemoration of International Human Rights Day showed how legitimate people’s protests such as those held on Mendiola by the youth, students, workers and urban poor dwellers were met with brutality because Malacañang was terrified of a Wall Street-inspired “occupy” action,” he further said

Jail GMA and Palparan, release all political prisoners

The End Impunity Alliance stressed that GMA and her favorite “butcher” Jovito Palparan should be jailed without any special treatment. “Without question, we want GMA and her military henchmen prosecuted, jailed and made to answer for their human rights violations.  This is to give justice to those who were wronged,” added Cristina Palabay, the convenor of the alliance.

“There’s a stark difference between how this government treats GMA and how the political prisoners, who were arrested because of their political beliefs, languish in jail based on insufficient evidence and trumped-up criminal charges.  Many political prisoners, especially the elderly and sick, are kept in congested cells making them more vulnerable to diseases. In fact, two have recently died due to lack of medical attention." Palabay added.