STATEMENT
February 25, 2025
Ferdinand Marcos Sr. held power for over 20 years, including 14 years of outright dictatorship. The Marcos family used martial law to entrech its political power and corner every posible source of profit-seeking in the economy for itself and its cronies.
The brutal silencing of dissent through extra-judicial killings, enforced disappearances and wholesale arrests of activists and protestors scarred the country’s fledgling democracy and deeply traumatized the nation.
Yet when the Filipino people could take no more, they rose up in a broad anti-dictatorship movement culminating in the historic EDSA uprising of 1986. Nearly four decades later, the Marcos family is back in power and busy burying the vast sins of the dictatorship and its crimes against the nation.
The current Marcos Jr administration portrays itself as a human rights champion — brazenly claiming unwavering commitment to this. Human rights groups and civil society organizations do not let this pass and denounce its extensive violations of civil and political rights as well as social and economic rights.
Human rights group KARAPATAN has documented 119 extrajudicial killings, 14 enforced disappearances, 255 illegal or arbitrary arrests, and about 560 cases of forced or fake surrenders under the current Marcos Jr administration, from from July 2022 to December 2024. There are also an estimated 60,000 cases of indiscriminate firing, 40,000 cases of indiscriminate bombings and forced evacuation and an estimated 3.7M cases of threats, harassment and intimidation.
Yet, it doesn’t stop there. A report by the National Union of People’s Lawyers (NUPL) and Council for People’s Development and Governance (CPDG) reveals increasing judicial attacks against non-governmental organizations (NGOs) using so-called counter-terrorism financing measures. These interrupt projects for marginalized communities, besmirch the reputations of the NGOs, and put them in harms way.
Furthermore, the neoliberal policies that the Marcos dictatorship started was continued by every administration since, including the current one of Marcos Jr. The liberalization of trade and investment, turning over of the economy to oligarchs and large capital, and using public resources to bloat private profit has made a few Filipinos prosperous at the expense of the majority left behind in deep poverty.
The Marcos Jr administration, like its first iteration as the Marcos dictatorship, upholds a government promoting elite and foreign interests rather than building democracy and shaping the economy for the interests of the people.
It is 39 years after EDSA which was the first time Filipinos overthrew a government since the country gained flag independence in 1946. Yet despite the end of the dictatorship and supposed restoration of democracy, our civic spaces continue to shrink and resistance to anti-people policies is met with violence. Human rights violations against advocates, developmental workers and human rights defenders keep growing.
While the Marcos family continues to manipulate the national memory, we call on to everyone to continue to uphold the spirit of resistance and democracy shown in the anti-dictatorship and at EDSA. Our battles continue against anti-democratic forces taking new and evolving forms.
Never forget. Never again.
#EDSA39
#NeverAgainNeverForget
#PeopleEconomics