THE AMPATUAN massacre trial—where 58 men and women, including 32 media workers, were brutally murdered in one of the worst attacks on democracy and press freedom in Philippine history—will enter a crucial phase. The Court of Appeals (CA) will be deciding on the petition for certiorari filed by Zaldy Ampatuan, suspended governor of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM).
Should Ampatuan get his way, he will be dropped from the list of those accused of participating in the Nov. 23, 2009 massacre and released from detention. If new evidence is found against him later, the process will have to begin all over again and there is fear that—like the other accused Ampatuans still at large—he will manage to avoid arrest.
We are not prejudging the guilt or innocence of Ampatuan. But for the sake of Philippine democracy and press freedom, it is imperative that the trial be perceived as credible and beyond question.
Should the perpetrators of the massacre, whoever they are, literally get away with murder, it will send the strongest message yet that neither the murder of journalists in such numbers, or that of politicians’ families and their partisans, can move the justice system to begin dismantling the culture of impunity that has taken deep roots in Philippine society. It will also encourage further killings. It is crucial not only to the media, but also and even more importantly, to Philippine democracy, that the Ampatuan massacre trial deliver to the kin of the victims the justice that has eluded so many in this country.
Some of the families of the slain journalists have filed a petition for two Court of Appeals justices—Danton Bueser and Marlene Gonzales—to inhibit themselves from hearing Zaldy Ampatuan’s petition because of doubts about their impartiality. Both had inhibited themselves from hearing the petition of Ampatuan patriarch Andal Sr. They should have disclosed their reasons for doing so as mandated by the new code of judicial conduct, but did not. Why should they then be part of a panel that will decide the Zaldy Ampatuan petition which is intimately related to the first petition?
We call for complete transparency on the part of the CA. But it is also for the country’s media, journalists and media advocacy organizations, as well as civil society groups, people’s organizations and the public at large, to vigilantly monitor the process so its integrity can be accurately evaluated—in keeping with their sovereign right as citizens who should be heard on matters of public concern and urgency.
—FREEDOM FUND FOR FILIPINO JOURNALISTS,
NATIONAL UNION OF JOURNALISTS OF THE PHILIPPINES, CENTER FOR MEDIA FREEDOM AND RESPONSIBILITY, NOVEMBER 23 MOVEMENT, PHILIPPINE CENTER FOR PHOTOJOURNALISM, CENTER FOR COMMUNITY JOURNALISM AND DEVELOPMENT, COLLEGE EDITORS’ GUILD OF THE PHILIPPINES c/o nujphil@gmail.com