YOUTH VS MARTIAL LAW. Students of the Ateneo de Davao University light candles on Monday, Nov. 21 to condemn the hero’s burial of the former president Ferdinand Marcos. (Paulo C. Rizal/davaotoday.com)
DAVAO CITY, Philippines – Protests against the hero’s burial for former President Ferdinand Marcos continued as students and faculty from the Ateneo de Davao University led a candle lighting activity in front of the university in Roxas Street, Monday.
Megue Zea Monteverde of the Buklurang Atenista said Marcos did not deserve a hero’s burial because it only served for the “political rehabilitation” of the Marcoses.
She also stressed that President Rodrigo Duterte must be held accountable for allowing the burial of a “dictator, thief, and lapdog of the US.”
The students also reacted on the critics who said young protesters who were not able to experience Martial Law should not be rallying.
Jamie Gundaya of People United to Lead, Obey and Serve UP Mindanao said the youth should not lose a “sense of history.”
“Just because they say that we weren’t even born then, just because they say that we shouldn’t be meddling, that we should be moving on, doesn’t mean that we should lose our historical unity, our sense of history that gives us identity as Filipinos,” she said.
Reil Benedict Obinque, editor of Atenews, the official student publication of Ateneo de Davao University also called the burial an act of historical revisionism.
YOUTH VS MARTIAL LAW. Students of the Ateneo de Davao University light candles on Monday, Nov. 21 to condemn the hero’s burial of the former president Ferdinand Marcos. (Paulo C. Rizal/davaotoday.com)
“Burying Marcos would mean revising history for our future generations. Many say that just because Marcos was buried in the Libingan doesn’t mean that he’s already a hero. But this Libingan ng mga Bayani is very symbolic and this may be used by the Marcos clan for their advantage. And we know the Marcos clan. They have never apologized to all of us,” Obinque said.
The Ateneo Public Interest and Legal Advocacy Center called the burial a “treacherous act” and a “blatant attack” against the country’s national dignity.
“This burial, undertaken through manipulated orchestrations is a reenactment of a historical injustice, a hundred times worse because it is perpetuated by leaders of this country who swore to uphold the constitution, the spirit of which is based on the democratic principles that overthrew the very same person that they honorably laid to rest,” said APILA’s Executive Director Romeo Cabarde.
Monday’s candle lighting echoed a protest rally of some 5000 students from different universities who marched to Katipunan Avenue in Quezon City last Friday. (davaotoday.com)
