CA junks Marcoses’ bid to stop hearing on $2B for Martial Law victims

The Court of Appeals (CA) has given the go-signal for a Makati court to hear the petition seeking the enforcement of the United States court decision that awarded some $2 billion in compensation to victims of human rights violations under the Martial Law regime of the late strongman Ferdinand Marcos.

A resolution issued by the CA Special 13th Division junked the bid of the Marcos family to extend the filing of a petition to reverse the orders handed down by Makati City Regional Trial Court Branch 134 Judge Elpidio Calis in May and August last year.

Calis' orders dismissed the Marcoses' plea to junk the enforcement case filed by some human rights victims including former Commission on Human Rights (CHR) chairperson Etta Rosales and film director Joel Lamangan.

The Marcoses had 60 days or until October 11, 2016 to challenge Calis' orders before the CA but failed to do so, citing a heavy workload regarding the preparations in defending Marcos' burial at the Libingan ng mga Bayani before the Supreme Court.

They asked for another 30 days or until November 10 to file the petition but the CA denied this.

According to the CA, the Rules of Court only allow parties 60 days from notice of judgment or from notice of denial of their motion for reconsideration within which to file a petition for certiorari. 

The Marcos family has yet to comment on the matter.

The subject of the court proceedings in Makati is the 1995 ruling of the United States District Court in Hawaii in the class suit filed by some 10,000 rights victims against the Marcos estate.

The ruling was affirmed by the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in 1996. —NB, GMA News