PTFoMS upbeat justice for victims of Maguindanao massacre served soon

President Rodrigo Duterte’s media security task force on Friday expressed optimism that the families of victims of the gruesome Maguindanao massacre will get justice soon despite the Supreme Court's decision to extend the deadline for the ruling on the cases.

The SC gave Judge Jocelyn Solis-Reyes of the Quezon City Regional Trial Court Branch 221 a non-extendible period of 30 days to decide the criminal cases.

She was supposed to have only until November 20 to promulgate a judgment but requested a deadline extension, citing "voluminous" case records.

“It is worth the wait. What is one month compared to ten years? Lower courts usually go on Christmas break in mid-December. So the decision may be out by December 14,” Presidential Task Force on Media Security (PTFoMS) Executive Director Joel Sy Egco said.

“Without preempting the outcome, I am optimistic that the families of the victims will finally get the justice that they have been waiting for the last decade.”

Egco added it took the political will of the Duterte administration “to finally see this through to its logical conclusion.”

The case was finally submitted for resolution in August after nearly 10 years of trial.

Tagged as the worst case of election-related violence and media killing in Philippine history, the Maguindanao massacre on November 23, 2009 involved the killing of 58 people, some of them family members of then-Buluan, Maguindanao vice mayor Esmael Mangudadatu.

Also among the victims were 32 journalists who were accompanying Mangudadatu's wife and supporters in filing his certificate of candidacy.

Mangudadatu was then about to go against Andal Ampatuan, Jr., the main accused in the case, for the 2010 gubernatorial race in Maguindanao province. —LBG, GMA News