Six years after Maguindanao Massacre, justice remains elusive for victims

This is a two-part series on election-related violence in the Philippines. The first part tackles the Maguindanao Massacre, considered as the worst election-related violence in the Philippines.

Six years after the Maguindanao Massacre on November 23, 2009, justice remains elusive for the 58 victims, including 32 journalists.

The Maguindanao Massacre is the worst election-related violence in the Philippines in recent history and single deadliest attack on Filipino journalists.

On Monday, exactly six years from the day of the massacre, Atty. Harry Roque, lead counsel of the families of the victims, said the widows urged the National Police Commission (NAPOLCOM) to come up with resolution dismissing from service the 64 policemen implicated in the massacre.

This is the second motion for the immediate resolution of the administrative case the widows filed in 2009 before the NAPOLCOM. The first motion was submitted in November last year.

In the resolution, Zenaida Duhay et al.  said "family members of the 13  victims of the 23 November 2009 Maguindanao massacre,  under the applicable principles of international human rights law, are entitled to due recognition of victimhood and effective participation in the search for legal remedies—including this administrative case—to the injury they suffered as a result of the gruesome death of their loved ones."

The complainants added, "the only main legal issue to be resolved in this administrative case is whether or not herein Respondents policemen are administratively liable for grave misconduct in relation to their respective conducts as policemen when the 23 November 2009 Maguindanao massacre happened."

Roque, in a text message to GMA News Online, said, "Six years is clear evidence of the state's failure to accord victims of the Ampatuan massacre their right to an adequate domestic remedy and their further right to compensation."

"The State's breach of these obligations is why we now have a culture of impunity. Simply put, extralegal killings in this country will continue unless the killers are punished," he said.

"We implore all branches of government to cease with their breach and to finally accord the victims what they deserve: justice," he added.

Days before the sixth year anniversary of the massacre, IFEX, an international group, lamented the glacial pace of the court proceedings against the alleged perpetrators of the massacre.

“Six years after the slaying, justice remains elusive as not a single suspect has been convicted,” IFEX said.

IFEX's member organizations include the Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility , Committee to Protect Journalists, International Federation of Journalists, Reporters Without Borders, and the Southeast Asian Press Alliance.

The group marks November 23 as a special day to honor the Maguindanao Massacre victims and a day to campaign against “impunity” or letting perpetrators of crime go unpunished.

What are the other important developments in the case against the perpetrators of the 2009 Maguindanao Massacre as of 2015?

(1) Death of the alleged mastermind of the 2009 Maguidanao Massacre: Ampatuan clan patriarch Andal Ampatuan Sr. died on July 17 this year, due to complications from liver cancer.

Andal Sr. had been confined at the National Kidney and Transplant Institute since June 2015 after the court allowed him hospital arrest due to his failing health.

(2) Probe of new suspects: In March this year, the Department of Justice started the probe of 50 new suspects, including town mayors and 14 members of the Ampatuan clan. Complaints against the new suspects were filed in January this year based on the testimonies of witnesses during the Maguindanao massacre trials.

(3) Ampatuan son out on bail and seeking office in 2016 polls: This year, the Quezon City Regional Trial Court  granted appeals for temporary liberty made by some of the primary suspects.

Datu Sajid Islam Ampatuan was granted temporary freedom in January as the prosecution failed to present strong evidence for his continued detention. He posted a bail of P200,000 per murder count or a total of P11.6 million for 58 counts of murder.

In October this year, he filed his certificate of candidacy for mayor of Sharrif Aguak, the Ampatuan clan's bailiwick.

2009 Maguindanao Massacre

Maguindanao province is located in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), composed of 36 municipalities,  with Shariff Aguak as the provincial capital.

Maguindanao is bounded on the south by Sultan Kudarat, on the north by Lanao del Sur, on the east by Cotabato and on the west by Ilana Bay. The province, 9,729.04 square kilometers in size, is inhabited by a little over 1.2 million people.

The remote province became the center of the world's attention when, in the morning of November 23, 2009, a convoy of seven vehicles carrying journalists, lawyers, and relatives of then Maguindanao vice mayor Datu Ismael “Toto" Mangudadatu was attacked by an estimated 100 people.

The convoy was on its way to file Mangudadatu's Certificate of Candidacy at the Comelec office in Shariff Aguak, Maguindanao's capital.

Based on the sworn affidavits of two Philippine National Police officers assigned to the checkpoint—PCI Sukarno Adil Dicay and PInsp Rex Ariel Diongon, the convoy was ordered to stop for a routine inspection when armed men suddenly appeared and commandeered the vehicles.

The two PNP officers claimed that then Mayor Andal Ampatuan Jr. of Datu Unsay town was among the armed men.

Before she was killed, Genalyn Mangudadatu, Toto's wife, managed to call her husband briefly to tell him what was happening.

Another victim, 25-year-old journalist Noel Decena of the Koronadal-based weekly Periodico Ini, was able to send an SMS to his brother before he was killed.

"Lab, i-ampo ko diri kay naa na mi diri sa Ampatuan. I-pray mo kami dito. Kritikal amo sitwasyon diri,” Decena said.

All in all, 58 people were killed by the armed men, including 20 members of the Mangudadutu family and supporters, 32 journalists, and six people who were not part of the convoy but were killed as well as they happened to be at the checkpoint at the time of the incident.

The victims were brought to a hilly and sparsely-populated part of  Ampatuan town —Sitio Magating in Barangay Salman. This area is 2.5 kilometers away from the checkpoint where the victims were first accosted.

At Sitio Magating, armed men systematically killed the hostages, shooting them at close range with rapid-fire weapons, and dumping their bodies in mass graves dug using a heavy-duty backhoe.

There were three grave sites:

(1) Grave 1, about 10 to 12 feet deep, contained the bodies of 24 victims, including Toto's wife Genalyn Mangdadatu and his sisters Eden and Farina Mangudadatu;

(2) Grave 2, also 10 to 12 feet deep, contained six bodies and three vehicles crushed by the backhoe: a Toyota Vios, a Mitsubishi L-300 and a Toyota Tamaraw-FX.

(3) Grave 3, about five feet deep, had the bodies of five more victims.

In the three graves, the bodies were alternately buried in layers of soil, alongside the vehicles.

According to an alleged masked witness interviewed on Al Jazeera, the killings and burials took just over an hour. This “witness” claims he was one of the armed men ordered to do the killing but was allegedly bothered by his conscience.

The witness claimed that the operation had to be stopped suddenly when they were warned of approaching Army soldiers, leaving behind about 24 unburied victims and their vehicles, along with the backhoe used to dig the mass graves. All the killers had already fled the crime scene when the soldiers arrived.

According to lead investigator PNP Chief Supt Felecisimo Khu Jr., Army soldiers arrested two “government militias" armed with an M16 rifle and a Gauge 12 shotgun.

Due to jurisdiction issues, the unidentified suspects were turned over to government authorities and were later released. They have not been found since then. —KG, GMA News