Palace: Bongbong, Enrile can’t twist truth, rights were violated under Martial Law

Malacañang on Monday turned to court decisions and the law mandating reparations for victims of human rights abuses in debunking the claim of former Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile about what happened during the martial law of the late strongman Ferdinand Marcos.

Enrile, in a one-on-one interview with Marcos' son and namesake, Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr., said that "very few" were arrested but later released and that nobody was killed for their political or religious beliefs during the martial rule.

"That's his belief. He's entitled to it, but as far as the Palace is concerned, there are decisions affirming that there were grave human rights violations committed during the Marcos regime," presidential spokesperson Harry Roque said at a news conference.

He also cited Republic Act 10368 or the Human Rights Victims Reparation and Recognition Act of 2013 which became the basis for compensating Martial Law victims through the P10 billion recovered by the government from the ill-gotten wealth of the Marcoses.

Enrile affixed his signature on the law.

"I don’t think they [Enrile, Bongbong Marcos] can twist history when there’s a law and there are court decisions attesting to what happened during Martial Law," Roque said. "We stand by what the law says. We stand by what court decisions have said."

Enrile's remarks were roundly condemned by the victims and political figures who suffered for fighting the Marcos regime which imposed martial law in 1972 that gave way to a one-man rule that lasted for 14 years.

Marcos died while on exile in Hawaii in 1989, three years after he was ousted from the presidency through the People Power revolt in February 1986.

His remains, brought home in September 1993, had been inside a glass coffin and on public display at the Marcos Museum and Mausoleum in Batac, Ilocos Norte before President Rodrigo Duterte, a vocal admirer of the late dictator, allowed a controversial interment at the Libingan ng mga Bayani in 2016. —NB, GMA News