MANILA, Philippines — Following the decision of the Supreme Court to overturn the graft conviction against former first lady Imelda Marcos that was only made public on Wednesday, groups have expressed rage over the decision.
The August Twenty One Movement (ATOM), known for their involvement in the 1986 People Power Revolution, said in a statement on Wednesday night that Marcos loyalists for years disputed that it was never truly proven legally that the Marcoses has ever done something wrong against this country.
The decision followed the arrest of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s cousin and former House speaker Martin Romualdez.
“The [High Court’s] decision is an example of why we never saw them spend a day in jail. They were so powerful during martial law, and it carried on even through the years after martial law,” the group said.
“Two days after the Ombudsman showed a flicker of hope to this nation that, finally, we may actually see justice being served after Martin Romualdez was charged with plunder, despite Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s blood ties to the former speaker, whatever flicker of hope we had was instantly quashed by this new decision,” they added.
The group said that they were reminded “that the shadow of the conjugal dictatorship never really left our government.”
“To the Marcoses and the Romualdezes, you may have won this round, but we have etched this in stone today, nothing stops until this part of history is that no one will stop until the true history that was altered by the Marcos and Duterte administrations is corrected. From the burial of the dictator’s remains at the Libingan ng mga Bayani (Heroes’ Cemetery) to the courts’ continued exoneration of the Marcoses!” ATOM said.
“We saw what you did. We know why you did it. We will not forget, and we will remember,” they added.
For Tindig Pilipinas co-convenor Kiko Aquino-Dee, whose grandfather and former opposition leader Benigno Aquino Jr. was murdered on Aug. 21, 1983, he was already thinking of giving the current administration the benefit of the doubt over the arrest of Romualdez, but was left at a loss over the High Court’s decision.
“In the best case scenario, the [High Court] is truly independent of the executive, and they've given us a preview of how this Romualdez drama will end. In the most realistic scenario, we've been robbed by a Marcos yet again,” he wrote on Facebook on Wednesday.
“No forgiveness for unrepentant thieves and murderers… Statements like this typically end with a call to action, but I’m at a loss. Just let me be sad and angry,” Aquino-Dee added.
The group also released a statement on Thursday.
“For those who lived through the Marcos dictatorship, for those who study history, and for those who examine the evidence, what was found in Imelda’s foreign accounts is not even a fraction of what the Marcoses stole,” Tindig Pilipinas said in Filipino.
The opposition coalition said there will come a day when there will be accountability.
“Our appeal to our fellow citizens: please do not lose hope in our country. To everyone who works honestly, everyone who does not steal, everyone who follows the law—we are the true Philippines,” it said.
Meanwhile, Project Gunita, an academic-research organization preserving and popularizing archival material about the Marcos dictatorship, said history will hold the former first lady accountable.
“The latest decision of the Philippine Supreme Court's First Division to reverse the landmark Sandiganbayan conviction of former First Lady Imelda Romualdez-Marcos for seven counts of graft on November 9, 2018 is not surprising. But it is nevertheless abominable,” the group said on Wednesday night.
“This is just another show of acquiescence of our (dis)honorable justices to Malacañang, whose current occupant is Imelda's equally unrepentant and thieving son,” they added.
The group called the High Court’s decision “astonishing” and called on the judicial system to be rid of “court jesters”.
“For the Supreme Court to find this insufficient to prove her guilt beyond reasonable doubt is astonishing, and any explanation to make sense of this decision should lead to no other conclusion than the existence of compromise under this political dispensation, led by another Marcos as president,” they said.
“We condemn this decision by the Supreme Court! Our judicial system, the SC included, must quit being court jesters for the Marcoses or any other corrupt political dynasty. The SC should not return to its dark days under the Marcos Sr. dictatorship, where it served as a mere cannon fodder to legalize Marcos Sr's illegitimate regime,” they added.
The group also reminded Filipinos that the High Court’s decision also came days before the 54th anniversary of the declaration of Martial Law.
“We now ask: If this is how the Imelda Marcos case ends, how can we then expect that former Speaker Martin Romualdez, her nephew and another beneficiary of the Marcos dictatorship's two decades of plunder, will even go to prison to face the music?” Project Gunita said.
“If our courts, under the presidency of the late dictator’s son, will refuse to hold Imelda Marcos accountable, our history will make the Marcos family pay. We will never forget. We will continue to hound the Marcoses. We will not relent to remind everyone of their corruption and other sins against our people. We will never cede an inch of truth and our historical memory to the legal contortions of the gods of Padre Faura,” they added.
Mrs. Marcos was convicted of graft on Nov. 9, 2018 by the Sandiganbayan for creating several foundations in Switzerland to hide accumulation of at least $200 million in stolen wealth during her tenure as Metro Manila governor, during the administration of her husband, former president Ferdinand Marcos Sr. The High Court overturned this decision last June, but only made public three months later.
