Marcos family, AFP must be cited in contempt—lawyer
Media personnel and Marcos loyalists gather outside the Libingan ng mga Bayani just before the scheduled burial of former president Ferdinand Marcos. FRANCES MANGOSING/INQUIRER.net
The Marcos family and the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) should be cited in contempt of court for disregarding the judicial process by pushing through with the burial of former President Ferdinand Marcos sans finality of the Supreme Court decision, a lawyer said on Friday.
Voting 9-5, the high court last week dismissed the petitions to stop Marcos’ interment at the Libingan ng mga Bayani (LNMB).
READ: SC OKs Marcos burial at Libingan
The high court said there is no grave abuse of discretion on the part of President Rodrigo Duterte in allowing the Marcos burial at LNMB.
The high court has also lifted the status quo ante order (SQAO) against the preparations for the burial. However, two separate urgent motions were filed asking the high court to reissue the SQAO pending finality of the decision.
Petitioners added that the re-issuance of the SQAO is also necessary so as not to render moot and academic the motion for reconsideration that petitioners intend to file.
Atty. Edre Olalia, Secretary-General of the National Union of Peoples’ Lawyers (NUPL), said the Marcos burial “smacks of bad faith, bad taste and even bad odor, as it were.”
The NUPL is counsel of one of the petitioners against the Marcos burial.
“The heirs of the tyrant have even outclassed him by showing brazen contempt even for the formal judicial and legal processes, not to mention mocking the cries for justice of the victims. It is consistent though with the lying, stealing & killing of the dictator: doing it with a straight face, washing hands, covering up & getting away with it,” Olalia said.
“ Despite his dictatorial rule, Marcos took great pains to give a semblance or trapping of legality and cynically following the ‘rule of law’ to justify his strongman rule,” he added.
Olalia said t he Marcos family and the military should be cited in contempt of court and in contempt of the judgment of history.
READ: PNP, AFP confirm Marcos to be buried at Libingan today
“ We think that the all-time thief, tyrant, and rights violator will turn on his grave and will not never lay to rest,” he said. RAM/rga
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