Imee forgot millennials protested her pa’s hero’s burial, youth group says

A youth group has slammed Ilocos Norte Governor Imee Marcos for claiming that millennials have moved on with issues hounding her family, noting that young people were prime movers of protests against her father, former President Ferdinand Marcos.

“She seems to have forgotten how the youth mobilized against the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos’s burial at the Libingan ng mga Bayani,” Samahan ng Progresibong Kabataan (Spark) said in a statement on Wednesday.

The group also said that Imee’s statements contrasted with how youth organizations have been “involved in making people remember the many atrocities that happened during martial rule.”

“There is no moving on until justice has been served.  There is also no moving on in that we will never forget the damage martial law has done. She has no right no claim what our stand is on the issue,” Spark claimed.

While several people were commemorating former Senator Ninoy Aquino’s death on Tuesday, Marcos told reporters that the feud between the two political families should not be dug up again.

“The millennials have moved on, and I think people at my age should also move on as well,” she said.

READ: Imee Marcos asks Filipinos criticizing her family: Why don’t you move on?

Several Liberal Party members and incumbent officials have condemned Marcos’ remarks, with Senator Bam Aquino saying that it would be difficult to move on without closure.

READ: Bam Aquino slams Imee Marcos’ ‘move on’ remark

Young people who were not yet alive when the late strongman implemented Martial Law said that there is a way to know the negative effects of a strongman rule, as some of the policies still affect the nation.

“We may not have been alive during that time, but policies passed during his time such as the Education Act of 1982 which hinders our right to education still affect us,” Spark claimed.

“The foreign debt incurred during his administration that our generation and the generations after us will have to pay also continue to affect how inaccessible basic social services are to ordinary Filipino people,” they added. /je