As the country observed the anniversary of the Edsa People Power Revolution, children and friends of the late Sen. Jose “Pepe” Diokno on Friday marked his 90th birth and 25th death anniversaries by calling on the government to speed up the resolution of human rights cases.
Two Diokno children—Jose Manuel and Ma. Socorro, chair and secretary general of the Free Legal Assistance Group (FLAG), respectively—said that despite the changes in the political leadership, a “culture of impunity” and a slow administration of justice still remained.
The late Diokno in 1974 founded the organization, which his children now head.
“The human rights situation remains very bad. There is still impunity,” Jose Manuel said. “While survivors and witnesses languish in the government’s witness protection program for years, those accused remain free.”
Socorro Diokno said the focus of the Edsa revolt anniversary should not be “picnics and singing” but people should remember those who were killed and who suffered during the Marcos dictatorship.
She said that while the younger generation looked at Fort Bonifacio as a shopping and “gimmick” area, people during the martial law years dreaded the place that hosted thousands of illegally detained Filipinos.
“People have forgotten what the Fort once stood for. We have refused to see that past for what it is,” she said.
An ‘unbeliever’
Although he served as the first chair of the Presidential Committee on Human Rights, Diokno was not initially supportive of the popular uprising that catapulted the late Cory Aquino to power, Socorro said. She said her father, despite being a stalwart in the anti-Marcos movement, chose to stay away from Edsa.
“He thought it was a product of a military conspiracy,” Socorro said. He said, ‘Why would I help them after what they’ve done to our people?’… He understood Edsa to be an action begun by the military for personal purposes,” she said.
Support for Cory Aquino
After Mrs. Aquino became President, however, Diokno chose to support her because the realized her government’s position was “shaky” and “because the alternative would be worse for us,” Socorro said.
In 1987, the former senator resigned from the government in protest against the Mendiola massacre and the murder of labor leader Rolando Olalia. “He said, ‘I did not fight for this. In cannot, in my conscience, fight for this,” recalled Socorro.
Mrs. Aquino was one of his last visitors before he died at his home in Quezon City on Feb. 27, 1987.
Two different songs
Diokno was elected senator in 1963 and served until martial law was declared in 1972.
A political prisoner until 1974, he and fellow opposition senator Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino Jr. —whose widow was to succeed Marcos in 1986—were kept in solitary confinement at the military base in Laur, Nueva Ecija, for nearly a month.
The two senators were said to have signaled to each other that they were still alive by singing in the morning—Aquino sang “Bayan Ko” while Diokno sang the national anthem.