‘JAIL HER’ | Martial Law survivors want Supreme Court to affirm Imelda’s graft conviction

November 9, 2021 , 01:26 PM

By Beatrice Puente

(November 9, 2021) – Survivors and victims of the brutal regime of former President Ferdinand Marcos Sr. on Tuesday urged the Supreme Court to throw out the appeal filed by former first lady Imelda Marcos on her graft conviction, seeking immediate action three years since the guilty ruling was meted out.

Danilo Dela Fuente of Samahan ng mga Ex-Detainees Laban sa Detensyon at Aresto said the Supreme Court should not sit on the appeal any longer to ensure justice for the nation that suffered under the tyrannical term of Marcos.

“We, the victims of the atrocities during Marcos’ Martial Law, have suffered enough,” wrote Dela Fuente in a letter. “We will continue to suffer as we witness Mrs. Marcos is still out of jail … living a profligate lifestyle, shamelessly luxuriating with the money she and her family stole from the Filipino people.”

In 2018, the Sandiganbayan Fifth Division found the Marcos matriarch guilty of seven counts of graft for transferring some $200 million to seven foundations in Switzerland while she was holding public office during her husband’s military rule. She was acquitted in three other counts due to insufficient evidence.

She was supposed to face a jail term of up to 11 years for each count but she has remained free after posting a P300,000 bail. The Supreme Court has yet to rule with finality on her appeal which has been pending for three years now.

Dela Fuente, who is also a convener of the Campaign Against the Return of the Marcoses and Martial Law (CARMMA), said the Marcos family’s lack of accountability for plundering public coffers adds salt to the wound. He also renewed calls for the government to seize all the ill-gotten wealth the late dictator’s family amassed.

“As long as there is ill-gotten wealth that remains in the hands of the Marcoses, we will continue to demand the return of all that was stolen from the Filipino people from the nation’s coffers,” stressed Dela Fuente.

CARMMA also issued a statement calling on authorities to hold the Marcoses accountable for their atrocities.

“Plundered money by the Marcoses should be returned to the people, instead of being held by this dynasty for their political rehabilitation and ambitions,” said CARMMA.

Bongbong Marcos Jr., who’s running for president in the 2022 elections, has refused to apologize for his family’s crimes despite historical and court evidence. Just recently, the Sandiganbayan Second Division told a bank linked to the Marcos family to return P96 million worth of ill-gotten wealth.

Youth groups like the College Editors Guild of the Philippines (CEGP) also joined calls to jail Imelda as they lamented the “selective justice” favoring the rich in the country.

“President Rodrigo Duterte has been instrumental in bringing back Marcos’ political power and getting away with killings, and multiple counts of corruption cases,” the CEGP said. “(We) are enraged by how selective justice operates perpetrated by the murderous and pathological liar Duterte.”

(PM)

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