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Our president Benigno Simon “Pnoy” Aquino is the son of Ninoy who was a political detainee upon the declaration of martial law along with legal moguls like the late Senator Jose Diokno, and Senator Lorenzo Tañada. Ninoy and his family became political exiles until the Marcos regime eventually allowed him and his family to come home, and upon arrival at the tarmac assassinated him.. His mother, was installed president by the EDSA revolution as people put their trust behind her to bring change and development to a free and democratic nation.

Our vice president Jejomar Binay was a human rights lawyer under the Free Legal Assistance Group during the Martial Law years. He, in the early 80‘s, did the legal documentation of the murder of Kalinga peacepact holder Macliing Dulag to support the case, trial and then the court conviction of the commanding officer of the soldiers who raided Dulag’s village and killed him.

Their (Pnoy and Binay) candidacy and election to their positions today is viewed as having been actively supported by the anti-dictatorship circles.

Any victim in those dark days of the dictatorship especially those who fought hard alongside the Filipino masses against the late dictator will not hesitate to say, No to the move to bury Marcos in the Libingan ng mga Bayani. Unless, like in the auction of an archaeological find or historical relic, he is negotiating the price tag to it.

Stories of the world war II medals, the Nalundasan murder case, the Yamashita treasure and the Golden Buddha are tales like the Indiana Jones movies to this generation but the Jabiddah massacre, the torture, imprisonment, abductions and gory murder of many political prisoners, activists, intellectuals, journalists, labor leaders, etc. in the seventies to the mid eighties, or the thousands of youth, students, workers, women and farmers who were pushed by this oppressive leadership to take to the mountains to defend the limited freedoms to simply live have not forgotten.

The experience under the martial law years shall remain a reminder against dictatorships. Like to the world dictators’ infamy built on a leadership that demonstrated gruesome cruelty in the persecution of peoples like the Jews, the Chinese in the Nanjing massacre, the dropped H bomb in Hiroshima, the Vietnam war genocide and Cambodia’s Pol pot’s killing fields.

We will never know why the devil believes he will win, nor why we believe the angels know they will prevail. But people who lived in the persecution of the two decades of the dictatorship, can at first sight recognize the devil along with the fallen angels among those who decide to legislate in the people’s name one undeserving to be buried among heroes of the Filipino people. May the dead rise and clear their name.

Still, dear president and vice president the thought of transferring, because it is now in place in Ilocos, of the dictator’s remains amongst those in the Libingan is like saying those buried there had lives not worth emulating. They were no peoples’ heroes. # nordis.net