Noy urged to appoint HR victims’ compensation board

MANILA, Philippines - President Aquino was urged yesterday to start the process of compensating about 10,000 victims of human rights violations during martial law by appointing the members of a board that would process compensation.

Former Albay Rep. Edcel Lagman, principal author of Republic Act No. 10368 or the Human Rights Victims Reparation and Recognition Act of 2013, said more than five months after the President signed the law, he has yet to organize the board.

He said the panel is to be composed of a chairman and eight members.

“The claims board is the indispensable core in the implementation of the law,” he said.

He said the panel would determine whether a claimant is a victim of human rights violation.

However, he added that complainants in a class suit adjudicated by the US Federal District Court of Honolulu in Hawaii and those acknowledged as human rights violation victims by non-government organization Bantayog ng mga Bayani are presumed to be human rights victims.

The claims board is also empowered to validate the amounts to be granted to all claimants relative to the severity of the atrocities they suffered in accordance with a point system.

Lagman pointed out that without the panel, the law giving compensation to human rights victims could not be implemented.

“The promulgation of the implementing rules and regulations (IRR) depends on the constitution of the claims board, which is mandated to promulgate the IRR within 15 days from its promulgation.

Consequently, without the claims board being organized, no IRR can be promulgated and no implementation of the law can be started,” he said.

He said the law “gives due reparation and recognition to countless deceased and surviving victims of human rights violations during the martial law regime from Sept. 21, 1972 to Feb. 25, 1986 who suffered summary executions, enforced disappearances, deadly torture and other violations of human rights and civil liberties.”

“The law likewise seeks to rekindle the nation’s memory of the atrocities of martial law and to immortalize the heroism and sacrifices of the victims,” he said.