Martial Law victims ask SC to void Sarmiento appointment

MANILA, Philippines - A group of human rights victims during the Martial law years on Tuesday asked the Supreme Court to nullify the appointment of retired police general Lina Sarmiento as head of the Human Rights Victims Claims Board.

The Martial Law victims led by former Bayan Muna Rep. Satur Ocampo, filed a petition for certiorari before the high court in Manila.

Petitioners include Martial Law victims- Ocampo, Bayan Muna Rep. Neri Javier Colmenares, Dr. Maria Carolina Araullo, Trinidad Repuno, Tita Lubi and Josephine Dongail. They were assisted by their legal counsels from the National Union of Peoples’ Lawyers. 

Based on RA 10368, members of the Human Rights Victims Claims Board should possess the following qualifications: 1) must be of known probity, competence and integrity; 2) must have a deep and thorough understanding and knowledge of human rights and involvement in efforts against human rights violations committed during the regime of former President Ferdinand Marcos; 3) must have a clear and adequate understanding and commitment to human rights protection, promotion and advocacy. 

"We want to mark it in our history that never again shall we allow perpetrators of human rights violations go unpunished. Letting a Martial Law relic head the Human Rights Victims Claims Board is a betrayal of that purpose. We shall exhaust any legal remedy available so that justice may be served," Ocampo said.

In their petition, the group said that "it is more than an issue of trust between the Human Rights Claims Board and the human rights victims. It is greater than ensuring confidence in the system supposedly envisioned to bring about justice. It is beyond the integrity of the process of arriving at the compensation to be awarded and the standards to be used in determining compensability and linking it to the rightful beneficiaries. The sum total of these values, though important, does not adequately address the issue against appointing a former police general to head the Human Rights Claims Board."

"The human rights victims are not beggars and are not concerned merely with seeking compensation for themselves for past and continuing atrocities. Compensation is a component of justice. Re-writing the history of human rights violations during the martial law regime is the bigger picture. By appointing a former police general to head the Human Rights Claims Board, the President is practically exonerating the entire system that perpetrated the abuses, justified their occurrence, and concealed them with a veneer of impunity," the petitioners added.