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Saturday, September 9, 2017
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YES, THE heirs and cronies of dictator Ferdinand Marcos should return their ill-gotten wealth, every centavo of it. But yes, they should be made accountable for the crime of plunder. No more, no less. Let this ill-gotten wealth benefit the people, yes, but full justice can only be attained if plunderers and criminals are punished.
Any compromise agreement in favor of granting immunity to the remorseless Marcoses and their cronies is a reversal of history and escaping accountability. This is unacceptable and should not even reach the halls of Congress, whose loyalty now is to a President who gives everything in favor of the late dictator, his heirs and cronies.
There have been a number of attempts in the past to enter into a compromise agreement with the Marcoses, and almost all of them aimed at rehabilitating the dictator while his heirs creep their way back to power by using their influence to get away from accountability.
A mere return of the ill-gotten wealth should not mean absolution from the crimes of plunder, human rights violations and massive corruption. Such offer is a deceptive gesture of a family seeking to complete their political rehabilitation without acknowledging the wrongdoings of the dictator.
The compromise agreement being floated seems like a fix designed to fool martial law victims and the people to make the plunderous and murderous Marcos dictatorship look benevolent. President Duterte should disclose detailsĀ ofĀ what seemed like ānegotiationsā with the Marcoses and he should stop acting like a stooge of the dictator.
The victims of Marcosā martial law have long been the ones painstakingly pushing for justice for all the wrongdoings of the Marcos dictatorship. They have earned the stripes to oppose any form of compromise agreement.
For 21 years the Marcos dictatorship plundered the country and made the economy worse. Any attempt to revise history should be rejected.
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