Vice President Leni Robredo on Tuesday revealed the supposed efforts by some groups this week to step up revision of history in a bid to erase the dark past of Martial Law.
In a Facebook post, Robredo said she was informed that a “lot of historical is being done” as the Philippines marked 48 years since the Martial Law declaration under late dictator Ferdinand Marcos.
“Yesterday, we commemorated the beginning of one of the darkest periods in our history. It is always important to learn from the lessons of the past so that we don’t allow the bad to happen again,” she said.
While she reminded the public about the lessons of the Martial Law, Robredo noted ”just this week, I was told of ongoing efforts to pursue this with more vigor.”
A human rights lawyer, Robredo has repeatedly said Filipinos must never forget the crimes and abuses under the Marcos regime.
Marcos placed the entire country under Martial Law on September 21, 1972, which he publicly announced two days later, supposedly to counter threats by communist insurgents, but the military rule was marred by killings, corruption, media oppression, and human rights abuses.
On Monday, Robredo, in her message, underscored the current task of the people to “push back against these lies at every instant and tell the stories of Martial Law and dictatorship over and over so that this generation, and the ones that come after, may be bound tighter through remembering.”
In this regard, the vice president encouraged the public to watch the DaangDokyu films, which they can access on its website and YouTube Channel for free.
Daang Dokyu Film Festival is organized by the Filipino Documentary Society (FilDocs) that features the largest collection of documentaries about the Philippines. It will run from Sept. 19 to November 5, 2020.
But from Sept. 19 to 23, they are running special Martal Law edition films, Robredo said.