Opposition Sen. Leila de Lima urged Filipinos Friday to continue  upholding human rights and come together to promote and protect people’s common rights and freedoms.

De Lima said that the Duterte administration has been using the COVID-19 pandemic to malign critics and harass human rights advocates.

“In the Philippines, while many world leaders have been doing their utmost to address the spread of COVID-19, President Rodrigo Duterte has only taken advantage of the crisis to satisfy his bloodlust, silence dissent, and pin down critics, truth seekers, and human rights advocates,” De Lima said.

De Lima and Senate Minority Leader Franklin Drilon and Sen. Risa Hontiveros had earlier filed a Senate resolution expressing the sense of the Senate to join the international community in commemorating the 2020 Human Rights Day every Dec.  10.

 This marks the 72^nd year of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) that set the universality of people’s rights regardless of race, beliefs, and status in life.
 
This year’s theme “Recover Better – Stand Up for Human Rights,” De Lima said, “calls upon us all in this time of pandemic to amplify our voices and push back more in upholding human rights, especially of those who have become more vulnerable to poverty, abuses, inequality, and discrimination.”

In the Philippines, having the longest lockdown in the world resulted to the further shrinking of civic spaces and continuous erosion of human rights, freedoms, and democracy, according to De Lima.

“More killings have been recorded; the filing of trumped-up cases against dissenters have become the norm; an anti- terrorism law was enacted that removed safeguards against warrantless arrests; the largest broadcasting company was shut down; and the arrest and guilty verdict against journalist Maria Ressa was orchestrated,” she said.

 
Though fighting for human rights is more challenging now with leaders like Duterte who has no qualms in his contempt for human lives and dignity, the lawmaker maintained there are glimpses of light in the battle to overcome this dark chapter of history.

“In a span of several months, we have also witnessed that there is no limit to the cruelty and heartlessness of this regime as it deprived a detainee mother of peacefully mourning and burying her three-month-old daughter, and months later, arresting another mother who had just given birth based on dubious grounds, while perpetuating the killings of activists, priests, lawyers, and human rights defenders,” she added.