Let us not forget sins
of the Marcos regime

The gracious welcome our state officials are giving this week to Ferdinand R. (Bong Bong) Marcos is totally insensitive to the victims of the grave human rights abuses committed during the martial law regime of his father, Ferdinand E. Marcos, from 1972 to 1986. President Marcos (the father) came to Honolulu after he was finally forced out of office by the "people power" revolt in Manila in 1986. Shortly after his arrival, numerous claims based on gross violations of fundamental human rights were filed against him. He died here in 1989, but the cases continued against his estate.

After a hotly contested and emotional trial held in three separate sessions during 1992, 1994 and 1995, a jury in Hawaii's federal court awarded 9,531 individuals (and their heirs) named in the suit who had suffered torture, murder or disappearance $1.2 billion in exemplary damages and $766 million in compensatory damages. Marcos had ruled the Philippines by autocratic decree, issuing almost daily lists of individuals who were to be rounded up. Many of those detained were subject to "tactical interrogation," the code phrase used to refer to the various torture techniques. Judge Manuel Real, who presided over the trial, listed the techniques utilized as including:

» beatings while blindfolded by punching, kicking and hitting with rifle butts;
» the "telephone," where a detainee's ears were clapped simultaneously, producing a ringing sound in the head;
» insertion of bullets between the fingers of a detainee and squeezing the hand;
» the "wet submarine," where a detainee's head was submerged in a toilet bowl full of excrement;
» the "water cure," where a cloth was placed over the detainee's mouth and nose, and water poured over it, producing a drowning sensation;
» the "dry submarine," where a plastic bag was placed over the detainee's head, producing suffocation;
» use of a detainee's hands for putting out lighted cigarettes;
» use of flat-irons on the soles of a detainee's feet;
» forcing a detainee while wet and naked to sit before an air conditioner, often while sitting on a block of ice;
» injection of a clear substance, believed to be truth serum, into a detainee's body;
» stripping, sexually molesting and raping female detainees; one male plaintiff testified he was threatened with rape;
» electric shock where one electrode is attached to the genitals of males or the breasts of females and another electrode to some other part of the body, usually a finger, and electrical energy produced from a military field telephone is sent through the body;
» Russian roulette; and
» solitary confinement while handcuffed or tied to a bed.

The human rights victims have been trying to collect their judgment from the assets of the Marcos estate during the past decade. Bong Bong Marcos, along with his mother, Imelda, serves as executor of this estate and has been systematically attempting to thwart these efforts. Judge Real has found both Bong Bong Marcos and Imelda Marcos to be in contempt of court for failing to appear and produce documents at scheduled depositions and for violating the injunction prohibiting any disposition or distribution of the assets in the estate of President Marcos. He has fined them $100,000 for every day that they continue to refuse to cooperate, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit upheld this finding of contempt in 1996.

In light of this continuing refusal of Bong Bong Marcos to cooperate with the U.S. federal courts and to address and resolve the outstanding debt owed to the long-suffering Filipinos who endured severe violations of their human rights, it is simply bizarre for our island leaders to honor him and to treat him as a legitimate political leader.

Sherry Broder and Jon M. Van Dyke, along with Philadelphia lawyer Robert A. Swift, have been representing the class of human rights victims against Ferdinand E. Marcos and his estate since 1986.

Let us not forget sins of the Marcos regime

Let us not forget sins
of the Marcos regime