Wednesday, February 21, 2007
Speak out: Karapatan Central Visayas
By Legislated terror
THE passage of the Marcosian Anti-Terrorism Act portends a new and terrifying effort by the government of institutionalizing an undeclared Martial Law.
With it will come forms of state repression worse than the one that has claimed 820 victims of political killings since 2001.
No amount of window dressing can hide the true nature and intent of this legislated terror.
No tired, recycled, motherhood statements on human rights can fool the people from seeing that it is designed to mangle human dignity.
Government apologists may crow at some amendments, like reducing the detention period of suspects without charges from 30 days, as originally proposed, to 15 days and now to three days.
But none of these deodorizers can cover the foul stench emitted from the day the measure was proposed by the generals.
These deodorizers cannot brush aside the odious intention of the measure, as shown by its failure to define “terrorism” and “terrorist acts.”
Its definition remains broad, ambiguous, and arbitrary.
Any militarist in government can use the measure to demonize and criminalize the simplest form of criticism and search for redress.
Worse, it ignores the gruesome phenomenon of state-sponsored terrorism.
It is time the people stop this brand of terrorism before People Power, our legacy to the world, will be criminalized as an “act of terrorism.”
For Bisaya stories from Cebu. Click here. (February 21, 2007 issue)
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