Victims’ families hope for justice under Duterte
SHARIFF AGUAK, Maguindanao: As families of victims of the infamous Maguindanao massacre commemorate on November 23 the gruesome murder of 57 civilians, including 38 journalists, eight years for Maguindanao governor to the provincial election supervisor in Shariff Aguak in May 2010 when members of the Ampatuan
The suspects, backed by their private army, herded the victims to a hilly area at Sitio Salman in Barangay Masalay of Ampatuan municipality where they were
The Ampatuan patriarch, former governor Andal Ampatuan Sr., did not want the candidacy for the same post of his son, Andal - lenged by any candidate.
The older Ampatuan, tagged as key plotter of the carnage, the country’s worst election-related violence ever, died of liver cancer while in detention at Camp Bagong Diwa jail facility in Taguig City.
The Ampatuans then were feared for their absolute non-tolerance of anyone who challenges them in their bailiwick.
Mangudadatu, then vice mayor of Buluan town, his siblings and other relatives, all scions of Maguindanao’s Rajah Buayan nobility, did even if the incident has transgressed clan pride and honor.
through the courts, in seeking This file photo taken on November 25, 2009 shows police investigators looking for evidence next to the bodies of Maguindanao massacre victims. justice. As up to when we have wait, we don’t know. We are knocking on the heart of Presi
Senior Ampatuan clan members, among them Datu Zaldy, former governor of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, are being prosecuted for their alleged involvement in the carnage.
Hope Teodoro, a son of journalist victim Andy Teodoro of Tacurong in Sultan Kudarat, said it is very painful on the part of the victims’ families that until now the case is far from being resolved.
Hope said he was in Buluan where the Maguindanao governor gathered the victims’ surviving families for the advance commemoration of the infamous Maguindanao massacre.
He added that the victims’ families are hopeful that with President Duterte’s help, the cases of multiple murder against the suspects will be resolved.
“We are indeed happy that [lawyer] Harry Roque, a known human rights lawyer and among those helping the families of the Maguindanao massacre victims, will now have more access to President Duterte, being his spokesman, for the speedy dispensation of