Podcasts
By Puma Podcast on May 4, 2023
An episode of the podcast series: What’s AP? Araling Panlipunan Rebooted
The story of Ninoy’s return from exile doesn’t end with his assassination, but with a long-forgotten van, a future museum, and a small office fighting to preserve martial law history. MemCom executive director Chuck Crisanto takes Sab and Ceej into the actual van that held the body of Ninoy Aquino, in this episode about being able to touch and see our history.
By Justice Visions on Jan 30, 2023
In May 2022, Ferdinand ‘Bong Bong’ Marcos, the son of former dictator Ferdinand Marcos won the presidential elections in the Philippines. The vice-presidential elections were won by Sara Duterte, daughter of the former authoritarian president Rodrigo Duterte.
What does the election of the son of a former dictator tell us about the Philippines’ transitional justice process? What to make of the historical revisionism that facilitated this electoral outcome, in light of transitional justice’s concern with truth and memorialization?
By Teka Teka News on Aug 10, 2022
Listen to this episode from Teka Teka News on Spotify. Join the Teka Teka news and What’s AP team as they visit the AVSECOM van that was used to transport the bodies of Ninoy Aquino and Rolando Galman shortly after the former senator was killed on the tarmac of the Manila International Airport on August 21, 1983. Rotting in a junkyard for decades, what secrets does the van hold? What stories may it still tell?
By GMA News on Sep 27, 2022
Howie Severino speaks to a man with a tough job, Chuck Crisanto, the executive director of the government agency tasked with memorializing human rights violations during the martial law era. Crisanto explains the challenge of educating the youth and building a museum mandated by law but may not receive any public funding.
By Puma Podcast on May 10, 2022
An episode of the podcast series: What’s AP? Araling Panlipunan Rebooted
50 years after Ferdinand Marcos declared Martial Law, the dictator’s family claws its way back into power. Here’s a guest episode from Teka Teka News that we’d like to share with you to help process this current moment—and so that we may #NeverForget.
Videos
By GMA News on Sept 5, 2023
The construction of the Freedom Memorial Museum, which will honor the lives of the victims of human rights violations victims during the Martial Law rule of the late former president Ferdinand Marcos Sr., will begin in January 2024, an official said Tuesday.
By GMA News on Aug 23, 2023
The inclusion in curricula of human rights violations under the regime of former President Ferdinand Marcos Sr. has yet to be implemented some ten years after the enactment of the Human Rights Victims Reparation and Recognition Act.
At the hearing of the Commission on Higher Education’s proposed P29-billion allocation for 2024, Albay Rep. Edcel Lagman asked if the CHED has implemented Section 27 of the law.
By Vice News on Sep 23, 2022
The Philippines’ latest presidential election results mark the return of the country’s most notorious political family into office. The late dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr ruled the country for 21 years, until he was ousted nearly four decades ago. During his regime, thousands were detained, tortured and killed under Martial Law, and the family allegedly stole billions from government coffers. Yet in May, his son and namesake, Ferdinand Marcos Jr, won the presidency by a landslide. We find out why and how it happened.
By ANC on Sep 22, 2022
By Radyo Katipunan 87.9 FM on Sep 19, 2022
Martial Law… Golden… Pagkaraan ng 50 taon, Paano Aalalahanin ang Martial Law?
News Articles
By CNN Philippines on Sept 19, 2023
A Senate finance sub-committee approved on Tuesday the ₱976-million proposed budget of the Commission on Human Rights for 2024.
“The deliberation of the proposed budget of the Commission on Human Rights and the Human Rights Violations Victims Memorial Commission is hereby submitted to the plenary since no other senators are willing to question,” Sen. Jinggoy Estrada said.
By CNN Philippines on Aug 22, 2023
By Inquirer.Net on Feb 25, 2023
By ABS-CBN on Feb 25, 2023
By BBC on Sep 30, 2022
The year was 1977, five years since President Ferdinand E Marcos had declared martial law in the Philippines – on 21 September 1972. Mr Marcos suspended parliament and arrested opposition leaders – Mr Matela was among the tens of thousands of people detained and tortured during a decade of martial law. Fifty years on, he is no longer afraid to speak out. But he is afraid of not being believed at a time when the truth about one of the darkest periods in Filipino history is under attack. Read More
By Inquirer.Net on Sep 26, 2022
How does a nation build a museum memorializing a time its own government believes is water under the bridge?
For the Human Rights Violations Victims’ Memorial Commission (HRVVMC), tasked with the heavy burden of building a martial law museum under the administration of the son and namesake of the dictator Ferdinand Marcos, this means crossing the proverbial bridge when the commission gets there. Read more
By Canadian Broadcasting Corporation on Sep 23, 2022
14-year period under Marcos rule considered to be a dark chapter in Philippine history. On the morning of Sept. 23, 1972, Chris Sorio remembers being awoken by his mother at their home in Quezon City in the Philippines. She told him that the country had just been placed under martial law. “There’s nothing on TV and nothing on the radio,” said Sorio, who was a teenager at the time. He is now 64 and living in Vancouver. “So there’s chaos and confusion among people because they don’t know what’s happening.” Read More
By ABS-CBN on Sep 21, 2022
The construction of a museum honoring victims of human rights violations during martial law is not a slap in the Marcos family’s faces, the head of the Human Rights Violations Victims Memorial Commission (HRVVMC) said Wednesday. Carmelo Victor Crisanto made the statement when asked if he thinks the project could move forward under a Marcos presidency, a day after he told lawmakers that it risks becoming a white elephant due to lack of funds… Read More
By AFP, Japan Times on Sep 20, 2022
American lawyer Thomas Jones still remembers the scars of Philippine torture victims he interviewed for Amnesty International inside the country’s detention centers in 1975 during the rule of late dictator Ferdinand Marcos… Read More
By Philippine Star on Sep 16, 2022
Budgets prepared by the executive branch from 2017 to 2020 did have a special provision allotting trust receipts from the ill-gotten wealth of the Marcoses to build a museum dedicated to memorializing Martial Law’s victims, contrary to a claim by the Department of Budget and Management. Read more
By CNN on Jul 16, 2022
Filipinos living abroad are snapping up books about the late Philippine dictator Ferdinand E. Marcos, not just to read about history but to preserve it. The rush to buy books documenting Marcos’ destructive 21-year reign comes as his son, Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr., assumes office after a landslide election victory in May. Read more
By CNN Philippines on Jun 24, 2022
Constructing the museum that would honor victims and survivors of martial law under the late dictator Ferdinand E. Marcos’ regime has been hounded by “all sorts of difficulties,” according to the head of the memorial commission tasked to complete the long-awaited project. The Human Rights Violations Victims’ Memorial Commission (HRVVMC) hit multiple snags, but its Executive Director Carmelo Victor Crisanto said this doesn’t mean they have little progress to show. Read more
By CNN Philippines on Jun 24, 2022
Whether or not the construction of the delay-ridden martial law museum will push through would depend on the incoming Marcos administration, said the head of the commission in charge of the project. Executive Director Carmelo Victor Crisanto made this response when asked by CNN Philippines when the Freedom Memorial Museum — the flagship project of the Human Rights Violations Victims’ Memorial Commission (HRVVMC) — may be expected to finally rise. Read more
By National Public Radio on Jun 17, 2022
NPR’s Sacha Pfeiffer talks to Carmelo Crisanto, executive director of the Human Rights Violations Victims’ Memorial Commission, about racing to archive human rights abuses in the Philippines. Read more
By Philippine Star on Jun 11, 2022
This week, international attention has turned to the Philippines as Ferdinand Marcos Jr. prepares to become the country’s next president. Instead of stamping out reminders of tyranny, will there be a restoration? With an ousted dictator’s son taking power, will historical documents be destroyed? Will the memories of victims be forcibly erased?… Read more
By The Guardian on Jun 7, 2022
Survivors fear documents may vanish when Philippine dictator’s son assumes office after election victory. Read more
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By Reuters on May 27, 2022
Books about the late Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos and his brutal era of martial law are flying off the shelves, spurred by “panic buying” after his son and namesake won a May 9 presidential election. Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr.’s presidency, set to begin on June 30, has many people worried about losing access to books and other accounts of his father’s rule, given his family’s decades-long effort to rehabilitate its name through what critics describe as a campaign of historical revisionism. Read more
By Ruptly on May 24, 2022
Activists campaigning for the victims who suffered under former Philippine president Ferdinand Marcos launched a digital library out of their offices in Quezon City on Tuesday, ahead of the May 9 election where the ex-leaders son is predicted to take power. Read more
By Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung on Apr 4, 2022
Before the presidential election in the Philippines, the dictator’s son Ferdinand Marcos Jr. is leading the field of candidates. His father’s victims are appalled at the potential return of the Marcos clan to power. Read more
By GMA News on Feb 25, 2022
An official of the Human Rights Violations Victims’ Memorial Commission has lamented the lack of knowledge by many people, especially the younger ones, about the atrocities committed by the government under Martial Law declared by the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr. Read more
By Rappler on Feb 25, 2022
On the day it became clear that Marcos Jr. had won the presidency, a book published in 1976 detailing corruption and abuses during the Marcos regime sold 300 copies, its publisher says. Read more
By Rappler on Feb 24, 2022
The Marcos family is very resilient and has invested much in trying to tell their own interpretation of history, says Human Rights Violation Victims Memorial Commission director Carmelo Crisanto. Information gap is among the many reasons why the Marcoses remained prominent even after 36 years had passed, according to the head of Human Rights Violation Victims Memorial Commission. Read more