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Whenever the subject of enforced disappearances and
extrajudicial killings (EJK) arises in the media, the
issue always seems to boil down to a clear and seemingly
irrevocable dispute over how many victims we are
actually talking about.
Human-rights groups like Karapatan claim more than 900
people have been subject to EJK since 2001 whereas the
government’s Task Force 211—also known as Task Force
Against Political Violence—puts the figure at “just” 252
(including 56 dismissed).
Unfortunately, each time the media covers the story,
disagreement over the real figure goes back and forward
without there being any kind of clear resolution. All
coverage pretty much ends up leaving both sides
presumably dissatisfied and the audience very confused;
I can’t even imagine how it leaves the families of the
victims feeling.
This
“numbers game” was again played in the media and
human-rights TV program Media Focus on ANC I
participated in, and again in a piece in the Philippine
Daily Inquirer.
On
last week’s TV program, Col. Lina Sarmiento, who leads
the Human Rights Department of the Philippine National
Police Force, maintained Karapatan’s figures were
artificially high and included people killed in “love
triangles” and not for political reasons. This is
something Karapatan denies. I have met Colonel Sarimento
on several occasions, likewise, the representatives of
Karapatan. I respect them all. But who is right and who
is wrong?
Similarly, in the Inquirer piece filed from Davao City,
the government reportedly accuses Karapatan of
“exaggerating” the figures. Government prosecutor Hazel
Valdez, who works with Task Force 211, is quoted as
saying she requested copies of the 903 cases Karapatan
says it has of EJK, “but all our requests have not been
answered.” For its part, Karapatan denied its figures
were “bloated” and said it had not yet provided the
information because the government had not yet made any
request.
Again,
who is right and who is wrong? Whether the real figure
is 903 or 252 doesn’t so much matter, surely. One person
who has been killed or “disappeared” is one too
many—especially in the view of the family affected.
Last
week’s TV debate also featured Erlinda Cadapan, mother
of University of the Philippines student Sheryl Cadapan
who has been missing now for almost two years. She sat
between Colonel Sarmiento and Jigs Clamor, Karapatan
deputy secretary general, as they disputed each other’s
figures. Perhaps the numbers game is not so important to
her. All she wants to know is what happened to her
daughter.
I used
to hold the opinion that maybe we shouldn’t be so
concerned with whether the real number is 903 or 252.
But I
think I was wrong. The reason I think I was wrong is
that if we are ever to move beyond the numbers game and
start to seriously challenge the continuing climate of
impunity, we need to thoroughly and dispassionately
investigate, document, publicize and push for action on
each and every single case.
Justice is all about evidence and proving our case. We,
thus, have to put the exact number of extrajudicial
killings and enforced disappearances beyond any kind of
doubt and debate and start focusing our efforts on
delivering justice.
In
part, I credit my conversion to an inspiring few days in
the company of Peruvian forensic anthropologist Dr. Jose
Pablo Baraybar. Dr. Baraybar used to work as a forensic
investigator for the International Criminal Tribunal for
the former Yugoslavia and last week led a series of
training seminars and workshops on extrajudicial
killings and torture for government prosecutors and
civil society in Subic Bay. I’m not sure how focused
some of the government prosecutors were, but it was a
great event. It was hosted by several local legal groups
and the University of the Philippines, as well as the
American Bar Association.
Dr.
Baraybar’s day job is currently as director of a
forensic civil-society group in Peru that documents,
identifies and recovers the remains of the many
thousands of victims of extrajudicial killings there. As
he said, the whole world knows of the victims of
Pinochet’s Chile because the general there was a
dictator. We don’t know much at all about the far higher
number of killings in Peru because they happened under a
democracy. There is a lesson in there somewhere about
how effective the local and international media has been
in covering Peru.
Perhaps more important for our own purposes, though, is
what he said about the issue of EJK and enforced
disappearances here. Two key things stick out in my
mind—the first being that civil-society groups in the
Philippines have to determine the “universe”—that is, we
need to find out and agree the exact number. Ultimately,
of course, every statistic is a person, and that person
had a family, and that person was denied their most
fundamental human right.
In
countries the world over, from Peru, Israel, the former
Yugoslavia, Rwanda, Cambodia and so on, documentation
centers and organizations work to painstakingly try and
piece together and document each and every life
lost—how, why and by whose hand.
Dr.
Baraybar also showed by the example of his own Peruvian
organization Equipo Peruano de Antropología Forense how
civil society and the media can and should actively
participate in the investigation and documentation
process, up to and including autopsies, where relevant.
It begins with documentation of numbers under agreed
criteria—but it extends to developing forensic
expertise. Who says the government should and does have
all the expertise in this?
The
way out of the current impasse and the numbers game is
surely for those human-rights organizations working on
the issue of EJK and enforced disappearances to come
together properly, to put any political differences and
aspirations aside and to begin work in a systematic,
objective and reliable way to investigate and document
the “universe.”
Until
we do so, until we recognize that the issue of
extrajudicial killings and enforced disappearances is an
issue of human rights and not political point-scoring or
lobbying, the numbers game will continue and we will
just keep on allowing the issue to be clouded in the
minds of many both here and overseas.
If 903
is indeed the figure, let’s all collectively work
together to prove it. If it is not, let us find out the
real figure and put it beyond further dispute, list
every name and identity and start working to deliver
them justice and to end the continuing climate of
impunity. In the end this is not about Left or Right,
but simply right and wrong. |
