The persistent pattern of enforced disappearances around the world provides a critical backdrop for historical revisionism in the Philippines. Nearly 30 years after Ferdinand Marcos and his family fled the country – the climax to the first modern 'People Power' revolution – the consensus on the dictatorship seems to have become diluted.
Making people 'disappear' is both an exercise of power and the entrenchment of it. It is a practice associated with regimes in the 20th century, such as those in Argentina, Chile and El Salvador. Dissidents and political rivals were abducted or arrested, never to be seen again. The object is to cultivate fear and insecurity. These were features of martial law under Marcos.
Many Filipinos who had been part of the resistance are still alive. Some of them are survivors of torture or relatives of the 'disappeared'. According to human rights group Karapatan, the bodies of 759 who were 'disappeared' have never been found – a portion of over 3000 extrajudicial killings.
Yet as the world marks the International Day of the Victims of Enforced Disappearance on August 30, post-1986 generations find it hard to grasp what it meant to express dissent or join opposition groups when Marcos was president. Some now assert that, compared to the current standard of governance and politics, life must have been better under Marcos.
Such perceptions are validated when trusted institutions invite Imelda Marcos as guest of honour. She appeared in July at a dinner hosted by the Ateneo de Manila University scholarship foundation, ostensibly due to the fact that the foundation began with proceeds from a Van Cliburn concert that she had organised in 1974. Students posted jocular 'selfies' with her on Instagram.
The optics caused considerable pain and outrage. There are staff members at the Jesuit university and its institutes who went 'underground' during the dictatorship. One of its former students, Edgar Jopson, was summarily killed along with many activists. Benigno 'Ninoy' Aquino Jr, the opposition senator who was assassinated at the airport on his return from exile, was also an alumnus. After the dinner, a faculty member posted a Facebook update – widely shared – in which he points out the incongruity of teaching Catholic social values while giving Imelda Marcos a place at the table.
It is an episode that demonstrates the tension between living memory and the apparent distance of history. The university president was compelled to offer a public apology, though