GET REALAmnesty International received Nobel Peace Prize in ‘77Solita Collas-Monsod
Philippine Daily Inquirer
February 04, 2017
I was in favor of [President Duterte’s] slogan ‘Change.’ All Filipinos want change. But no Filipino wants dead bodies all over the streets, and for the police killing people to become the norm.â€
Thus begins the report of Amnesty International (AI) on extrajudicial executions in the Philippines’ “war on drugs,†titled “If you are poor, you are killed.†It is a quote from a woman whose husband was unlawfully killed in a police operation.
It is a terrific quote for two reasons: 1) It reflects what we Filipinos have in the back of our minds, no matter what our political persuasions are, and (2) it was spoken, not by an “elite,†not by a “yellowtard,†but by a “masaâ€â€”a 30-year-old woman who related that her house, which had a dirt floor, was wrecked during a “buy-bust operation.†She said it happened during a belated celebration of the birthday of her husband, who was killed with four celebrating friends, leaving her and an infant child.
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