Wander on, my Dear

the-artificem

heres some random updates so you can get a grasp on whats happening here in the philippines:

professors are urging their students to let them know if theyre not gonna come to class so theyll know that theyre still alive
parents are telling their kids not to come home late, or if they will, to take an uber even though its priced like 5x more
people are sharing constitutional rights on twitter, to teach everyone what to say to the popos just in case
nobody trusts the police anymore
police have a QUOTA of “drug addicts” they need to kill
almost 13k dead without due process, but chines drug lords and presidents son who were involved in a drug smuggling worth 6 billion are still walking free
all it takes is a facebook rumor to put you on the hit list
politicians who are criticizing the administration are being impeached
politicians who love the administration admit that their duty is to the president, NOT to the people
theres been talks in extending the presidents term
It literally feels like an unofficial dictatorship
please help us

travelingmindlostsoul

does anyone have any news sources and dates for people to be better informed??

the-artificem

hiya i made that post on mobile so i wasnt able to add links but here are some sources on whats been happening in the ph for the last few months:

numbers of people dead and arrested because of the war on drugs as of january 2017

17 and 19 yr olds tortured and killed by the police

presidents son involved in 6 billion drug smuggling has charges suddenly dropped

twitter thread on what to do in case the police accuses you of being a drug dealer

what to do in case the police demands to search your stuff

police suddenly shows up at bars near a university demanding to search students bags

president orders police NOT to share case files with the commission of human rights

talks about extending the presidents term until 2025 bc federalism

house of representatives votes to give commission on human rights a budget of $20 for the WHOLE YEAR

im p sure i missed a lot since something bad happens literally EVERYDAY so like feel free to add more

crystalthecool

in what ways can we help? like. this is a pretty bad situation yall are in and we’d love to help out any way we can

muchymozzarella

@crystalthecool for the most part just keeping awareness up helps. Making it a big deal and pointing out just how fucked up it is actually does help put it into perspective for the Filipinos who have no idea just how serious the situation is (mainly because awareness and education are so lacking that most Filipinos don’t even know what the CHR does and will just parrot Duterte when he says he doesn’t like it)

The budget hasn’t been finalized but with Duterte’s well documented vendetta against Human Rights and his friendship with the Marcos family aka the reason the Human Rights Commission was created in the first place after Ferdinand Marcos stole billions during a two decade Martial Law era which saw the torture, disappearance and death of thousands of Filipinos we’re not very optimistic about it.

freedomaboveallelse

Okay, you know what, let’s take stock at what’s happening at the moment.

One of the Philippines’ largest broadcasters have been denied a license by their own Congress because of the president’s personal vendetta and of course, to trample on press freedom and manipulate the media. They’re trying to silence the people, like they silenced a top journalist, Maria Ressa (founder and executive director of a news media website called Rappler, one of TIME’s most influential people in 2019) and one of Rappler’s researchers, Reynaldo Santos Jr.

They’re now planning to have the police do house to house searches to combat the virus, and this is alarming due to the rampant human rights abuses carried out by the cops themselves. (see the drug war casualties above)

As of July 13, there are over 57,000 recorded positive cases and on July 15, the PH Department of Health Secretary Francisco Duque III stated that they have successfully flattened the curve since April. I’m not a math wiz, but I’m quite sure that the curve in their charts is far from flat.

Hospitals have been reporting that they’ve reached full capacity and the officials stated that self-isolation and home quarantine aren’t advisable. I can’t believe it took them four months to figure that out.

Meanwhile, in the West Philippine Sea, the dispute for the Philippine territory continues as the Chinese keep on building structures on Philippine islands. They also rejected the 2016 Hague ruling even though the Ph clearly won the arbitration case based on the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).

Something new and in the government’s favor happens everyday, and with the growing voices of dissent, they prioritized silencing the people and the media over solutions to the pandemic. They have no plans at all. You get sick? Your fault. Stay at home. You can’t because you have work? Well. Too bad. We have to sacrifice y’alls for the economy. No hard feelings.

July 15, 2020 marks the fourth month of Philippine lockdown. It’s like they’re just announcing what kind of lockdown to use and they’ll wait for another 15 days to do it all over again. Mass testing has been long suggested and they heeded the call several weeks too late.

Here’s another link from Al Jazeera re: a summary of the Philippine government’s competencies (rather, the lack of it). Also, the United Nations Rights Office called them out because of the drug war casualties and human rights abuses.

Quite sure there’s more, since there’s some new shit everyday. But yeah, all these links check out. God save the Philippines.

@the-artificem @muchymozzarella

muchymozzarella