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Facilitating Factors To Seeking Accountability And Legal Reparation
Table 37
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Hindering Factors to seeking accountability and legal reparation
Main themes Family Motivation
Assistance received from organizations
Knowledge on Transitional Justice & Legal Processes Sub-themes 1. 2. 3. 1. 2.
Motivated to seek justice for deceased loved one
Strong Support System
Desire for security, peace, and closure
Biopsychosocial spiritual assistance
CHR assistance
1. 2. 3. Change in Administration Knowledgeable of own rights Presence of Evidence
This portion would explore the factors that helped and made the respondents push for filing a legal case and make concrete steps and actions to demand for accountability from the government.
Family motivation Motivation received from family members and motivation for peace, security, and closure for the self, family members, and other people play big roles in the desire of the surviving families to seek justice and accountability from the injustice and untimely deaths of their loved ones. Seven respondents shared that the justice they seek is for their peace of mind, their children’s future, and for other people. They do not want their families and other people to experience and feel what they all had to deal with.
Three respondents said that their strong support systems have helped them in their journey of finding justice and being active in the activities of SOW and PAGHILOM.
Assistance Received from Organizations According to two respondents, another facilitating factor that helped them as survivors were the different assistance they received from various organizations. The assistance ranges from legal help to medical assistance to livelihood assistance, to psychosocial, and even spiritual help. One of the two respondents expressed that without CHR and other legal groups’ intervention, she would not have had the courage to file her case.
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Family motivation and the wide range of assistance being extended to the surviving families make their lives easier and give them relief. Again, citing Kian Delos Santos’ case, the family was able to finish their fight for justice because they were provided with much assistance both from the public and private sector (Stein, 2017). The parents were given protection from CHR and they had willingness and support from their family members to win the fight.
Change in Administration Two respondents shared their belief that justice is only attainable once there has been a change in the administration. “Lou” says that she hopes for change, “Magbago na gobyerno. Hanggat sila namumuno, walang hustisya.” ([There should be a] change in government. As long as they are still in power, there will be no justice). “Tina” agrees with this sentiment, “Pababain muna natin si Duterte. Kapag bumaba raw kasi si Duterte, lahat ng death certificate na may gun wounds, may laban, magkakaso. Eh pinakuha ko yung death certificate ng asawa ko gun wounds talaga sa side and backhead.” (Let Duterte step down first. When Duterte is no longer in power, all those with death certificates indicating gun wounds, we have a chance, we can file a case. I had my husband’s death certificate retrieved, it showed that he died of gun wounds on the side and backhead).
Knowledgeable of Own Rights Only one respondent has shared that her new knowledge of human rights became a deciding factor for her to pursue legal action. “Claire” admits that she did not even know what it meant when the incident happened to her husband, “Tapos ito nga po na parang ayan na naliliwanagan na ako sa mga nangyari.. hindi ko nga po alam yung ibig sabihin ng EJK e. Hindi ko alam anong ibig sabihin - ang pagkakaalam ko sa EJK yung naririnig ko lang sa Davao. Pero yung EJK pala na ‘yan once na hindi ka dumaan sa proseso sa pagkapatay sa tao, EJK na ang tawag doon.” (I was starting to understand what happened... I did not even know what EJK was. I didn’t know what it meant, all I know about EJK is that I heard that about Davao. But apparently EJK is when there was no due process in the manner of killing of an individual, that is what EJK is). She has now filed a case with the CHR and is waiting for the resolution to be released.
Presence of Evidence For one respondent, the change from not being interested to pursue a case and claim justice to finally doing something about the incident, was influenced by the evidence which they have acquired. This evidence was a copy of the CCTV footage that showed what actually happened to her brother, thus prompting their father and other relatives to pursue the case.
There are multiple factors that encourage and influence these families to pursue legal reparation and claim justice for their loved ones. Knowing about their rights and the legal process and gathering of accurate evidence are key factors should these families continue to file for cases and seek for accountability when this administration ends. Unity and collective action could be one of the drivers of change and motivation for these families to pursue legal reparation. This is essential in ensuring that there is a safe and peaceful future for their children and communities. According to Talabong (2019), there are communities who have been united to fight against the inhumane treatment that they have experienced and have decided to use the fear they felt as fuel to their courage to move together towards the attainment of justice. As Martinez et al. (2019) mentioned in their policy brief on the WoD, the united support for the surviving families and the help they felt became their hope not only for their own but for the world.
Figure 14
Hindering and Facilitating Factors to Seeking Legal Justice
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Theories in action This section majorly applied the Strengths-based and Rights-based approaches in exploring the hindering and facilitating factors to seeking government accountability and legal reparation. The Strengths-based approach helped in identifying the factors that facilitated and hindered the desire to seek for legal justice among the respondents. The findings showed that the hindering factors were almost the exact opposite of the facilitative factors, underscoring the resources, capacities, and skills the respondent have using the Strengths-based perspective (Saleeby, 1996), which imply that if only the hindering factors were removed through proper intervention, the desire for seeking accountability from the government and legal reparation would be stronger.
Moreover, in light of the Rights-based approach (UNFPA, 2014), the respondents should pursue legal action and remedies to the HRV, as this is a right. However, since many of the reported EJKs are linked to the government’s WoD, implying that these are stateled killings, the problem is systemic, and even successful filed cases in court are at a compromise because of this. This reflects the particular hindering factor experienced by the families in seeking legal justice which is hopelessness in the justice system of the country. However, at the other side of the spectrum, some respondents look forward to the transitional justice that awaits when the current administration ends instead. Applying the Empowerment Theory, this particular perception of some of the respondents could be used for collective action (Lee, 2001), encouraging one another to seek accountability for what the state has committed, and act for a unified goal which is to claim reparation from the HRV. The lack of legal knowledge can also be addressed by one of the central concepts of the said theory which is the “construction of capacity and knowledge to read social and political realities of an individual’s environment” (Lee, 2021). Through community education, and even training, of legal rights and other important related knowledge, the capacity can be built and acquired. These would give a sense of “power” (Ryan, 1971) that has been lost from the surviving families because of the violations and discrimation experienced.
