Muslim rebels in the southern Philippines want the family of former president Ferdinand Marcos to apologize for human rights violations during martial law.

Robert Maulana Marohombsar Alonto, a member of the negotiating panel of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), said an apology would be more important than the money now being awarded to victims of abuses during the Marcos regime.

The money is part of the so-called Marcos wealth ordered released by a court in the US to martial law victims.

“Philippine regimes came and went since Marcos was ousted [in 1986] but never was there an attempt by any of these regimes to offer as much as a verbal apology to the Moro people for what was done to them,” Alonto said.

Khaled Musa, deputy chair of the MILF committee on information, earlier asked Judge Manuel Real of the US district court of Hawaii if the “tens of thousands of Moros who were victims of massacres are also entitled to compensation.”

Real approved the distribution of US$7.5 million in settlement of a class suit filed by thousands of rights victims and their families. The distribution of the payment started on March 1.

Alonto said Musa’s question was a rhetorical one meant “to underscore the immensity of the injustice committed against the Bangsamoro people.”

“Monetary compensation is not what we need; it is our right of self-determination and freedom that we want back. I hope this is clear enough,” he said.

During the Marcos dictatorship, government forces and state-sponsored paramilitary forces perpetrated massacres against innocent Moro civilians.

“They have not filed their petitions; they are dead, and therefore they cannot expect anything,” Musa said.

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