As social movements, groups and the United Nations commemorate July 18 as Nelson Mandela International Day, and days before the fourth State of the Nation Address of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., human rights alliance KARAPATAN scored the Marcos administration for its heightened attacks against human rights defenders and communities through illegal or arbitrary arrests, judicial harassment through trumped up criminal cases and terror laws, political imprisonment, enforced disappearance and red-tagging.
Mandela, an anti-apartheid activist and former political prisoner who endured 27 years of incarceration under harsh conditions, was the first black president of South Africa. The United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, a set of international guidelines outlining minimum standards for the treatment of PDL that emphasize respect for their inherent dignity and value, prohibit torture and other cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment, are likewise known as the Nelson Mandela Rules.
In the launching of a publication on human rights and civic space in Asia, KARAPATAN said these attacks against human rights defenders undermine civic space and democracy in the country. “The increased number of political prisoners in congested jails and prisons under Marcos, for instance, embody the continuing weaponization of the law against those who express dissent against his governance,” KARAPATAN secretary general Cristina Palabay said.
KARAPATAN documented 737 political prisoners detained, as of June 2025, with 164 of them arrested under Marcos. Many of them are facing trumped up criminal charges, while their court hearings remain snail-paced. Thirty of them were arrested on fabricated cases using the Anti-Terrorism Act and the Terrorism Financing Prevention and Suppression Act, including community journalist Frenchie Mae Cumpio, development workers Marielle Domequil and Emilio Gabales, church worker Aldeem Yañez, and environmental activist Miguela Peniero.
Currently, there are 96 sickly and 104 elderly among them, who, together with the thousands in jails and prisons, were subjected to torture, cruel and inhumane treatment, low and corruption-prone budgets, and subhuman conditions including highly congested cells, unhealthy food, and lack of or inadequate medical and other care services. These and the lack of appropriate environment for sick and elderly prisoners have compounded conditions which led to deaths in detention, including that of 13 political prisoners, under Marcos.
KARAPATAN said that the Marcos administration, through his Anti-Terrorism Council and the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC), has wielded the use of the terror laws, including cases against human rights defenders, development organizations and church and humanitarian workers. At least 166 individuals have been arbitrarily designated or are facing charges or complaints under the said laws, while at least 17 non-governmental organizations have had their bank accounts and assets frozen. Red- or terrorist-tagging remains a prevalent practice by the NTF-ELCAC and their minions. The cases, affecting a broad spectrum of society, reveal a sinister pattern of instilling fear and suppressing dissent.
Of those charged with terror laws, three of them—Elgene Mungcal, Norman Ortiz and Lee Sudario—have been forcibly disappeared. The three are among the 15 desaparecidos documented under Marcos.
Most of the cases documented by KARAPATAN are part of the cases and trends considered in the “Defending in Numbers: Reclaiming Civic Space, Unbroken Voices,” a publication of FORUM-ASIA which was launched today at the Commission on Human Rights.
KARAPATAN called on the Marcos administration to release of all political prisoners on just and humanitarian grounds and to surface all desaparecidos. The alliance also reiterated its call for the repeal of the terror laws, and the enactment of legislations for the recognition and protection of human rights defenders and the creation of the National Preventive Mechanism against Torture.