Team DailyPedia
Last July 6, a report was posted on the Bawat Bato Movement’s Facebook page detailing how certain protesters were prevented from laying their protest stones on the supposed future grave site of late President Ferdinand Marcos at the LNMB (Libingan ng mga Bayani). Their stones were also confiscated and the protesters were brought to the LNMB office for an interview.
The Bawat Bato Movement, as stated on their FB page, is “A non-partisan initiative against the burial of Ferdinand Marcos in the Libingan ng mga Bayani.” People who first joined in the peaceful protest action initially laid protest stones, stones bearing the names of Martial Law victims, last June 26 at the Marcos grave site. But the Movement continues to encourage others to carry on the protest action even after the initial gathering. “We can each place a stone: at his grave or in places stained by the atrocities of Martial Law — memorializing its thousands of victims, and for us tens of millions who’ve not lived as we all deserved in the decades since,” they stated.
Apparently irked by the protest action, orders to have the stones confiscated and to restrict public access to the grave site have supposedly been issued.
“We were able to place stones at Libingan today. Now being brought to office to be interviewed. Our stones were taken as soon as they were laid, we were approached immediately by 2 men and are now being escorted by approximately 5 people in two vehicles,” states a report sent to the Bawat Bato FB page.
The protester then went on relating more of what they experienced. “After a short but amicable lecture, xeroxing our IDs, taking pictures of us, taking down our personal info and explaining convolutedly why we were in the wrong, they let us go on our way with a friendly handshake… And also told that the area had always been restricted to the public which is not true. Libingan is on the Malacañang.gov.ph page listed as a tourist attraction alongside other cemeteries.
“The personnel at Libingan are just sort of doing their job,” the protester clarified. “Orders come from above apparently. But what is frightening is the way information is spinned around so quickly and glibly. If we hadn’t done our research beforehand, maybe we would have believed everything they told us.”
Asked by FB user Bryan Joseph Santiago why the protest action was “wrong,” the Bawat Bato admins explained, “Because ‘sacred place.’ ‘Hallowed ground.’ ‘Desecration.’ Something about if you enter someone’s house you need to ask permission first. Because daw even if LNMB is a public space it is still inside a military camp and therefore the ‘house’ of the military. Also any kind of activity that is not visiting relatives ‘is not and has never been’ allowed at LNMB (super false). Also, protest is necessarily vandalism and disrespect regardless of whether it is righteous, peaceful or symbolic. Also stones are evil… Any argument daw really to justify their strong arming and intimidation. They’re trying to make sure heads don’t roll. All they’re doing is making themselves look really bad and stoking the indignation that sparked this movement in the first place.”
