Editorials assail abuses during lockdown

CHEERS TO the Philippine Daily Inquirer and Manila Standard for editorials calling attention to the strong-arm approach of the government on violators of quarantine regulations, assailing it in the time of the pandemic.

The Inquirer’s “Crackdown” on April 28 referred to recent incidents, among them the warrantless arrest of businesswoman Victoria Beltran over a satirical Facebook post in Cebu on April 19, the shooting and killing of an army veteran with post-traumatic stress disorder in Quezon City on April 21, and the police’s assault on a homeowner in Makati City on April 26.

The Inquirer noted that human rights and civil liberties “are seemingly being set aside willy-nilly in the name of fighting the COVID-19 pandemic.” It also recalled that officials such as Foreign Affairs Secretary Teddy Boy Locsin Jr., who shared fake news about Divisoria market’s supposedly being filled with people, and Senator Koko Pimentel Jr., who violated quarantine protocols, “have been spared by the crackdown.”

The Inquirer cited Canada, Germany, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan for the openness displayed by their governments in addressing the challenges of the pandemic. In contrast, “as anxiety stalks the land and many more citizens worry about where to get their next meal, officialdom is busy wielding a deplorable, unnecessary weapon: fear.”

The Standard published “What the public deserves” on the same day, enumerating what citizens do not need in this time, among them the recurring threats to impose martial law, the shooting of a lockdown violator and officials dodging responsibility for the infection and deaths of health workers.

It is clear in its call:

“What the locked down public needs is some transparency and honesty in COVID-19 reporting. What the public needs to hear is a detailed plan of testing, isolation and treatment so that by the end of two months, we will have a better idea of how we can reasonably deal with this public health emergency.”

With routine reports on the number of COVID cases, the editorials called attention to the clear lack of any evidence of human rights dimension in the government’s approach in addressing the pandemic.