MANILA – On the third year of the disappearance of labor organizer Elizabeth “Loi” Magbanua, the Center for Trade Union and Human Rights (CTUHR) concluded that state security agents can simply ignore human rights writs issued by the court in favor of victims and their families.

Magbanua, a member of the national labor center Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU), was abducted by suspected state agents after attending a meeting in Valenzuela City on May 3, 2022, incommunicado since 7:00 p.m.

In August 2022, the Supreme Court (SC) issued a writ of amparo for Magbanua and her family, which also granted them a temporary protection order (TPO), prohibiting members of the military from going near the petitioners within a radius of one kilometer. The petitioners are Magbanua’s life partner Ruth Manglalan and niece Alyssa Marie Magbanua. The SC also ordered the Court of Appeals (CA) to conduct a summary hearing.

“Magbanua’s continuing disappearance shows that state security agencies can simply ignore writs of amparo and other court decisions that favor labor rights defenders,” said CTUHR in a statement. 

Later on, the CA decided in favor of the families, as announced by their legal counsel on September 9, 2022, granting them a permanent protection order. The respondents, namely Armed Forces chief of staff Lt. Gen. Bartolome Bacarro, Jose Faustino Jr., officer in charge of the Department of National Defense, National Intelligence Coordinating Agency Director General Ricardo de Leon and Army chief Lt. Gen. Romeo Brawner Jr., have been held accountable for Magbanua’s disappearance. 

Read: CA orders military to surface 2 missing activists

“Respondents did not observe the required extraordinary diligence…Evidently, respondents failed to show the concrete steps they ostensibly took to locate Loi and Ador if only to refute respondent’s probable culpability which inaction borders on a dereliction of positive duty,” the CA ruling stated.

The ruling also noted that the respondents (government agencies and the military) submitted “passive and worthless certificates which are inadequate and non-compliant with the requirement for a detailed return.” Since the respondents are duty-bearers, the court argued that they must be held to a higher level of accountability because of their inaction, bordering on indifference.

Despite this, Magbanua remains missing and justice remains evasive, KMU stated. “Two days after the #MayoUno2025, we should amplify our call to surface Loi Magbanua and all victims of enforced disappearance!”

In a previous interview with Bulatlat, Manglalan said that she had mixed feelings with the granting of protective writ since Magbanua remains missing.

“More than the decision of the court, the victory in this case is choosing to fight amid this political repression,” Manglalan said. “I know that Loi would not want me to bargain and plead with the military.”

Read: Women brave the frontlines to find the disappeared

Human rights group Karapatan and Desaparecidos, a group dedicated for the families and friends of victims of enforced disappearances, met with members of the United Nations Working Group on Enforced and Involuntary Disappearances (UN WGEID) on April 29. The mechanism is a special procedure under the UN Human Rights Council tasked to assist families of the disappeared.

“We have noted that whenever we accompany families of victims of abduction to military camps and police stations to look for their loved ones and invoke provisions of the law, we are met with indifference, ignorance of the law, or worse, hostility,” said Karapatan’s secretary general Cristina Palabay. “It would take several days for them to even confirm if the person that we’re looking for is in their custody or not.”

Based on the data of Desaparecidos, there have been 18 cases of enforced disappearance during the administration of Ferdinand Marcos Jr. Karapatan documented that at least 30 who were abducted have surfaced dead or alive.

The Philippines enacted the Anti-Enforced or Involuntary Disappearance Act of 2012 (Republic Act No. 10353), to criminalize and prevent enforced disappearances. Despite this, the cases remain rampant and there has been no conviction yet. (RTS, RVO)