The location of the protest was Manila, Philippines, where there were thousands of demonstrators, including the Roman Catholic Church. Around 17,000 police officers were deployed in metropolitan Manila to secure the safety of the separate protests: the left-wing groups were in Manila’s main park with a demand for all implicated government officials to resign and face prosecution.
The biggest cause for this protest is that, according to nbcnews, “In a very deeply divided democracy where the two presidents have been separately overthrown in the last 39 years partly over allegations of plunder, there have been isolated calls for the military to withdraw support from the Marcos administration.” They are demanding that members of Congress, officials, and construction company owners behind thousands of food-control projects in recent years to be imprisoned and asked to return the funds the government stole. The Armed Forces of Philippines rejected calls and welcomed a statement signed by at least 88 mostly retired generals on Sunday.
Roman Catholic churches in the country helped lead Sunday’s anti-corruption protests in their districts, with the main daylong rally being held at a pro-democracy “people power” monument along EDSA highway in the capital region. Police said about 5,000 demonstrators, mostly wearing white, joined before noon, according to NBC news. This means that several groups in the Philippines participated in this event including churches. This is the reason why the problem is so big: because many people are participating in this protest.
“If money is stolen, that’s a crime, but if dignity and lives are taken away, these are sins against fellow human beings, against the country but, most importantly, against God,” said the Rev. Flavie Villanueva, a Catholic priest, who has helped many families of impoverished drug suspects killed under the former President Rodrigo Duterte’s crackdowns (NPR News). After this protest, at least seven public officers were jailed for illegal use of public funds and other graft charges in one flood control project anomaly alone. Executives of Sunwest Corp, a construction firm involved in the project, were being checked.
