A mass was held January 1 at the Forest Lake Memorial Park in General Santos City where 12 of the 31 journalists were buried.

A mass was also held January 2 at the gravesite of lawyer Concepcion Jayme-Brizuela in President Roxas, North Cotabato, officiated by Fr. Ramon Quiogue, OMI.

Brizuela was a human rights lawyer and was also a lawyer for Vice Mayor Esmael Mangudadatu.

She was one of two female lawyers who accompanied Mangudadatu’s wife and sisters, along with journalists on a convoy to the provincial office of the Commission on Elections when stopped along the national highway in Ampatuan, Maguindanao, and made to turn left towards the foothills of the Daguma Range. Three kilometers later, in Sitio Masalay, Barangay Salman, they were massacred by men believed led by Datu Unsay Ampatuan mayor Andal Ampatuan, Jr.

Twenty one bodies were found in  two vehicles and on the grassy area afternoon of November 23. A 22^nd body was found early morning of the 23r. At the end of the day, 24 more bodies were found, dug up from the first gravesite, putting the number of dead at 46. On November 25, 11 bodies more were found in two gravesites, one of which included three flattened vehicles.

Members of human rights advocacy groups and women’s and children’s rights advocates like Gabriel North Cotabato chair Ruby Padilla-Sison, was also there, along with Brizuela’s former colleagues at radio station DXND where she worked years ago.

Nonoy Jayme, younger brother of Brizuela, said that while they have accepted the fact of their sister’s death, they will not stop until the killers are meted out the “maximum penalty.”

On December 28, he said, the Brizuela family filed with the Department of Justice in Manila complaint for murder against the Ampatuans with Atty. Romy Capulong, also a human rights lawyer, assisting. (Malu Cadelina-Manar/MindaNews)

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