FORMER Datu Unsay mayor Datu Andal “Unsay” Ampatuan Jr. has submitted his formal offer of evidence to the Quezon City Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 221 in connection with his case stemming from the 2009 Ampatuan Massacre.
The purpose of the evidence is to prove that he was in a meeting at the Municipal Building of Datu Unsay in Maguindanao province from 8:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. of Nov. 23, 2009.
Fifty-eight (58) people, including 32 journalists and other workers in the media, were massacred that day in the town of Ampatuan, Maguindanao, as they were accompanying a group filing the candidacy of a rival of the Ampatuan family, Esmael G. Mangudadatu. The incident remains widely regarded as the biggest political crime in the post-Marcos era.
Among the evidence submitted are minutes of the meeting dated Nov. 23, 2009 and other judicial affidavits that aim to prove that Mr. Ampatuan was in that meeting.
Others in the Ampatuan family charged in connection with the crime include Mr. Ampatuan’s father, Andal Sr., tagged as the mastermind, who died of cancer on July 17, 2015.
This year marks the ninth-year commemoration of the Ampatuan massacre. — Vann Marlo M. Villegas

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