Etta Rosales

Who is Etta Rosales?

Etta Rosales is a Filipino activist, teacher and politician who has served three terms as the party-list representative of the Akbayan Citizens' Action Party to the Philippines' House of Representatives from the 11th-14th Congress. She is currently the Chairperson of the Commission on Human Rights of the Republic of the Philippines.

She is a well-known defender of human rights and was instrumental in instituting a class action suit in the Hawaii District Court which resulted in the only judgment holding the former dictator Ferdinand E. Marcos liable for gross human rights violations committed during his incumbency, which judgment was partially executed in 2011. She herself is a victim of human rights violations by the Marcos regime.

As an activist, she founded the leftist and now party-list Alliance of Concerned Teacher. She was also the chairperson of Partido ng Bayan.

Rosales left ACT sometime before 1998. After her departure from ACT, she joined Akbayan. She was elected as a congresswoman for that party list from 1998-2007.

After serving in Congress for three terms, she served as Co-Chairperson of the Philippine Coalition for the International Criminal Court and founded Building Bridges for Peace, a multi-sectoral initiative to secure land rights and security for agrarian rform and indigenous communities through dialogue.