This story
was taken from Bulatlat, the Philippines's alternative weekly
newsmagazine (www.bulatlat.com, www.bulatlat.net, www.bulatlat.org).
Vol. V, No. 14, May 15-21, 2005
INVESTIGATIVE REPORT
A Reign of Silence by GMA The fact that President
Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has kept mum on the killings has bolstered accusations
that either she has unleashed an undeclared war against progressive leaders and
activists - or that she has lost her grip on the military. BY DABET CASTAÑEDA AND
ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO Based on Bulatlat’s
own investigation, the cases of killings and disappearances looked into appear
to have been perpetrated not in isolation. They occurred in the midst of
nationwide violence that particularly targeted cause-oriented organizations,
party-list groups as well as human rights lawyers, Church members and others.
All incidents took place in the provinces. Documentation by
human rights groups also shows that the concentration of terror and violence has
been in territories where there are huge economic stakes and a high incidence of
what the government calls insurgency. In an interview,
party-list group Bayan Muna (BM or people first) deputy secretary general
Roberto de Castro, noted that many cases of politically-motivated killings have
taken place in Central Luzon and Eastern Visayas where BM and its allied
progressive party-list groups scored high in the 2004 elections. BM in
particular topped the 2001 and 2004 party-list elections for Congress. The killings in
Central Luzon, for example, have been associated with the six-month old strike
in the region’s largest sugar estate, Hacienda Luisita, which is owned and
operated by the family of former President Corazon Cojuangco-Aquino. These
included the daylight highway killings of Tarlac City Councilor Abelardo Ladera
and Aglipayan Fr. William Tadena. Before these, peasant leader and retired army
man Marcelino Beltran was killed night of Dec. 8 or two days before
International Human Rights Day. On Nov. 16, seven striking workers and their
supporters were massacred outside the main gate of the estate’s sugar central
120 kms north of Manila. In this region alone,
13 killings and six disappearances have been documented since January. Eastern Visayas
Meanwhile, in Eastern
Visayas, particularly the island-province of Samar - host to several mining
areas - killings and involuntary disappearances have also taken place. Human
rights violations in the region have escalated since February when Maj. Gen.
Jovito Palparan Jr. took over as the commanding general of the Army’s 8th
Infantry Division. In his inaugural
speech on Feb. 10, Palparan cited Samar as the “staging ground for cadres of the
communist terrorist movement before being deployed to other areas…(T)his is
where the communist terrorist (sic) will take their last stand.” In a media
forum March 5, the general declared war against the open mass movement in the
area vowing to “end up anti-government rallies in Samar Island within six
months.” The recent series of
killings and disappearances in Samar have alarmed provincial and town officials
that resolutions have been filed calling for an investigation into reports of
military involvement. At least 900 villagers have deserted their communities
following intense military operations including aerial bombings and strafing.
Palparan had
previously been put under fire when he commanded the 204th Infantry
Brigade in another island-province, Mindoro Oriental - a rich source of gold and
copper where mining sites are to be reopened. In this province, 41 killings
occurred in three years. Biggest number Both in Mindoro
Oriental and in the recent spate of killings, it is the party-list BM that has
suffered the biggest number of casualties. Nationwide since 2001 – the year BM
first took part in legislative elections - 51of its leaders and members have
been killed and four have disappeared. Twenty-one of the victims come from
Mindoro Oriental. Since January this
year, the most celebrated killings and disappearances have BM leaders as victims
– Romy Sanchez (Ilocos), Ladera (Tarlac), Danilo Macapagal (Nueva Ecija) and
lawyer Felidito Dacut (Samar). Another BM lawyer, Charles Juloya, also of Ilocos,
survived an assassination attempt. BM’s allied
party-list groups have been attacked as well. Two coordinators of Anakpawis
(toiling masses) Party, Ben Concepcion (Pampanga) and Beltran (Tarlac) were
gunned down in front of their houses. Another Anakpawis activist, 21-year-old
Marvin Montabo, was shot inside his home in Samar and was scorched to death when
the gunmen burned down his house on March 7. In Mindoro, Isaias Manano was
killed in the thick of the campaign during the 2004 election period. Members of the
Left-leaning women’s party-list group Gabriela Women’s Party (GWP) have not been
spared, either. On March 1, four of its members in Quezon province were accosted
and arrested by army soldiers. They were released later without any charges
filed against them. War on terror The current spate of
violence and disappearances may be reminiscent of the Marcos years which saw the
killing and torture of tens of thousands of activists and the uprooting of
hundreds of thousands of people as well as the total war policy of the
succeeding administrations. Today the brutal killings, abductions and
assassination attempts have included targets in the progressive party-list
groups and have taken place under government’s war on terror policy. While ostensibly
targeting the Abu Sayyaf bandit group because of its alleged terrorist links,
the gears of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s war on terror have shifted more
and more against the armed Left – tagged by the military as the country’s top
national security threat. Macapagal-Arroyo’s
security and defense officials have waged a campaign to demonize as terrorist
not only the underground Communist Party of the Philippines, which leads the New
People’s Army (NPA), but also its alleged “support system” – legal mass
organizations. Apparently, this demonization campaign has made these “communist
terrorists” a fair game for the military, police, vigilante squads and other
paramilitary units. Before they were
silenced, many victims of politically-motivated killings particularly in Mindoro
and Eastern Visayas, were reportedly on the military watchlist and had in fact
been warned by authorities to mend their ways or else. For instance, before he
died Councilor Ladera was reportedly named in a news briefing as the New
People’s Army’s (NPA) contact person in Tarlac. Part of the Armed
Forces of the Philippines’ (AFP) psywar campaign against the Left is the
circulation of a powerpoint presentation (PPT), “Knowing the Enemy,” and
propaganda books where several legitimate organizations – including from the
church and media – are described as “communist front organizations.” Following
protests however “Knowing the Enemy” was pulled out by no less than Defense
Secretary Avelino Cruz. But there have also
been reports that some of the politically-motivated killings might have also
been committed in cahoots with some “rebel returnees” and armed groups who in
the early 1990s had bolted out from the mainstream underground Left. In Negros,
central Philippines, military authorities have confirmed the participation of a
“rebel group,” the Revolutionary Proletarian Army-Alex Boncayao Brigade (RPA-ABB)
in counter-insurgency operations. Local human rights groups have singled out the
RPA-ABB as behind the recent summary execution of some peasant and labor
leaders. The murder of Sanchez
in Baguio has also been attributed by the police to the same group. The case of the
missing brothers in the coastal village of Sapang Kawayan
in Masantol, Pampanga could be linked to another splinter group, the
Rebolusyonarong Hukbong Bayan (RHB), a village resident told Bulatlat.
Roger Viray, one of those abducted in February and who has been missing
since, is a local leader of the fisherfolk group Pamalakaya. In statements sent to
the media, the CPP-NPA named the RHB as conducting operations jointly with the
military in the coastal areas of Bulacan, Pampanga and Bataan. In Nueva Ecija,
another province in Central Luzon, a number of attacks have been linked to the
Red Vigilante Group (RVG). RVG, according to some media reports, is a group of
former communist guerrillas-turned gun-for-hire. Reportedly, its latest victims
are peasant lawyer and Anakpawis municipal coordinator in Llanera town, Ambrosio
Matias and his son, Leonard, a law student at the Saint Louis University in
Baguio City. Without let-up The series of
politically-motivated killings, abductions and other atrocities have been
vicious and, as of presstime, without let-up. Military authorities have
consistently denied involvement in the killings claiming that it was the New
People’s Army (NPA) that should be blamed because it aims to generate public
outrage and recruit more members to its fold. What shocks the
victims’ families and friends even more however is the massive reign of silence
by President Macapagal-Arroyo. Statements of protests and calls for
investigation into the killings by concerned groups including legislators,
lawyers, Church leaders and others here and abroad have poured into the
presidential office. Still – save for the routine police probes which in the
main have dismissed the cases as the handiwork of the Left themselves - no
formal investigation has been directed by the President. This attitude has
bolstered accusations that the finger of accountability in connection with the
killings points to the doorsteps of Malacañang itself. Some have suggested that
Macapagal-Arroyo – who is supposed to be the commander-in-chief of the armed
forces - has become a lameduck president with the military outside of her grip. Meanwhile, the
killings go on. Bulatlat © 2004 Bulatlat
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