Month: July 2018

Pope and Holy See Continue Tireless Effort to Help Victims

July 30, 2018 06:00 Jim Fair | Human Rights And Justice

Pope Francis and the Holy See continue to press for an end to the horrendous practice of human trafficking today, July 30, 2018: World Day against Trafficking in Persons.

The day is promoted by the United Nations. Pope Francis noted it after praying the noonday Angelus on July 29, 2018, with a crowd of 25,000 pilgrims in St. Peter’s Square:

“This plague reduces many men, women, and children to slavery for the purpose of labor and sexual exploitation, the sale of organs, of vagrancy and forced delinquency, also here, in Rome. Migration routes are also often used by traffickers and exploiters, to recruit new victims of trafficking. It’s the responsibility of all to denounce the injustices and to oppose firmly this shameful crime.”

Human trafficking is a crime that exploits women, children, and men for numerous purposes including forced labor and sex, according to the United Nations. The International Labour Organization estimates that 21 million people are victims of forced labor globally. This estimate also includes victims of human trafficking for labor and sexual exploitation. While it is not known how many of these victims were trafficked, the estimate implies that currently, there are millions of trafficking in persons victims in the world.

Every country in the world is affected by human trafficking, whether as a country of origin, transit, or destination for victims, the UN claims. Children make up almost a third of all human trafficking victims worldwide, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime Global Report on Trafficking in Persons. Additionally, women and girls comprise 71 percent of human trafficking victims, the report states.

In 2010, the General Assembly adopted the Global Plan of Action to Combat Trafficking in Persons, urging Governments worldwide to take coordinated and consistent measures to defeat this scourge. The Plan calls for integrating the fight against human trafficking into the UN’s broader programmes in order to boost development and strengthen security worldwide. One of the crucial provisions in the Plan is the establishment of a UN Voluntary Trust Fund for victims of trafficking, especially women and children.

At the same time, the Holy See has been outspoken in its concern about trafficking. During the May 28-29, 2018, meetings of Session I of the 1st Supplementary Human Dimension Meeting (SHDM) of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), held in Vienna, Monsignor Janusz S. Urbańczyk, the Holy See’s permanent representative to the OSCE, stressed two key elements:

1) “Strengthen education and awareness-raising efforts, including human rights education, and develop and implement empowerment programmes which take into account the particular needs of women, men, girls, and boys, in order to enhance the capacity to recognize, prevent and fight human trafficking within communities”  Continue reading

At least 15,000 people leave shelter in village gymnasium alleging further persecution by Philippine military

An estimated 1,600 tribal people in the southern Philippine province of Surigao del Sur march to the provincial capital Tandag on July 30 to complain against alleged military harassment in their villages. (Photo courtesy of Karapatan)

Ben Serrano, Surigao del Sur, Philippines
July 30, 2018

More than 1,500 tribal people in the southern Philippines, who fled their homes early this month due to alleged harassment by soldiers, were on the move again July 30 at the start of another exodus.

From a village in the town of Lianga, Surigao del Sur province, the tribal people began a 90-km walk to the provincial capital city of Tandag.

They claimed they could no longer take continuing pressure from the military, who have accused them of being rebel sympathizers.

In a statement, human rights group Karapatan said the people had to leave because of “escalating military persecution.”

“We can no longer bear the difficulties inside the gymnasium,” said Sandy Sanchez, spokesman of the tribal group Mapasu.

He said the people had no access to water of food in the village gymnasium where they had taken refuge and which was surrounded by soldiers. “We decided to leave the area,” Sanchez told ucanews.com.

“We cannot return home because of the presence of the military in our villages. We don’t want to be caught in the crossfire [in clashes with rebels],” he said.

About 1,600 tribal people fled their homes in 15 communities in the towns of Lianga and San Agustin on July 16 and sought refuge in the village of Diatagon in Lianga.

They said they were forced to leave their communities because soldiers, who set up camp in their communities, had been “spreading fear” among residents.

Even in the evacuation center, the people claimed the soldiers followed them, and prevented food and water supplies reaching them.

“The military had virtually taken control of the evacuation center. The [tribal people] felt that they were not safe there,” said Bishop Rhee Timbang of the Philippine Independent Church.

The prelate, who is the local head of human rights group Karapatan, said people are taking a “communal journey.”

“They are to walk literally to a safer place, a secured sanctuary,” he said. “It does not matter how many days it takes them to walk,” the bishop added.

The march started about two o’clock in the morning. “We will rest when we get tired,” Sanchez told ucanews.com by phone.

Authorities said they had no idea what prompted the people to leave and march to the provincial capital.

“We only learned early today that the evacuees had left,” said Merlyn Layno, disaster management officer of Lianga town.

It was not the first time that the tribal people have fled their homes. In 2015, they fled after gunmen executed their tribal leaders.

In 2017, they left their communities due to military operations against communist rebels in the area.

Separating the struggles of indigenous people from the problems of those in cities has left many not caring

Religious groups hold an ecumenical prayer to show solidarity with indigenous peoples during a tribal celebration in the northern Philippines in this April 22 photo. (Photo by Mark Saludes)

Mark Saludes, Manila, Philippines
July 26, 2018

I felt compassion, love, and respect for Mindanao’s indigenous peoples the first time I met tribal youth leader Michelle Campos in 2015.

The photograph I took of her that day inspired and stimulated a desire in me to become an advocate of tribal peoples’ rights.

The picture depicts the ordeal of a young woman who stood up to fight and seek justice despite the pain and suffering she had to encounter, and to become the symbol of her tribe’s struggle.

It was two years after I took the picture that I realized that compassion, love, and respect are not enough to understand the situation of indigenous groups.

One must fully immerse into the culture and look deeper into their knowledge and their spirituality that is deeply connected to the environment.

Michelle is the daughter of the late tribal leader Dionel Campos who was killed on Sept. 1, 2015, by members of a paramilitary group in the southern Philippines.

Campos was executed because of his opposition to mining operations and other destructive environmental issues in his ancestral land.

The murder of Campos and two other tribal leaders resulted in the forced evacuation of more than 4,000 people from their communities.

A year later, in September 2016, Michelle and the people of Diatagon village in Lianga town, Surigao del Sur province, returned home.

However, the political, economic and military situation in the area has not changed.

The threat of displacement due to armed conflict and military operations still hangs over the village.

On July 16, 2018, more than 1,000 people from Campos’ tribe fled their homes again due to soldiers who reportedly set up camp in their community.

My eight-day visit to Michelle’s community in August 2017 brought more questions than answers.

I asked myself why those terrible things happen to a community, which has nothing but a claim to land left to them by their ancestors.

What concerned me most was the realization that nobody seemed to care about the rural poor in far-flung places, aside from a few church people and rights advocates.

We can engage many people to give food to the hungry but only a few dare ask why there is hunger in the so-called promised land of the southern Philippines.

We can make religious leaders condemn the killing of farmers and tribal people, but only a handful offer sanctuary.  Continue reading

Jul. 24, 2018 DAVAO TODAY

DAVAO CITY, Philippines — Most of the Indigenous People’s in Mindanao are currently facing some “dangerous games” being played by big capitalists and the government, particularly state forces. And these perilous undertakings are taking its tolls on the IPs – to their homes, communities, and identities. When the greed for huge profits play with graft and corrupt practices of those in power, the end result is catastrophic.

Since the imposition of martial law in Mindanao, the IPs and their communities are among the hardest hit. Aside from the cases of evacuations in regions 11 and 12, displacements of IP communities in Caraga region never ceased, as the Armed Forces of the Philippines continues its military operations in far-flung areas in Mindanao.

The Andap Valley Complex in Surigao del Sur is one of the largely militarized areas in Caraga region nowadays. The place now portrays the epitome of the never-ending exodus of ousted IPs from their communities. The crisis is becoming serious every day with the complex turning as “the apple of the eye” of giant capitalists for mining and exploration.

Lumad evacuees trek for about nine hours. Despite several army checkpoints, Lumad evacuees travelled to Barangay Diatagon Gymnasium in Lianga to seek temporary shelter. (Mara S. Genotiva/davaotoday.com)

MASSIVE EVACUATION. About 1,600 indigenous people from rural villages of Lianga and San Agustin towns in Surigao del Sur fled their homes on July 16, after a month of military encampment of their communities. As these capitalists eye the complex, the AFP, particularly the 75thInfantry Battalion of the Philippine Army is also there to protect their interests.

In its latest monitoring, the group Caraga Watch said that a total of 328 Lumad families with 1,607 individuals were forced to abandon their abodes in 15 IP communities in the towns of Lianga and San Agustin in Surigao del Sur last July 16.

These IPs moved out from their areas due to the brutal militarization and human rights violations committed by the 75th IB and the paramilitary group called Magahat-Bagani headed by a certain Marcos Bocales.

They chose to leave Andap Valley Complex “because they have had enough of fear and hunger within the 33 days of the encampment of more than a hundred military troops in their communities,” the Caraga Watch said in a statement issued on July 21.

The group emphasized that the IPs in the complex have decided to leave in order not to succumb to a situation similar to that infamous incident last September 1, 2015, where Lumad leaders Dionel Campus and Datu Jovello Sinzo of MAPASU group were brutally killed by Mahagat-Bagani with the backing of the 75th IB.

The same notorious paramilitary group also murdered Emerito Samarca, the executive director of non-government organization ALCADEV, an education institution religiously advocating for the rights and welfare of Lumad people in the complex.

“The purpose of the militarization of Andap Valley Complex is clear: to remove any opposition against the entry of coal mining companies into the ancestral lands of the Lumad,” the Caraga Watch said.

The Andap Valley Complex has since been the target of huge mining companies, as the place had deliberately been opened by President Rodrigo Duterte for explorations.

The Caraga Watch noted: “Recall that on February 1, 2018, at the Indigenous Peoples Leaders’ Summit in Davao City, President Duterte declared that he will choose the investors in ancestral lands of the Manobo in the Andap Valley Complex in Surigao del Sur. He further told the Lumad gathered to prepare for relocation, insinuating the dislocation of the Lumad from their ancestral homes amidst combat operations of the AFP to ease the entry of plantations and mining projects.”

The group reported that as early as 2015, massive military operations were already launched by combined forces of 36th IB, 75th IB and paramilitary forces in the complex that targeted particularly the MAPASU members in 22 IP communities.

The MAPASU group have signified their continued opposition to the entry of big mining explorations in the area.

The situation in the area has worsened when martial was declared in Mindanao by Duterte, which paved the way for the establishment of a number of military checkpoints in the province of Surigao del Sur, the group said.

“After declaring Marawi free from the Maute group and focusing its military operations to go after the New People’s Army, these checkpoints became stricter especially in Sitio Neptune, Barangay Diatagon in Lianga town, one of the entrances to the Andap Valley Complex,” the group added.

The checkpoints have since limited entry of people and food supplies to the communities, the Caraga Watch continued, adding that teachers of Lumad schools in the area are constantly harassed upon passing through these military barricades.

The military is also telling the people in the area to allow the entry of huge mining companies to operate in their lands to escape further persecution.

Records provided by Caraga Watch reveal that five mining companies are now gearing to operate in Andap Valley Complex.

Continue reading

Photo credit: Couple to Couple League (CCL)

“Every child is a blessing”

Happy are all who fear the LORD, who walk in the ways of God.
What your hands provide you will enjoy; you will be happy and prosper:
Like a fruitful vine your wife within your home,
like olive plants your children around your table.
Just so will they be blessed who fear the LORD.
May the LORD bless you from Zion, all the days of your life
that you may share Jerusalem’s joy
and live to see your children’s children.
Peace upon Israel! (Psalm 128)

Brothers and sisters in Christ, as we mark the 50th anniversary of Humanae Vitae, Blessed Paul VI’s encyclical on parents’ decision regarding the number of children, we offer these reflections based on our consultations with married couples and parents:

1. For the Filipino, every child is a gift from God.

It is natural for married Filipino couples to wholeheartedly embrace each child, who is a fruit of their love for each other. Despite the fear and criticism that arise from having big families, we still rejoice at the coming of a child. The Psalmist sings: Children too are a gift from the LORD, the fruit of the womb, a reward (Psalm 127:3).

When a Filipino mother is told that she should only have two children instead of five, she would automatically ask: Who among my children should have not been born? What will you do with my “excess” children?

2. For the Filipino, the parents are anointed by God to educate their children.

This, indeed, is “Responsible Parenthood.” It is not only reduced to the limiting of children. It is natural for parents to be responsible for their children.

Moreover, family planning is not only about “method.”(1) Every family plans for their future: when they are ready to have children or when to add more, how they will be raised, where they will be sent to school, how to teach them to pray, where they could go for vacations, how will they manage their finances, etc.

If family planning is simply reduced to the avoidance of pregnancy, should we be puzzled when some children feel that they are fruits of “unwanted pregnancies”? Won’t they feel that their parents love them simply because they have no choice? This is the effect of what we call the “contraceptive mentality.”(2) Pope Francis says, “‘when speaking of children who come into the world, no sacrifice made by adults will be considered too costly or too great, if it means the child never has to feel that he or she is a mistake, or worthless or abandoned to the four winds and the arrogance of man.’(3) The gift of a new child, entrusted by the Lord to a father and a mother, begins with acceptance, continues with lifelong protection and has as its final goal the joy of eternal life.”(4)     Continue reading

Prelate closes Philippine evangelization gathering by remembering more than 23,000 people killed during two year drug war Cardinal

Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle of Manila speaks during the last day of the Fifth Philippine Conference on New Evangelization in Manila on July 22. (Photo by Angie de Silva)

Jose Torres Jr., Manila Philippines
July 24, 2018

A teary-eyed Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle of Manila has lamented the deaths of innocent people killed since Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte’s assumed office during the last day of a summit on new evangelization on July 22.

Addressing a crowd of priests, nuns, religious and lay people, the prelate asked if people were happy with all the deaths around them.

“Do you rejoice at the deaths of the innocent?” Cardinal Tagle asked in the wake of a statement released by the country’s Catholic bishops condemning a wave of killings across the country.

In his prayer, the Manila archbishop spoke to God about many innocent people dying.

“We want to believe that you do not rejoice in their death. But there are so many of them,” said the prelate.

Police have reported more than 23,000 killings over the past two years, which human rights groups said were likely linked to the government’s war against narcotics.

The cardinal included in his prayer a 36-year-old migrant worker who was killed in Slovakia for defending two women from being attacked.

“Where do we see your face? Where do we hear your word? Some people are asking, where are you?” asked the cardinal.

The cardinal told about 8,000 participants at the Fifth Philippine Conference on New Evangelization to become “bread” for others amid the hunger in the world.

“Let us be bread, broken, shared for others so that we are all moved with compassion and can feed others,” he said in his parting message at the University of Santo Tomas in Manila.

“All that we have, all that we are, if taken, blessed and shared can become the bread of life for all,” Cardinal Tagle said.

He said fish-shaped bread, distributed to participants, was a “reminder of our call to compassion and solidarity.”

“Faced with so many kinds of hunger in our world we hear the words of Jesus: You give them something to eat,” said the prelate.

Archbishop Gabriele Caccia, papal nuncio to the Philippines, reminded those present that being compassionate means not looking at people as numbers.

“If we want to have compassion don’t look at numbers. Look at people. Each one is unique. Each one has a name. Do as Jesus does. He knows us by name,” he said.

Delivered at the Senate Hearing of the Puno Constitution

July 17, 2018

By: Christian S. Monsod

The surveys of both SWS and Pulse Asia, while sometimes contradictory due to differences on polling questions, agree that about 74% of Filipinos admit to knowing nothing or very little about the Constitution. Thus, I ask for your indulgence to allow me a few minutes to say something about it, as well as the context in which charter change is being proposed. As someone said, text without context is pretext.

The inspiration of the 1987 Constitution was EDSA. But EDSA was more than the restoration of democracy through peaceful means. – it was also the promise of a new social order, especially to the poor, with radical changes, but through democratic means.

Before its writing, consultations nationwide were held to listen to the people and they overwhelmingly preferred the stability of familiar structures – a democratic, representative, unitary presidential system, with checks and balances and separation of powers. And, they wanted the power to directly vote for and have access to their president. But from the experience of the Marcos regime, they also wanted safeguards against the return of authoritarianism. It was not only the brutality in the violation of human rights, but the economic disaster of 1983 with total powers, or more accurately because of total powers, from which we did not recover until 2002 to the detriment of the poor. The people also wanted social justice and wanted our national destiny to be firmly and safely placed on Filipinos themselves.

Thus, there are three central themes of our Constitution – first, social justice and human rights with the poor as the center of development, second, never again to authoritarianism in any form and third, never again to any foreign domination of our economy like parity rights and amendments to the 1935 Constitution where we could not even change our exchange rate without the approval of the U.S. President. Which resulted in a foreign exchange crisis in the early fifties.

All these themes were, in many ways, counter-cultural and therefore “radical” because our history is marked by a tendency to give up powers to colonizers and dictators, of deferring to so-called “strong” leaders, of allowing big business to rule our economy and of an over-dependence of the poor on rich landowners for their basic necessities.

The 1987 Constitution can be viewed as affirmative action for our democracy – to correct the shortcomings of previous constitutions, to address the “wrongs” of history and to empower and enable the ordinary Filipino to rise above himself. It provides a system that should correct itself when it theatens to get out of control. And in that process of correction, the role of the people is critical because “sovereignty resides in the people”.

The 1987 Constitution was the first time that we spoke to the world as a truly independent and democratic Filipino nation. It is a document that had not been imposed on us by any colonial power or by a dictatorship.

The 1987 Constitution cut the umbilical cord of the 1935 and 1973 constitutions to the United States Constitution, which gives primacy to civil and political rights because it is a country of immigrants who all started from the same position and only wanted to be free from autocracy.

Our Constitution gives social and economic rights equal primacy with civil and political rights because we are a country of inequalities from the colonial days to the present where the starting positions of the rich and the poor are not equal. Social Justice and human rights are about the adjustment of these starting positions. It is not only a central theme, but the heart, of the Constitution.

This is the Constitution under threat of overhaul because it is blamed as the source of our problems today. I submit that we have largely failed in human development not because of the Constitution but because we have not fully implemented it. No thanks to our legislators who slept on the job for 30 years.. These are the people who want to re-write the Constitution. The question to the Puno constitution and other versions and to the ConAss itself is: are the proposed revisions going to depart from or do away with these three central themes of the 1987 Constitution?

In operational terms and in relation to federalism as a means to the ultimate goals we seek, i.e. address mass poverty, gross inequalities and underdevelopment of outlying areas, I quote/paraphrase from the Philippine Human Development Report 2012-2013:

“….Human development is about the welfare of people, not the development of places. The nature of economic development is uneven. It is not about bringing jobs to people but about closing the distance between the people and the jobs by giving people the capabiity and mobility to choose where to go. But the principle is different when it comes to quality education and quality health care. Breaking the vicious cycle of poverty of the young means bringing these services to wherever they are regardless of the cost. That is what human development is about.,,,,,,”

We might also note that if a federal (or federal-parliamentary) system is critical to our future, why is there no mention of it at all in the Philippine Development Plan 2017-2022 and Ambisyon2040, launched by President Duterte on October 11, 2016, including the means to achieve on a year to year basis its Results Matrices with about 300 targets?

The Philippine Development Plan also addresses the problem of unequal development in our country that the President talks about, with what is called the NSS (National Spatial Strategy) to maximize the benefits of what economists call economic agglomeration.

In other words, the design of government interventions to achieve development outcomes does not require a shift to a federal (or federal-parliamentary) system.

This is not the time to go into details, but my answer to the question with regard to the Puno Commission is a definite yes – that it departs from or does away with the central themes of the 1987 Constitution.

The list of questionable provisions is rather long but we might think about the implications of some examples that depart from those central themes:

• the idea of a “surveillance warrant” ,
• the deletion of the phrase “guarantees full respect for human rights”,
• the absence of “distributive programs” in the exclusive powers of the federal government that development experts say should be centralized under any system because of the need to have uniformity of scope and outcomes,
• the provisions with “in an emergency” where the Congress OR the President can act with extraordinary powers;
• the addition of “lawless violence” to proclaim martial law;   Continue reading

Last two years have seen most egregious human rights abuses since declaration of martial law in 1970s, activists claim

Human rights activists call for a stop to the spate of killings in the country during a protest march in Manila on July 23 ahead of the third State of the Nation Address by Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte. (Photo by Jimmy Domingo)

Mark Saludes, Manila Philippines
July 24, 2018

On July 23, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte warned the public during his third State of the Nation address that his two-year war on drugs would become even “more chilling” in the coming days.

Earlier that, day, a group of activists heard Mass before taking to the streets of Manila armed with banners and placards calling for an end to extrajudicial killings, rallying for “democracy, justice, and freedom,” and demanding he step down from office.

During the Mass, the bishop who delivered the homily reminded parishioners that some 23,000 people have been slain as part of Duterte’s brutal campaign against narcotics pushers and users.

Some didn’t need reminding: They had already lost family members to what critics see as a campaign of state-sanctioned murder, with many suspects gunned down before being able to defend themselves in court.

Nanet Castillo is a case in point. Her son was killed during the first wave of the war on drugs in 2016.

“We continue to seek and wait for justice to be served,” she said.

Gilbert Villena, a Catholic priest and member of Rise Up, a group formed by the relatives of those killed by security forces, said it was time to demand the president to fulfill his promises of “change for the greater good.”

Human rights groups have described the past two years as the “worst years for human rights” in the Philippines since the declaration of martial law in September 1972.

Karapatan, a local group of rights activists, described the country as being in a state of “crisis” under Duterte.

“This government is even worse than all the other administrations that followed the period of martial law,” said Cristina Palabay, one of the group’s members.

She said the body count from drug-related killings at the hands of security forces has already surpassed the number of deaths recorded during the martial law years of late dictator Ferdinand Marcos.

Meanwhile, Amnesty International Philippines said the country has become a “far more dangerous place” because of the impunity and lack of accountability police officers enjoy in carrying out Duterte’s mandate.

The president has “created a culture where anyone can kill or be killed,” said Jose Noel Olano, Amnesty’s director of operations in the Philippines.

He also took issue with Duterte’s “short-sightedness in accepting criticism” and “resistance to recommendations” on policy, claiming this has dovetailed to create an environment where people’s human rights are being trampled upon on a daily basis.

Lawyer Harry Roque, one of the president’s spokespeople, said such claims were unfounded as the anti-narcotics drive has been conducted legitimately.

He blamed the killings on suspects who “violently resisted” arrest and said Duterte “does not and will never condone extralegal killings.”

The Promotion of Church Peoples Response, an ecumenical group, offered a different opinion, saying the current administration has been characterized by a “culture of fear, death, impunity, and un-peace.”

Protestant pastor Mary Grace Masegman said Duterte “has not accomplished anything except demonstrating his gross incompetence and inability to rightly govern the nation.”

Even members of the Catholic Church are being persecuted, she claimed.

In December 2017, Catholic priest Marcelito Paez was gunned down in Nueva Ejica province after facilitating the release of a political prisoner.

This year four foreign religious missionaries, including Australian nun Patricia Fox, have been arrested, detained, and deported after they were accused of having participated in political activities opposing the state.

Catholic and Protestant priests have also become more vocal in taking issue about threats, harassment and surveillance conducted against them by the apparatus of the state.

Karapatan claims to have records showing 169 cases of “extrajudicial killings” during the first two years of Duterte’s rule, significantly higher than the 103 cases reported during the same period under former president Benigno Aquino.

Moreover, from July 2016 to June 2018, at least 432,380 individuals have reportedly been displaced compared to 9,756 under Aquino, the rights group said.

On July 16, at least 1,600 tribal people from 15 communities in the towns of Lianga and San Agustin in the southern Philippines fled their homes because of military operations.

Karapatan noted many more cases of illegal arrests and arbitrary detention during the early years of the current administration.

It listed 359 cases where people where illegally arrest and detained, and another 1,695 where suspects were apprehended unlawfully but not detained over the last 24 months.

“The majority of those who were arrested illegally were human rights activists, environmental defenders, union leaders, and poor people in big cities,” Palabay said.

The bulk of the cases occurred in Mindanao, where martial law was declared at the onset of a five-month-long armed conflict in Marawi that began on May 23, 2017, the group said.

Since then, at least 72 political killings have been reported in the region.

Even students and teachers have apparently not been spared. Save Our Schools Network reported 535 attacks on schools in tribal areas of Mindanao from July 2016 to April 17, 2018.

“We also documented at least 30 occasions of military encampment on tribal schools, with over 3,000 students affected,” said Rius Valle, a spokesperson for the network.

He said that from June 2016 to July 2018 at least 72 tribal schools had been forced to close their doors either permanently or temporarily after being tagged by the military as “communist training camps.”

Andrea Maxene Punzalan contributed to this report

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte delivers his third State of the Nation Address before the joint session of the Philippine Congress on July 23. (Photo courtesy of the Presidential Communications Office)

As Philippine president enters 3rd year in office, bishops condemn his human rights record

Jose Torres Jr., Manila Philippines
July 24, 2018

Catholic Church leaders and various activist groups in the Philippines have, for the most part, condemned Rodrigo Duterte’s record as president at the start of his third year in office.

His human rights record in particular received most attention.

As if to spite his critics, the president in his State of the Nation Address on July 23 said his concern was not human rights but the lives of people.

“Your concern is human rights, mine is human lives,” the president told critics of his war against narcotics in his speech.

“The lives of our youth are being wasted and families destroyed, and all because of chemicals called shabu, cocaine, cannabis, and heroin,” Duterte said in his 48-minute address.

The comments did not sit well with Bishop Pablo Virgilio David of Kalookan whose diocese in the northern part of the capital has witnessed most killings.

“Such a statement implies that the victims of drug-related killings are not human,” said the prelate in a Facebook post hours after the president delivered his speech.

“Is not the right to life the most basic human right?” said Bishop David, vice president of the bishops’ conference.

He said the Catholic Church “can never agree” with the president’s view. He said Duterte’s statement is “illogical.”

“With all due respect, the church can never agree with such a statement,” said Bishop David, adding that for the church, drug dependents “are sick people” who need rehabilitation.

The prelate said the government should instead focus its anti-narcotics war against big-time drug dealers.

“How come the supply of illegal drugs remains steady in spite of all the killings?” he said.

In his speech, Duterte vowed to continue his “war on drugs,” saying “it will be as relentless and chilling as on the day it began.”

“Let me begin by putting it bluntly: The war against illegal drugs is far from over,” said the president in a prepared speech.

“The illegal drugs war will not be sidelined,” he said.

Since June 30, 2016, when Duterte assumed office, up to June 30 this year, the Philippine National Police claimed more than 4,500 people were killed in legitimate anti-drug operations.

Human rights groups, however, said thousands more have been killed by still unidentified assailants throughout the country.

Weighed but found wanting

Hours before Duterte delivered his speech, Manila Auxiliary Bishop Broderick Pabillo, a vocal critic of the president’s policies, expressed hope the leader would admit to his mistakes.

He said Duterte’s previous speeches were filled with arrogance and lacking in substance.

“We want to know the real score of government action, or inaction, or wrong action … however ugly they may be,” he said.

“Enough of the insults, cursing and accusations,” said the bishop.

For the first time, however, the president did not utter any cuss words during his speech.

One prelate, Bishop Ruperto Santos of Balanga, even lauded the president for promising to take care of the well being of migrant workers.

“It is commendable that he promised to fight and work against abusive employers,” said the bishop who heads the Episcopal Commission on Migrants and Itinerant People.

He said he is “thankful to the president for mentioning our beloved [migrant workers] as he appreciates their sacrifices and services for their loved ones.”

“He also mentioned the resiliency of [migrant workers],” added the prelate.

Bishop Gerardo Alminaza of San Carlos said he assumes the president has “all the good intentions to serve the best interest of our country.”

The prelate, however, said “it’s obvious after two years [that] there are unfulfilled promises.”

He said that while the Catholic Church is one with Duterte in his goals “to alleviate poverty, stop corruption, solve drug problem … we can’t agree with his approaches.”

Bishop Alminaza said the “total disregard of human rights and human dignity, disrespect of women and other people’s beliefs and religious convictions” are not acceptable.

Archbishop Antonio Ledesma of Cagayan de Oro said Duterte’s war against drugs “is a classic example of how the end cannot justify any means.”

“It can also lead to authoritarianism and even a return to dictatorship that we have all decried,” said the prelate of the Mindanao archdiocese.

New promises

Elsewhere in his speech Duterte urged government workers to end corruption and simplify government processes by cutting red tape.

The president said he would immediately sign a law that creates a new Muslim region in the southern Philippines and promised “significant increases” in the budget for Mindanao.

He called on Congress to pass a law that will prohibit all forms of casual labor contracting, admitting that he has no power to end the scheme despite his election promise to do so.

He also urged legislators to pass a law that will create a national land use policy and a disaster management department.

The president also warned mining firms to be responsible and stop destroying watersheds, forests and bodies of water, adding that natural resources must benefit all Filipinos.

For the first time, the president stuck to his prepared speech, the shortest in his three annual reports to the nation so far.

Mark Saludes and Melo Acuna contributed to this report.

A string of broken election promises has seen the majority of Filipinos who voted for him suffering the most

A group of urban poor settlers stage a demonstration outside the national police headquarters in Manila in this June 28 photo to protest a wave of arrests and killings in recent months. (Photo by Jire Carreon)

Inday Espina-Varona, Manila Philippines
July 23, 2018

More than 55,000 homes lie abandoned, rotting in relocation sites for informal settlers of the Philippines’ capital. Billions of pesos were spent to build these homes but beneficiaries have shied away due to dangerously shoddy construction.

Members of the urban poor group Kadamay launched a campaign in June to occupy the vacant houses. They have already built a thriving community north of Manila following a campaign last year that took the government by surprise.

Nobody else wants to live in the tenements. Instead of negotiating, President Rodrigo Duterte ordered elite policemen to guard the empty structures, telling officers to “shoot” the activists.

Duterte got 16 million votes during the 2016 elections, mostly from the poor.

Voters angered at decades of neglect and pro-rich governance could not resist his promises: a crackdown against crime groups that prey on the young, an end to labor-only contracting that has withheld social benefits and security of tenure for millions of workers, the completion of the government’s agrarian reform program, homes for the homeless, the safe return home for indigenous tribes displaced by a military working for mining and plantation interests.

As Duterte prepares for his third year in power, critics say he has delivered on only one main promise. The president, who built his fame on the pacification of a southern city via a bloody pogrom against criminal suspects, has brought his bloody act to the national stage.

Police have shot dead more than 4,000 mostly poor drug suspects. Several thousand more have been slain by assassins whom police claim are members of crime syndicates, although witnesses to several murders have tagged law enforcers.

Duterte’s drug war delivered on his threat of bloodshed. It is a big zero in terms of solution. The president promised an end to drugs in six months, then one year, and then two. Now he says it will take him all six years to rid the country of the problem.

Critics scoff at his words. Few heads of cartels have been arrested. Big drug lords have walked from jail. Hundreds of millions of dollars worth of illegal drugs have entered the country. One scandal had customs officials facilitating a huge shipment of illegal drugs from China.

Duterte, who routinely threatens to kill corrupt government officials, promoted those responsible for the smuggling attempt.

There is no sense or reason to Duterte’s bloody campaign. Children have died, millions rounded up with no room to protest their innocence. He has drastically trimmed the budget for drug rehabilitation.

Duterte’s promise to labor groups now hounds him. At least 30,000 workers protested on Labor Day this year, the first time in decades rival organizations have united. They rejected an executive order that only touches the problem, allowing many legal loopholes to remain.

Last month, strikes broke out at a dozen big national and multinational firms, all to end labor-only contracting. North of Manila, where hundreds of workers barricaded the gates of the country’s biggest manufacturer of condiments and spices, police attacked, gravely injuring seven people and arresting more than 20 others.

There has been silence from the man in power.

The Ibon Foundation think tank reports that eight of 10 families earn less than US$526 per month. Government economists acknowledge that a family in the capital region needs at least US$843 monthly to avoid the poverty trap.

Many of the thousands of workers now at the barricades earn between US$7 and US$8 daily, well below the US$9.5 minimum wage.

The poor are exempted from paying income tax. But a tax reform program that benefits the richest burdens the poor with indirect taxes from an expanded value-tax list and higher excise taxes on petroleum products.

As a result, inflation is at a five-year high, with little end in sight. Even legislators have called for a review of the tax-reform program, but Duterte’s economic managers refused to budge. To defray the additional cost, they have given the poorest of the poor a US$3.75 monthly subsidy, not enough to cover a week’s increase in the price of rice.

Duterte has reneged on his pledge to protect indigenous peoples. He now threatens to bomb their schools for churning out alleged militant youths. Displeased at indigenous opposition to plantation and mine operations, he has vowed to open up their lands and choose investors.

After bombing the Islamic city of Marawi to smithereens, Duterte has shut out the local community from decision-making in the US$1.3-billion rehabilitation program.

Martial law in Mindanao allows shortcuts in the budget process. The military-led Task Force Rise Marawi has little oversight as it negotiates with big Chinese state firms and Malaysian investors for reconstruction.

Thousands of the 400,000 displaced residents remain in temporary shelters outside of Marawi, their children reluctant to enroll in schools where they brave discrimination against Muslims.

Faced with an inability to deal with economic problems and growing outrage, Duterte has fallen back on his solution comfort zone: draconian crackdowns.

A young man died following a round up of poor men for the crime of idling on streets, a regular activity for Filipinos who live in urban poor communities, sometimes in multi-family homes with poor ventilation.

Going around shirtless in Manila’s sweltering monsoon season has suddenly become a crime.

Responding to human rights groups’ concern, Duterte snapped back with his favorite line: Nobody tells him what to do.

The police aren’t going around seeking shirtless men in exclusive villages. The focus of the crackdown is once again the poor. A Kadamay leader believes it is a ploy, framed as another anti-crime policy, to prevent the urban poor from organizing.

The latest outrage is a proposal by the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency for mandatory drug tests among elementary school pupils and teachers. It is a ridiculous solution that places the onus of blame on children to cover up the failure of state mayhem to resolve crime.

As the poor reel from killings and growing hunger and poverty, the only solution Duterte has for them is more misery.

Inday Espina-Varona is editor and opinion writer for various publications in Manila.