Investigate Ph called on the UN Human Rights Council on Monday, Sept. 13, to conduct a probe into alleged rights abuses in the Philippines
Jose Torres Jr. September 14, 2021
High Commissioners composed of parliamentarians, lawyers, religious leaders, and activists from across the world lead the launch of the Third Report of the independent international body on Sept. 13. 2021. (Screen grab from Investigative Ph webinar)
An international investigation into the human rights situation in the Philippines claimed to have found “damming evidence” linking President Rodrigo Duterte and his administration to human rights abuses.
People’s organizations and civil society groups behind Investigate Ph called on the UN Human Rights Council on Monday, Sept. 13, to conduct a probe into the alleged violations in the Philippines.
Investigate Ph, an independent investigation on alleged abuses in the Philippines to substantiate the June 2020 report released by the Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights (OHCR), issued its final report on Monday.
The report examines alleged violations of the economic, social and cultural rights of the Filipino people, and the reported denial of the people’s rights to self-determination, development, and peace.
The report claims that it found that the Duterte administration “was deliberately violating these rights through its submission to US domination and neoliberal economic policies.”
Please WATCH from PPCRV FB Page https://www.facebook.com/ppcrv/videos/902739213665605/
A Catholic Church-backed poll watchdog yesterday launched a nine-month novena Masses in preparation for next year’s elections.
The Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting (PPCRV) said the “Prayer Power Campaign 2022” will run until the May 9 polls.
It said this is “to implore the aid of the Divine Providence for Filipinos to do their share” for orderly and credible elections.
The Masses are also intended to seek God’s guidance for voters to choose the right leaders for the country.
“Let our every action in these elections be guided by these basic values for good citizenship so that those elected be exemplars of these values,” the PPCRV said.
The first novena Mass was presided over by Bishop Pablo Virgilio David of Kalookan, Vice President of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines.
The Masses are streamed via the official Facebook page and Youtube channel of the PPCRV.
Quezon City, Philippines— Climate and health groups expressed opposition to the Department of Energy (DOE) draft Circular on Waste-to-Energy and the agency’s inclination to circumvent existing laws just to promote garbage incineration, disguised as WTE, in the country.
“Renewable energy is defined as energy created from natural processes that do not get depleted. DOE’s claim that WTE technologies are a form of “renewable energy” is fallacious. Waste, the feedstock for WTEs, cannot be properly classified in the same category as wind, wave or solar energy. Waste consists of discarded materials (e.g., paper, plastic and glass) that are produced from the extraction and processing of finite natural resources such as minerals and fossil fuels. Moreover, burning these materials will do more harm to our environment and climate,” said Atty. Lievj Alimangohan of EcoWaste Coalition.
The DOE’s draft circular which is now undergoing public consultation wants to package garbage incineration as “renewables” and provide special incentives for this type of technology such as priority dispatch, double equivalent in of RE certificates per MWh of production and exemption from competitive selection process for incinerator projects involving LGUs.
“By classifying WTEs as “renewable energy”, the DOE Circular unduly expands the scope of the Renewable Energy Act. Worse, the policy promotes and legitimizes anti-competitive conduct in the power sector by giving special preferences for incineration over genuine renewable energy systems. Also, by providing specific exemptions from the Competitive Selection Process, the policy also exposes consumers to disadvantageous power supply agreements,” said Alimangohan.
“WtE technologies (traditional heat recovery incinerators, pyrolytic incinerators, plasma pyrolysis, gasification, etc.) ALL produce poisonous and toxic substances. These facilities simply transform the garbage problem into a more persistent environmental and health problem. They merely transform the waste into other forms of wastes, such as carbon monoxide, dioxins and furans, polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons, nitrogen oxides, carbon dioxide, methane, volatile organic compounds, aldehydes, particulate matter and heavy metals such as mercury, lead and cadmium. This is true even for WtE facilities that claim to be “high-tech and clean”. All WtE are a massive waste of energy. They produce only small amounts of energy while destroying large amounts of reusable materials. Conversely, zero waste practices such as recycling and composting conserve 3 to 5 times the amount of energy produced by waste incineration,” added Sonia Mendoza of Mother Earth Foundation and a former Commissioner at the National Solid Waste Management Commission.
“Dealing with the solid waste problem sustainably involves reducing the volume of waste at source and promoting a less extractive and more circular economy. Incinerator technologies however, draw attention away from sustainable production and solutions that address the waste problem at its roots. Instead, incinerators legitimize continued extraction and high-carbon economic development. The promotion of WTE technologies as “renewable” is a clear case of greenwashing,” said Archie Abellar of GAIA Asia Pacific.
The groups emphasized that studies in Europe and the United States invariably show that WtE facilities generate very small amounts of energy and have very low efficiency rates of 19-27%. In Europe, WtE facilities contributed less than 1.5% to the European Union’s final energy consumption. Given these low energy conversion rates of WtE facilities, they cannot be expected to actually become baseload renewables in the Philippines.
“Since WtE facilities produce low amounts of usable energy, the power generation segment of these facilities is not profitable. In the United States and Europe, WtE facilities’ main sources of revenue are subsidies, tipping fees, and contractual “put-or-pay” arrangements shouldered by local governments. In other words, not only are WTE facilities inefficient, they need to be propped up through public financing,” the groups said.
The groups further noted that WTE technologies and facilities are not just harmful to health and the environment, but financially burdensome which are harmful “solutions” that have been greenwashed to appear eco-friendly.
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The #breakfreefromplastic is a global movement working towards a future free from plastic pollution. The Plastic-free Pilipinas project is a collaboration of #breakfreefromplastic members EcoWaste Coalition, GAIA Asia Pacific, Greenpeace Southeast Asia, Health Care Without Harm Southeast Asia and Mother Earth Foundation.
Soldiers conducting operations to evacuate civilians from Kabul (Public Domain)
At the Angelus, Pope Francis calls Christians to show solidarity with the people of Afghanistan, especially women and children, the victims of violent attacks in recent days. “Let us continue to assist those in need”, he says, “and pray that dialogue and solidarity may lead to peaceful and fraternal coexistence.”
By Vatican News staff reporter
“I am following the situation in Afghanistan with great concern,” Pope Francis said on Sunday, adding, “I share in the suffering of those who mourn for the people who lost their lives in the suicide attacks last Thursday, and of those who are seeking help and protection.”
Almost two hundred people were killed in the suicide bombing at Kabul’s airport last week, and thousands of people are still waiting desperately to flee to the country as the Taliban takes control of the war-torn nation.
“Code Red for humanity” is how the UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres describes the latest IPCC Sixth Assessment Report1 which shows the world is dangerously close to irreversible global warming unequivocally caused by human activities. This is the context where we are called to celebrate the Season of Creation, renewing our home which is on the verge of the abyss.
From September 1 to October 4, the Christian family celebrates the beauty and goodness of creation. This global celebration began in 1989 with the Ecumenical Patriarchate’s recognition of Creation Day, which is September 1, and is now embraced by the wide ecumenical community.
In 2003, through the Pastoral Statement of the Permanent Council2 “Celebrating Creation Day and Creation Time”, CBCP called for the observance of Creation time. In 2015, Pope Francis formally added the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation3 to the Catholic calendar as an annual day of prayer. And in 2016, the Holy Father officially invited all Catholics to celebrate the full season.4 This year, our theme for the Season of Creation is “A Home for all? Renewing the Oikos of God”. In the Philippines, we extend our celebration of this special season to the second Sunday of October, the Indigenous People’s Sunday.
This “time for creation” offers, in the words of Pope Francis, “individual believers and communities a fitting opportunity to reaffirm their personal vocation to be stewards of creation, to thank God for the wonderful handiwork which he has entrusted to our care, and to implore his help for the protection of creation as well as his pardon for the sins committed against the world in which we live.”5
Let us pray for the two important meetings that are happening this year. The UN Biodiversity Conference (COP 15) gathers nations around the world to face the problem of biodiversity loss and the UN Climate Change Conference (COP26) to address the urgency of the climate crisis. These two issues, climate and biodiversity, are intricately connected, with climate change projected to become an increasingly important driver of biodiversity loss.
On behalf of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines, drawing inspiration from our previous pastoral letters and from the vision of Laudato Si’, I would like to enjoin all to:
Celebrate the Season of Creation with your families, communities and parishes. To help you with the celebration please visit https://www.facebook.com/CBCPLaudatoSi for more resources.
Participate in the activities organized through the National Laudato Si’ Program to roll out the Laudato Si’ Action Platform6 – a 7-year journey together towards living the vision of Laudato Si’.
Sign the Healthy Planet, Healthy People Petition7. Invite your families and friends to sign this petition for the upcoming two big meetings on Biodiversity and Climate Change. I encourage all dioceses and parishes to use their social media platforms by connecting to the Facebook page of the CBCP National Laudato Si’ Program to monitor signatures from the Philippines.
Our common home is on the brink of catastrophe. Urgent actions are needed. We hope that this Season of Creation would lead us to renew our commitment to action to ensure that all creation will have a safe and healthy home to flourish and participate in renewing the Oikos of God.
For the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines:
+ROMULO G. VALLES, D.D. Archbishop of Davao CBCP President 23 August 2021
Rex JMA Fernandez is the 57th in the list of lawyers and judges killed under the Duterte administration.
Emily Vital | August 26, 2021 Bulatlat.com
MANILA — Human rights lawyer Rex JMA Fernandez was ambushed by a lone assailant this afternoon August 26 in Good Shepherd Road, Banawa, Cebu City. He was 64.
According to the National Union of Peoples’ Lawyers (NUPL)’s count, Fernandez is the 57th in the list of lawyers and judges killed under the Duterte administration.
As a former legal counsel of human rights group Karapatan, Fernandez also took on cases of human rights victims filed military officials, including that of torture survivor Raymond Manalo against former Gen. Jovito Palparan Jr.
In a statement, NUPL President Edre Olalia condemned the incident. “No words, indeed. Another colleague has fallen with his boots on. We had lost count. It has not stopped and every lawyer is a sitting duck,” he said.
He described Fernandez as “passionate, intense and brave, even as he was unique in many ways.”
Olalia said that even after Fernandez became inactive in NUPL, he continued to collaborate with fellow human rights lawyers in public interest cases.
Fernandez, founding member of the NUPL, handled the case of the Carbon vendors against the Carbon modernization project of Megawide Construction Corp, according to alternative media group Aninaw Productions. He also served as one of the lawyers of Cebu 8, or the protesters and bystanders arrested during a protest against the Anti-Terror bill on June 5, 2020.
Recently, Fernandez also figured in a dispute with condominium owner over water supply.
“Before he was silenced, he castigated the present administration which he had hitherto placed his sincere hope on would bring change,” Olalia said. “He died disillusioned that it was not meant to be.”
Integrated Bar of the Philippines (IBP)-Cebu chapter also denounced the killing. “An attack on our brother-lawyer for case-related motives is an attack on the justice system and the rule of law we promised to protect,” the group said.
IBP-Cebu called on the authorities to investigate the incident promptly and bring the perpetrators to justice. Lawyers groups have been calling on the Supreme Court to act on the rising cases of extrajudicial killings and threats against the officers of the court.
Indigenous peoples are under threat as never before and need the international community to stand with them as they demand justice, their ancestral land rights and an end to the exploitation and abuse they suffer in many countries.
They suffer discrimination, stigmatization and racism. How disingenuous that is since all people in the world today descended from some indigenous tribal people through the ages. In fact, DNA tests show that everyone in the world is descended from one common ancestor in Africa. Real science does not lie. The human species emerged in the Makgadikgadi-Okavango wetland. It was not just any home, but the ancestral “homeland” for all modern humans today. https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/controversial-study-pinpoints-birthplace-modern-humans
Today, there are more than 476 million indigenous peoples that live in 90 nations around the world. According to the United Nations, they make up 6.2 percent of the world population. They have their own unique languages, culture, customs and traditions and have ancestral rights to their lands having possessed these from time immemorial. They are people that are capable of self-governance and have survived for many thousands of years before nations emerged in history. In the last 500 years, colonialism spread across the world and foreign nations invaded the lands of indigenous people, killed millions and stole and occupied their lands. The indigenous people were infected with western diseases against which they had no defense and millions more died. Others were massacred and driven to the edge of extinction.
Pope Francis greets members of the Laudato si’ Inter-University Congress and highlights the importance of promoting social awareness to the care of our common home.
By Vatican News staff writer
August 24 2021
Pope Francis has sent greetings to the members of the Laudato si’ Inter-University Congress scheduled to hold from 1-4 September in Argentina.
In the video message delivered in Spanish, he expressed hope that the initiative will “advance social awareness and consciousness” for the care of our common home.
“The Encyclical Laudato si’ is not only a ‘green’ Encyclical, it is also a ‘social’ Encyclical,” the Pope said, hoping that the Congress will help its scope and consequences to become more visible.
Finally, with a request for prayers for himself, the Pope blessed the participants at the Congress.
Laudato si’ Congress
The Congress is organized by the National Inter-University Council (CIN) and the Council of Rectors of Private Universities (CRUP), in conjunction with the Bishops Conference of Argentina (CEA) on the occasion of the sixth anniversary of the encyclical Laudato si’.
The conferences, talks, and other activities, put together under the theme “Caring for the Common Home,” will promote dialogue on some of the main themes of the 2015 encyclical, including fraternity, personal dignity, intercultural dialogue, the environment, and integral development of people, among others.
The Congress will bring together both national and international experts that will share their expertise on the multidimensional complexities of the various themes in order to foster dialogue about joint action in the future.
The Laudato si’ Congress will be accessible virtually to facilitate participation from all over the country.
August 8, 2021 is a remarkable day for the Missionary Sisters of the Immaculate Conception (M.I.C.) as they commemorate the arrival of the first M.I.C. Sisters in the Philippines. A Eucharistic Celebration was held at Our Lady of the Assumption Parish Church, Davao City on that day officiated by Archbishop Romulo Valles, D.D., head of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines and on August 9, 2021 at Mary the Queen Parish, Greenhills, presided by Fr. Guy Peter V. Guibelondo, SJ, the Parish Priest. This momentous event was celebrated with grace and thanksgiving by the M.I.C. Sisters and their benefactors, alumni of their schools and their lay associates, the AsMICs.
Interestingly, Archbishop Valles and Fr. Guy have known the M.I.C.’s in their personal capacity. Archbp. Valles gave testimony to the grace of celebrating 100 years of MIC missionary presence in the Philippines, as part of a tapestry intertwined in the last 100 years of the quincentennial celebration of Christianity in the Philippines. While the celebration is during the days of the pandemic, the Archbishop exhorted the faithful to imagine how daring MIC sisters were, to travel all the way from Canada at that time after World War I and the widespread of the Spanish Flu to come to the east. In his homily, he expounded on the theme of the celebration with the readings of the 19th Sunday in ordinary time:
Go to the peripheries. This has been the character of the church … and that is what the M.I.C.’s did 100 years ago, to go nowhere …. to people they don’t know.
Walk for a Mission. From the first reading from the Book of Kings, Elijah walk for a mission…exhausted….to go up to the mountain of the Lord… to find the Lord. When the M.I.C. Sisters arrived in Mati, Davao Oriental in 1947, exhausted from travel, the first order of the day was to go to the presence of the Lord.
Christlike attitude. In the second reading, St. Paul exhorted the Ephesians to be kind to one another, do away with anger, and every kind of malice. This was paramount in the lives of the M.I.C. Sisters, so that they can become Christlike when they go out and serve… bearing the aroma, the atmosphere, the aura of Christ. On a personal note, Archbp. Valles related his personal experience when he served in Mati in the 70’s as a young priest on how the Sisters educated him in good manners and right conduct and even making sure that his English was impeccable.
Daily Holy Eucharist. Jesus is the Bread of Life. We are asked to become one, to be familiar with the people. Though we smell like sheep, our service should be bringing people to heaven.
Fr. Guy on the other hand, congratulated the M.I.C. Sisters on their 100 years of missionary presence in the Philippines. He reminded the M.I.C.’s to always remember: “who chose you”, “why you were chosen” and “what you should do”. He also stressed on the need of a re-examination of hearts; to go back to what you learned in the Novitiate, in the initial formation; to adapt without losing one’s soul. Above all – Edification! To be mindful of your spiritual attractiveness…. because before we can inspire others, we have to inspire each other. Most importantly, do not lose hope!
Presently, the M.I.C. Sisters have three schools, two in Metro Manila and one in Mati, Davao Oriental. These are Immaculate Conception Academy, Greenhills, Immaculate Conception Academy of Manila in Gagalangin, Tondo and Immaculate Heart of Mary Academy in Mati, Davao Oriental. They also engaged in the evangelization among indigenous people in the parish of Kiburiao, Quezon, Bukidnon and on the defunct mission with the Mangyans in Mindoro Occidental that enabled the Mangyans to secure ownership of their ancestral lands.
In Davao City, the MIC Retreat House (MRH), beside Our Lady of Assumption Parish, is a preferred place for spiritual renewal among many groups not only in Davao but also from other parts of the country .
One hundred years ago, on August 8, 1921, five (5) Missionary Sisters of the Immaculate Conception (M.I.C.) arrived in the Philippines upon the request of Dr. Jose Teehankee, one of the community leaders of the Manila Chinese, to take charge of the Chinese General Hospital and the new School of Nursing. Dr. Teehankee found an ally in Msgr. Michael O’Doherty, archbishop of Manila who sent a cablegram to his counterpart in Montreal, Canada, Archbishop Paul Bruchesi. The M.I.C. foundress, Venerable Delia Tetreault moved by the Spirit, responded favorably to Msgr. O’Doherty.
MICs have embraced the theme for their platinum jubilee, “In joy and thanksgiving!” which the present pandemic have not managed to dampen.
The organization allocated Php65.5 million for its educational assistance as part of its Alay Kapwa Legacy Stewardship Program
LiCAS News August 10, 2021
Local counterparts of the social action secretariat of the Philippine Catholic Church attend a workshop conducted by Caritas Philippines. (File photo by Mark Saludes)
Caritas Philippines, the social action arm of the Catholic Church in the country, has set up a scholarship fund for “academically challenged” junior high school students.
The organization allocated Php65.5 million for its educational assistance as part of its Alay Kapwa Legacy Stewardship Program.
Bishop Jose Collin Bagaforo said the aim of the project is to provide at least 525 poor children “with equal access to primary and secondary education and skills and opportunities.”
“We need to invest in the education of our youth if we want more gold medals, better government and next-generation leaders,” said Bishop Bagaforo in a report on CBCP News.
Father Antonio Labiao, executive secretary of Caritas Philippines, said the educational assistance covers online learning and other school fees, tutorial services and training.
