Below is the speech of a Australian Senator delivered before the Federal Parliament that criticizes the arrest and detention of Bayan Muna Rep. Satur C. Ocampo. The lawmaker is demanding an explanation from the Australian foreign ministry on the situation in the Philippines, and the case of Ocampo and unresolved political killings.
The Arroyo government’s handling of the case of Bayan Muna congressman Satur Ocampo has backfired. That’s according to the many commentary and opinion pieces that have been written since Ocampo was arrested, shoved into a van and then into a Leyte-bound plane while Filipinos were asleep.
Who is Satur Ocampo and why is the Arroyo regime hellbent on throwing him behind bars?
Extrajudicial executions, forced disappearances, political persecution, baseless accusations, and arbitrary arrest and detention have no place in a democracy. These are contradictory to it. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, Norberto Gonzales, Raul Gonzalez, and the AFP cannot claim to be defending democracy, for they are a curse to it.
Even the parents of nominees of progressive party-list groups are not spared of the harassment directed against them. Last March 13, the father of Kabataan Party?s second nominee and National Capital Region (NCR) chairperson Enrico Almonguerra received a letter from the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) summoning him and Enrico to the Civic Military Operations (CMO) headquarters in Fort Bonifacio on March 22. This is not the first time that the youth party-list group?s nominees experienced harassment from the military.
The seven bodies found in an alleged mass grave in Inopacan, Southern Leyte, which were presented in the multiple murder case against Bayan Muna Representative Satur Ocampo, Jose Ma.Sison, Luis Jalandoni, Vicente Ladlad, Rafael Baylosis, Randal Echanis and several others, have already been buried and used in a case somewhere else.
Related story: Witness in Murder Case Vs. Satur a Desaparecido