(Second of three parts)
First Part : A Pattern to Madness
AT LEAST three people whose names and groups were on the reported military list that Bayan Muna Rep. Satur Ocampo leaked to the media in May, were killed in the last two years. The picture of Pojas, killed on May 15 last year, appeared in one of the slides.
Partylist Representatives Satur Ocampo and Teddy Casio of Bayan Muna, Lisa Maza and Luz Ilagan of Gabrielawho all declared to run under the progressive political party Makabayansaid they launched the Atras Con-As (Back-off, Con-As) campaign in Davao City to challenge Nograles right in his bailiwick. It was Nograles who pushed for the passage of House Resolution 1109 which calls to convene members of both the Lower House and the Senate into a Constitutional Assembly to change the Philippine Constitution. Read on.
Its possible that the government will use it to declare a state of national emergency and arrest enemies of the state, including the opposition, Bayan Muna Rep. Satur Ocampo warned. Read on.
DAVAO CITY (davaotoday.com) — A farmer last seen beaten and forcibly taken allegedly by soldiers on July 4 is missing, according to the human rights group Karapatan.
Witnesses saw Alvin Lopez, 25, a farmer and resident of sitio Maot, Barangay San Jose in Monkayo town of Compostela Valley Province hogtied, and forced into a military vehicle during a military operation. Alvin’s mother, Erlinda, 46, sought Karapatan’s help to locate his son. She filed a complaint Tuesday before the Commission on Human Rights (CHR) in the region against the military’s 26th Infantry Battalion based in the area. Read on.
(first of three parts)
Killed on the feast of San Isidro, the patron saint of peasants, Celso Pojas fell just a few steps from the gate of the KMP office in Maa. (contributed photo)
First, their groups have been tagged as the legal fronts of the Communist New People’s Army. Then, top military officials make public statements suggesting they’re enemies of the state. Finally, before anyone could stop to consider, they are killed.
This pattern emerges in the extrajudicial killings of activists in the country, which have become more pronounced in Davao City and neighboring provinces of Compostela Valley as the government’s 2010 deadline to wipe out the Communist insurgency looms.
After Bayan Muna Rep. Satur Ocampo exposed the existence of a military document linking some individuals and civil society groups to the Communist movement, Davao Today finds it urgent to look into the pattern of the killings of activists in this part of the country. Read on.
DAVAO CITY — High-ranking military officers earlier named in the Davao lawyers’ petition for writ of amparo failed to show up in court for the scheduled hearing on Wednesday.
This was the second time that Judge Jose Manuel Castillo of the Regional Trial Court Branch 10 called a hearing on the amparo petitions of Davao-based lawyers, Carlos Isagani Zarate, Lilibeth Ladaga and Angela Librado-Trinidad. Read on.
DAVAO CITY — Scholars of House Speaker Prospero Nograles, the Davao City first district Representative, are worried. When the congressman steps down after his last term in 2010, they fear that funds for the scholarship program “Oplan Kaalam” will also end.
So, when a Nograles staff mentioned this in a May 26 scholars’ orientation program, some scholars suggested letting Karlo Nograles, the son of Prospero Nograles, run for election. Read on.
