DAVAO CITY, Philippines – Two labor organizers of Kilusang Mayo Uno Southern Mindanao (KMU-SMR) were harassed and red-tagged in separate incidents recently, the group said.
The group said the incidents is the latest of the harassment its members that started since 2023 as the Marcos Jr. administration continued the counter-insurgency program of the Duterte administration under the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC).
The recent incidents involved organizers Marvin Dacanay and Jeffrey Uypala that took place last July 24 and August 8 respectively.
Dacanay’s home was visited by three persons claiming to be members of the Task Force Davao, the city’s security unit against terrorism. The group, led by their leader identified as Sergeant Roy Tamon, asked Dacanay’s father of his whereabouts and said Dacanay was already an armed rebel in the countryside, alleging that the KMU is a front of the Communist Party of the Philippines.
Before leaving the Dacanay home, the state agents urged the father to convince his son to “surrender” and to stop his organizing work with KMU.
In their statement, KMU-SMR clarified that Dacanay is doing organizing work with agri-workers and service workers in the region.
In Uypala’s case, he came out from a meeting with transport workers along JP Laurel Avenue (Bajada) when he was stopped by four persons aboard two motorcycles.
The four men identified themselves as personnel from the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG). Uypala reported was intimidated and pressured by these elements to cooperate with them and was promised financial assistance.
Before leaving Uypala, the alleged intelligence group photographed him.
There are no details as to what form of “cooperation” was asked by the alleged CIDG men from Uypala. Uypala and Dacanay have declined to appear for an interview with as part of their “extra precautionary measures”, according to Rauf Sissay, secretariat of Bagong Alyansang Makabayan Southern Mindanao, a group allied with KMU.
KMU-SMR has faced instances of harassment, surveillance and red-tagging in the past years. Their secretary-general Paul John Dizon was tracked by NTF-ELCAC agents in his residence on November 2023 and was asked to surrender. Since then, Dizon has also sought precautionary steps for his safety. https://www.facebook.com/
Another former secretary general of KMU-SMR, Carlo Olalo, and Melodia Gumanoy, a leader of a banana plantation workers union in Compostela, were also visited by the military in their homes in 2024 and were also asked to “surrender”.
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1CkZVRTCAX
On April 2024, KMU SMR organizer William Lariosa, went missing after a military operation in a farm community in Quezon, Bukidnon. The 63-year old Lariosa was already targeted by military agents in Davao del Norte years earlier that prompted him to leave to Bukidnon. The military had denied knowing the whereabouts of the 63-year old Lariosa
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/15wXiCA1uB
Human rights groups and international rights experts have called out the Philippine government to abolish the NTF-ELCAC as it violates the people’s rights to organization and expression. The groups all raised concerns of how red-tagging and attacks on activists, journalists and members of the marginalized groups have impacted democracy. https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1GdKLJU6Ku/
But KMU-SMR the Marcos Jr. administration for extending the NTF-ELCAC through the National Action Plan for Peace, Unity and Development.
The peace program, signed last May 2025, outlines the “country’s strategic blueprint to end insurgency and attain inclusive and sustainable peace” from 2025 to 2028.
https://www.pna.gov.ph/articles/1249625
The labor group said this peace framework only continues the harassment including “trumped-up charges against activists and organizers, threats against human rights defenders across sectors, and rights violations in rural areas such as the illegal arrest of the Agusan 6 composed of former University of the Philippines student regent Charisse “Chaba” Banez, former student activist Louvaine Espina and their fellow peasant organizers who were nabbed in Agusan del Sur last June 2025.”
“Civic space and the expression of dissent in Mindanao are increasingly shrinking by the day,” lamented the labor group.(davaotoday.com)
