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WE REJECT A MORALLY BANKRUPT GOVERNMENT!
We are gathered in the midst of crisis to unite and help overcome the
grave challenges the nation faces.
When Gloria Macapagal Arroyo took office as President in January 200l, she
proclaimed that she would usher in good governance, that she would show
honest leadership by example, and ensure transparency in public
transactions for public welfare.
We are now in the seventh year of that presidency – and that presidency
has instead reaped pain and ruin for our nation and people.
We are pained by the extrajudicial killings; by the forced disappearances
which have heightened despite the fact that this pattern of abuse was
brought to the attention of the President early on, long before the outcry
of concerned international officials and organizations condemned them
before the world.
We are pained when billions of pesos are shamelessly diverted to serve
personal political interests – such as the abrasive diversion in the
fertilizer scam of public funds meant for farmers to ensure victory in the
tainted presidential elections of 2004.
We are pained when demonstrators are bludgeoned by police and military men
misled and emboldened by an erroneous "calibrated preemptive response"
policy, a distorted policy already declared illegal by the Supreme Court
but still enforced in the Parliament of the Streets.
Worse, our values have been degraded, our collective integrity blighted by
the wanton examples of bribery, graft and corruption. Parents cannot
adequately answer the questions of their own children – about the ZTE, how
much bribes are involved, why? They cannot answer how come Congressmen and
Governors receive so much money. Who are guilty? Why do they go
unpunished? What kind of justice do we have?
Neither can they answer adequately what kind of future lies ahead for
their children. For they themselves see no real future. There exists no
vision, no real production, no genuine development – only self serving
assertions of a "strong republic" -- whose doctors want to become nurses
in order to go abroad, whose teachers are diminishing, whose farmers' and
workers' future continues to slide dismally.
We cannot allow the pain and ruin of the Filipino. We cannot have a nation
without a soul, governance without morality. We must unite! We must
struggle for Truth! For Justice! For Meaningful and Fundamental Change!
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SIGNATORIES:
Archbishop Angel N. Lagdameo D.D .
Diocese of Jaro
Archbishop Oscar Cruz D.D.
Diocese of Lingayen-Dagupan
Vice President Teofisto T. Gungona Jr.
Fr. Jose Dizon, Solidarity Philippines
Sharon Joy Ruiz Duremdez
National Council of Churches of the Philippines (NCCP)
Father Rudy Abao, MSC (Missionaries of the Sacred Heart of Jesus)
Mo. Mary John Mananzan. OSB (Benedictine Sisters)
Sr. Maureen Catabian, RGS
Chair, W-JPIC Committee of the SIsters of the Good Shepherd
Bro. Edmundo Fernandez, FSC (De La Salle Brothers)
Sr. Teresa Mueda, DC (Daughters of Charity)
Ma. Luz Mijares, OSA (Order of St. Augustine)
Fr. Jesus Maliit, SSS (Congregation of the Blessed Sacrament)
Sr. Elen Belardo, RGS
Pastor Rey Geloagan
United Church of Christ in the Philippines (UCCP)
Mayor Jojo Binay, United Opposition (UNO)
Betina Legarda, Concerned Citizens Group
Teresita Quintos Deles, Black and White Movement
Dr. Carol P. Araullo, BAYAN
Ver Eustaquio, United Movement for Democracy and Justice
Paco Alcuaz, Kubol Pag-asa
Manjette Manalo, Laban ng Masa
RC Constantino
Boy Morales
Linggoy ALcuaz
Oscar Orbos
Other signatories.... |
Inquirer:
“STRIKINGLY
UNCONVINCING” IS HOW A United Nations special rapporteur has dismissed the
claim of Philippine authorities that the extrajudicial killings of leftist
activists were a result of internal purges in the communist ranks.
Tribune:
AFP systematically executing leftists — UN
The United
Nations yesterday affirmed another national embarrassment under President
Arroyo
GMANews-TV
news:
Bishops
want Arroyo resignation, not snap polls
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Malaya:
Alston: AFP hunting down, killing activists
Final report to UN traces abuses to new anti-reb tactic
BY
ANTHONY IAN CRUZ
RECENT
efforts of the Arroyo government to influence the final report of United
Nations special rapporteur Philip Alston on political killings besetting
the country have proved useless.
In his
66-page final report, Alston blamed the government and the Armed Forces of
the Philippines for the extrajudicial executions of activists and called
on President Arroyo to issue an order ending "aspects of counterinsurgency
operations which have led to the targeting and execution of many
individuals working for civil society organizations."
The
report came about a month after Arroyo sent a team led by Executive
Secretary Eduardo Ermita to the UN headquarters in New York to defend the
government’s human rights record.
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The Alston report clearly shows Arroyo gov’t policy
in killings
Press Statement
November 28, 2007
Reference: Renato M. Reyes, Jr.
There are no if’s and but’s about it.
The final report of United Nations Special Rapporteur Philip Alston on the
extrajudicial killings in the Philippines clearly points to a national
policy of the Arroyo administration through its Armed Forces of the
Philippines and other agencies such as the Inter-agency Legal Action Group
(IALAG) of Norberto Gonzales.
The national policy being pointed out by Alston is the counter-insurgency
program of the AFP known also as Oplan Bantay Laya as well as various
pronouncements from ranking officials and military literature which label
legal Left organizations as “communist fronts”. This attitude of the
military, which the Arroyo regime fully agrees with, is the lynchpin of
the national policy for exterminating legal activists. The Oplan Bantay
Laya 1 and 2 all emanated from the Arroyo regime. We hold this government
responsible for these fascist policies and for the 800 dead and almost 200
disappeared.
We in Bayan and our allied mass organizations and partylist groups, as
affirmed by Altson’s report, have borne the brunt of the attacks, killings
and enforced disappearances. Yesterday, Hope Hervilla, a Bayan leader in
Panay Island, was almost assassinated by unidentified men believed to be
working for the military. The fascist policy continues.
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Meanwhile, the IALAG under Sec. Norberto
Gonzales has also been tagged by Alston as partly responsible for
reinforcing the military view of legal activists as “communist fronts”.
That military and police officials also sit on the IALAG establishes a
circumstantial link between this agency and the killings. We support the
call for the abolition of this agency insofar as it has been responsible
for the arrests, detention and political
persecution of many activists including partylist representatives.
We demand that the Arroyo administration adhere to all of Alston’s
recommendations insofar as government’s role in the extrajudicial killings
is concerned. This includes an immediate stop to the practice of publicly
labeling our organizations as “communist fronts”, the harassment of our
leaders and members and the drawing up of an Order of Battle which serves
as a virtual hit-list on activists.
We call on the Philippine Senate to sanction the AFP based on these abuses
by reducing the military’s budget. The Philippine Senate can certainly do
better than the US Senate which has tied $2 million in military aid to the
Philippine government’s human rights record.
We urge the Philippine Supreme Court and the Commission on Human Rights to
intensify the defense of human rights and civil liberties now that a
national policy on killings has been affirmed by the UN rapporteur.
We call on the AFP and PNP and the entire administration to once and for
all get over their collective state of denial and start facing the
problems squarely. This includes the investigation of officials known for
their human rights abuses, starting with the notorious Gen. Jovito
Palparan. Anything less will be construed as a refusal of the regime to
reverse the national policy of killings that Alston has blamed. ###
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