Owen vows to continue protecting the environment
Missing activist Rowena Dasig had been found and is now in the company of friends and her legal team, human rights group Karapatan Southern Tagalog announced on Tuesday, October 22.
Disappeared for two months since her supposed release from the Lucena City District Jail (LCDJ), Dasig is undergoing debriefing with her lawyers led by former Ateneo Law School Dean Antonio La Viña, the group said.
Jail authorities claimed Dasig was released last August 22 after Branch 172 of the Gumaca (Quezon) Regional Trial Court granted her and fellow accused Miguela Peñero their demurrer to evidence petition.
Karapatan Southern Tagalog however said Dasig’s release was irregular and suspicious as her lawyers were not informed.
She went missing on the very same day.
Karapatan Southern Tagalog deferred announcing how Dasig was found as well as the circumstances of her disappearance pending the result of her debriefing with her lawyers.
They however said Dasig signified her intention to resume her campaign for environmental protection as well as for the freedom of political prisoners and victims of state terrorism.
Dasig and Peñero were arrested by a composite team of the 2nd Quezon Provincial Mobile Force, the 85th Infantry Battalion and the 201st Infantry Brigade of the Philippine Army on July 12, 2023 in Atimonan, Quezon.
The two were investigating the possible impact of the proposed combined cycle gas turbine power project and a liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal plant on the community when arrested by government forces.
Karapatan Southern Tagalog said the arresting forces also ransacked the two’s house without a warrant and planted bullets and explosives they later submitted as evidence in their trumped-up charges.
The group said the Philippine Army units involved in the two’s arrest must be made accountable, as well as the LCDJ for being complicit in Dasig’s enforced disappearance.
In a separate statement, La Viña and fellow counsel and former Bayan Muna Rep. Carlos Zarate said they are planning on filing charges against LCDJ authorities.
The lawyers said the jail authorities refused to release Dasig from August 13 despite the completion of release papers only to be complicit in her disappearance a week later.
Peñero on the other hand remains detained at the Batangas City Provincial Jail, facing alleged Anti-Terrorism Act violation charges.
Supporters said she is battling parotid gland cancer, chronic lumbar pain, and hyperthyroidism following a total thyroidectomy, making her continued imprisonment life-threatening. # (Raymund B. Villanueva)
