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Advocates welcome report of peace talks resumption; warn of ‘fake amnesty and surrender’

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A group of peace advocates welcomed reports that the Ferdinand Marcos Jr. government is planning to revive its negotiations with the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP).

The Citizen’s Alliance for Just Peace (CAJP) said the Office of the Presidential Adviser on Peace, Reconciliation and Unity (OPAPRU) announced that a presidential proclamation related to the “political settlement” of the five-decade long civil war in the country is a “productive engagement.”

The CAJP added that the reported proclamation is said to be about “granting amnesty to the rebel fighters,” a long-standing tactic by the Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP) that has been repeatedly and officially rejected by the NPA, the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and the New People’s Army (NPA).

“Whatever the real score is, we hope that the government will rethink its bloody all-out war strategy against the CPP/NPA/NDFP that was resumed when former President Rodrigo Duterte terminated the GRP-NDFP peace negotiations in November 2017,” the advocates said.

Earlier, Marcos unveiled his administration’s 2023 – 2028 National Security Policy (NSP) peace advocates said is essentially a reiteration of the government’s long-standing “whole-of-nation” approach.

“The government of Pres. Marcos Jr. appears confident that the death of NDFP Chief Political Consultant Prof. Jose Ma. Sison from natural causes and the killings and arrests of several top leaders of the CPP/NPA/NDFP have greatly weakened it,” the alliance said.

They pointed out that Marcos is the only post-EDSA president who did not engage in peace negotiations with the NDFP at the start of his term.

“He continued his predecessor’s ‘whole-of- nation approach and the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF- ELCAC)…notorious for its wanton red tagging of government critics, social activists and civil society organizations (CSOs) and the human rights violations that come with it,” the CAJP said.

The group also echoed human rights organizations reports the Marcos administration continues to intensify use of laws such as the Anti-terrorism Act (ATA) and the Anti- Terrorist Financing Act (ATFA) against critics and political dissenters.

“Unfortunately, this ‘whole-of-nation approach’ and the NTF-ELCAC have greatly contributed to the shrinking of civic space in the country. The recent case of environmental activists Jonila Castro and Jhed Tamano starkly illustrates how those opposing government projects, like the reclamation of Manila Bay, are illegally and forcibly taken by state security forces and later presented as NPA ‘surrenderees’,” the CAJP said.

CAJP’ statement, issued last Sunday, was signed by Archbishop Emeritus Antonio J. Ledesma, SJ, of the Philippine Ecumenical Peace Platform, former Iglesia Filipina Independiente Obispo Maximo Rhee Timbang of the Pilgrims for Peace, and Karen Tanada of Waging Peace.

“As the biggest and broadest network of peace advocates in the country, the (CAJP) strongly believes that resuming the formal GRP-NDFP peace negotiations will be a productive engagement,” the alliance added. # (Raymund B. Villanueva)

CPP vows justice for Tiamzons and companions a year after deaths

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The Communist Party of the Philippines vowed to attain justice for Benito Tiamzon, Wilma Austria and their companions it said were massacred in Catbalogan, Samar a year ago today, August 21.

In a statement, CPP chief information officer Marco Valbuena reiterated their belief that the couple and their eight comrades were arrested by troops belonging to the 8th Infantry Division of the Philippine army and subsequently tortured and executed.

“The revolutionary forces reiterate their vow to attain justice for the Tiamzons and all other victims of state terrorism,” Valbuena said.

The CPP officer added the murder of Tiamzon, Austria as well as their companions he identified as Ka (comrade) Divino, Ka Yen, Ka Jaja, Ka Matt, Ka Ash, Ka Delfin, Ka Lupe and Ka Butig “are dastardly fascist-terrorist crimes of the Marcos regime, perpetrated under the direction of their US military advisers.”

In a report eight months after the incident last April, the CPP’s Political Bureau said the Tiamzons were traveling on two separate vans along the national highway eastwards towards Catbalogan City.

READ: CPP reports capture, torture and murder of Tiamzons by the military

The group, later dubbed as the Catbalogan 10, was flagged down between 12:00 noon and 1:00 in the afternoon, after which all communications with the group were lost, the CPP said.

The group was unarmed, it added.

The Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) meanwhile said the victims were killed in a legitimate encounter off the coast of Catbalogan when their motorized boat exploded following a firefight with their soldiers.

“We have long suspected the deaths of CPP chairman Benito Tiamzon and his wife Wilma during an armed encounter with government troops on Aug. 22, 2022 in the seas off Catbalogan City, Samar, but we did not have the evidence to confirm it,” then AFP spokesman Col. Medel Aguilar said.

The AFP added that only body parts were what remained of those killed, preventing their immediate identification.

The military had long suspected that Tiamzon was CPP chairman while Austria was secretary general

Valbuena said that the couple long served as among key CPP leaders who selflessly dedicated their lives to the Filipino people’s struggle for national and social liberation and the socialist aspirations of the working class.

READ: NDFP Peace Panel ‘immensely outraged’ at Tiamzons’ brutal deaths

Tiamzon and Wilma were last seen publicly as consultants of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines in peace negotiations with the Rodrigo Duterte administration of the Government of the Republic of the Philippines in 2016 and 2017.

“[T]he martyrdom of the Tiamzons will forever be remembered and inspire the younger generation of workers, peasants and all democratic classes to carry forward the Filipino people’s national democratic struggle,” Valbuena said. # (Raymund B. Villanueva)

Farmers demand justice for NDFP consultant 3 years after assassination

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Agricultural workers commemorated the third death anniversary of murdered National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) peace consultant Randall Echanis, saying government policies that led to his assassination are still in place.

The Unyon ng Manggagawa sa Agrikultura (UMA) led a protest rally at the Department of Justice in Manila on Thursday, August 10, demanding justice for the peasant leader who died of 40 multiple stab wounds.

Echanis was deputy secretary general of the Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP), president of Anakpawis Party, and vice chairperson of the NDFP’s Reciprocal Committee on Social and Economic Reforms when he died.

READ: NDFP peace consultant Randall Echanis murdered

UMA said it condemns the Ferdinand Marcos Jr. government for maintaining former President Rodrigo Duterte’s violent counter-insurgency programs that resulted in Echanis’ assassination.

“But this US-endorsed counter-insurgency measure, one that depoliticized national liberation as mere ‘terrorism,’ was not the sole policy to blame. By then, Executive Order 70 (EO70) or the ‘all-of-nation approach’ to end the civil war was already entrenched, and gaining more and more notoriety for targeting peasant leaders,” UMA said in a statement.

Farmers groups and supporters hold a protest rally at the DOJ in Manila on the 3rd anniversary of the killing of peasant leader Randall Echanis. Holding the microphone is Echanis’ son and the poster his widow. (Photo by Nuel M. Bacarra/Kodao)

More farmers fall victims to repression

The group added that three years after Echanis’ death, government’s Memorandum Order 32 (MO32) covering Negros, Samar, and Bicol had also already normalized the massacre of organized farmers and agri-workers such as the Negros 14.

“[A]nd the fake war on drugs had made extra-judicial killings, especially of the urban poor, an everyday occasion and a household term,” UMA said.

“Comrade Randy was not the first civilian to be victimized by these fascist policies, and he was definitely not the last,”UMA acting chairperson Ariel Casilao said.

“Duterte’s terrorist legacy is being perpetrated by Marcos by his implementation of the ‘Terror Law’, EO70, MO32, and even the fake war against illegal drugs,” Casilao added.

The former Anakpawis represented further said the same policies that killed Echanis remain at work in, among others, the ongoing militarization of Tuy, Batangas; the proscription of four Cordillera activists and three more in Southern Tagalog into the terror list; red-tagging as a form of union-busting in Sta. Maria, Isabela; as well as in the aerial bombings of civilian communities in Abra.  

“Worse, such human rights violations kept escalating into enforced disappearances and murders. Bazoo de Jesus and Dexter Capuyan, indigenous people’s rights advocates, had yet to surface 100 days since their abduction. Billy Fausto, an organized sugar worker, was massacred along with his wife Emelda and two children in Himamaylan, Negros Occidental last June,” UMA complained.

The group also pointed out that the number of political prisoners had ballooned to 778, 49 of them arrested in the past 12 months alone.

“The peasant death toll under the present regime now reached 58. Drug-related killings since Marcos, Jr. took power totaled to 336, even while he continued to refuse holding his predecessor accountable for 13,000 or so,” UMA revealed.

The agricultural workers also expressed fears that the proposed allotment of P10 billion for confidential and intelligence funds in the government’s 2024 national budget could only aggravate the implementation of EO70, MO32, and the Terror Law.

“[T]hese statistics could only grow. The impunity with which Ka Randy was killed certainly remained intact, and this was so to keep the peasantry landless and the working class precarious,” UMA said.

READ: Randall Echanis: Funny guy who was serious at the negotiating table

“Marcos and Duterte’s fascism are not without reason. They are protecting the big landlords and the compradors, and especially the interests of the imperialists,” Casilao added. # (Raymund B. Villanueva)

On journalists and objectivity

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Today is the 91st birth anniversary of Antonio Zumel II, a pioneer of unionism among media workers. A former national president of the National Press Club, he was proclaimed a hero of the Philippines in 2016 at his name’s inclusion at the Bantayog ng mga Bayani.

Acknowledged by his peers as an impeccable writer, including former House of Representatives Speaker Feliciano Belmonte, Zumel worked as reporter at The Philippine Herald and editor at the Manila Bulletin. He went underground on the night Ferdinand Marcos Sr. declared martial law on September 22, 1972. He went on to edit the underground newsletter Ang Bayan of the Communist Party of the Philippines, Liberation and its news service Balita ng Malayang Pilipino of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) and regional newsletter Dangadang.

After Marcos was deposed in 1986, Zumel served as member of the NDFP Negotiating Panel in its peace negotiations with the Corazon Aquino government. In 1990, he was elected chairperson of the NDFP while seeking political asylum in The Netherlands. He died of kidney failure and diabetes in Europe in 2001.

Autopsy: Ericson Acosta injured way before fatal shots, after he already died

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National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) peace consultant and celebrated poet Ericson Acosta was shot both on his front and back, bolstering claims by various activist groups he and peasant leader Joseph Jimenez were actually killed execution-style by the military.

In a press conference Saturday, July 29, forensic pathologist Raquel Fortun said Acosta died from hemorrhagic shock resulting from chest wounds that lacerated his lungs.

But Fortun added that Acosta may have been shot way before his fatal wounds and after he died, based on the wound on his right hand that had severe hematoma as well as a back wound that lacerated the aorta at his lumbar area but did not bleed.

“It seemed the shots were fired at different times…On his hand, that was way before the fatal shots,” she said in a mix of Filipino and English.

Fortun underscored that Acosta’s wound from the left side of the torso was probably fired when he was already dead.

“He should have bled profusely (from that laceration of the aorta). He was probably dead by then,” the expert explained of the wound that also shattered two thick vertebrae.

“He had so many wounds and these were in clusters,” she said, adding that Acosta also had edema on his right thigh.

Fortun also explained that Acosta’s wounds on his upper right arm that was earlier reported as stab and hack wounds resulted from exiting bullet wounds.

“He must have had his right arm close to his chest,” she said.

READ: NDF-Negros: Military murdered peace consultant-poet Ericson Acosta

Fortun and University of the Philippines College of Medicine colleague Patricia Ann Franco conducted the autopsy on Acosta’s remains last December 5, five days after he and Jimenez were killed in Kabankalan City, Negros Oriental in what the military claimed was a firefight with the New People’s Army (NPA).

Acknowledging the limitations imposed on an autopsy procedure after embalming, Fortun bewailed that they examined Acosta’s remains after his wounds have already been sutured.

She also noted that the white shirt Acosta’s body was wearing when it arrived in Manila was not the blue shirt he was wearing on the photographs the military posted online.

“There is no independent, immediate and scientific investigation conducted at the scene. That is the problem in this country as far as forensic pathology is concerned,” Fortun complained.

Photo of the poet by the Free Ericson Acosta campaign.

Execution

In their announcement of Acosta and Jimenez’s deaths last November 30, National Democratic Front-Negros spokesperson Bayani Obrero said the victims were killed by the 94th and 47th infantry battalions of the Philippine Army.

The government troopers first strafed the house where the victims were sleeping in and later killed them outside, Obrero said.

Obrero also denied there was a fire fight with the NPA at Sitio Makilo, Barangay Camansi were the victims were killed.

In a separate statement, human rights group Karapatan said Acosta and Jimenez were actually captured alive by the military at 2 AM last November 30 and were taken 200 meters away from the house to be executed.

The 94th Infantry Battalion is also accused of having massacred the Fausto family last June 14 and having killed farmer Crispin Tingal last May 3 in Kabankalan City.

READ: Mission reports AFP responsible for Fausto massacre, other killings

After the release of the autopsy report on Acosta, Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (BAYAN) again called for an independent investigation of the killings.

“The militarization and killings in Negros must stop. We call on human rights defenders and the people to fight the increasing trend of fascist terror in the countryside of Negros that has resulted in the deaths of many peasant organizers and masses,” BAYAN president Renato Reyes Jr. said.

“There is armed conflict in Negros but this cannot be solved by militarist means. The social roots must be addressed for there to be a just peace,” Reyes added. # (Raymund B. Villanueva)

Reds dismiss Marcos offer of amnesty as ‘treachery’

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The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) dismissed President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s amnesty proclamation announcement in his second State of the Nation Address (SONA) before Congress yesterday, July 24.

CPP chief information officer Marco Valbuena said their group and the New People’s Army (NPA) firmly reject Marcos Jr.’s “treacherous offer of amnesty and surrender” as an additional instrument of deception and oppression.

The CPP added communists and revolutionary fighters remain true to the aspirations of the Filipino people and that their cause is genuine freedom and social justice is far greater than any offer of amnesty.

“Revolutionaries are motivated not by the selfish desire for some personal gain, rather by the selfless devotion to serve and struggle with the people,” Valbuena said.

In his SONA, Marcos claimed the government’s Barangay Development Program (BDP) and the Enhanced Comprehensive Local Integration Program (E-CLIP) are solving the root causes of armed conflict in the country.

“Through community development and livelihood programs, the barangay development and enhanced comprehensive local integration program have been effective in addressing the root cause of conflict in the countryside,” Marcos said.

“To complete this reintegration process, I will issue a proclamation granting amnesty to rebel returnees and I ask Congress to support me in this endeavor,” he added.

The CPP however said that Marcos is being grossly insolent and is seriously mistaken to think that NPA fighters will line up to gain a few individual concessions in exchange for giving up the cause they have committed themselves to.

“Marcos’ offer of amnesty for those who will surrender is duplicitous, considering that close to 800 political prisoners remain in jails, and every day, people are being arrested and persecuted for their political beliefs and social commitment,” Valbuena said.

Persistent landlessness

Valbuena also scored Marcos’ claim that government is effectively addressing the root cause of conflict in the countryside.

”[These] are utterly devoid of the truth and completely out of touch with reality,” Valbuena said.

The CPP officer said government’s community development and livelihood programs, farm to market roads as well as its newly-signed New Agrarian Emancipation Act only perpetuate the basic problems of social injustice and poverty that are rooted in the problem of landlessness.

“The Marcos regime ignores the outstanding clamor of the peasant majority population for genuine land reform, and the Filipino people’s demand for national industrialization,” Valbuena said.

He added widespread economic dislocation and agricultural crisis in the countryside continue in the countryside under the Marcos Jr. government.

Valbuena pointed out that hundreds of thousands of farmers and minority people are being dispossessed of land and their means of production.

“Agricultural and ancestral land are being grabbed by the expansion of plantations and mining operations, real estate, construction of dams, ecotourism, ‘green’ energy and other foreign-funded infrastructure projects. Millions of peasant tillers and fisher folk are being forced to bankruptcy by wanton importation of rice, sugar, vegetables and other agricultural and aquatic produce,” he said.

Since he took office in June 30, 2022, Marcos Jr. had been concurrent secretary of the Department of Agriculture which struggled with smuggling and agricultural product price manipulation controversies.

Police violently arrest agrarian reform beneficiaries and supporters in Concepcion, Tarlac. (Altermidya photo)

Worse, Valbuena said, peasant masses are daily subjected to worsening forms of oppression and exploitation, particularly those who voice grievances and choose to assert their demands who are subjected to political repression by government agents.

“Military and police abuses, summary killings, torture, unlawful detention, enforced disappearances and other violations of human rights are most rampant in the countryside, and are being carried out with utmost impunity,” Valbuena complained.

‘Remember Sakay’

The CPP said amnesty offers to those who take up arms had only been sugar-coated bullets against revolutionary forces.

 The group recalled United States of America’s colonial government in the Philippines offered amnesty to Filipino freedom fighter Macario Sakay and his government in 1905 only to publicly execute him in 1907.

In 1946, some leaders of the Hukbalahap were baited by the amnesty program of President Elpidio Quirino only to be murdered a few months later.

The Hukbalahap (Hukbong Mapaglaya Laban sa Hapon) was a Communist guerilla army that fought the invading Japanese Imperial Army during World War II and is regarded as forerunner to the NPA.

The CPP also cited Presidents Corazon Aquino and Gloria Arroyo’s amnesty programs but under whose respective governments several killings and massacres of farmers would occur.

Valbuena said Marcos Jr.’s government is similar to his predecessors in its drive for ‘localized peace talks’ and ‘surrender drive’ in which rural communities are subjected to military occupation, psychological warfare and intelligence and combat operations.

Many of these communities are later declared as “insurgency free,” characterized by well-publicized “mass surrender” ceremonies.

Valbuena also cited the mass filing of charges against mass organizations and activists under the Anti-Terrorism Law.

The government’s draconian measures against all forms of resistance make their struggle just and necessary, Valbuena said. # (Raymund B. Villanueva)

NDFP vows continuation of agrarian reform campaigns, ‘with or without peace talks’

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The National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) said it continues to pursue agrarian reform to free poor farmers from exploitation and oppression even if the Ferdinand Marcos Jr. administration refuses to resume peace negotiations.

In an interview with Liberation International, the group’s global version of its magazine, NDFP Negotiating Panel interim chairperson Julie de Lima said peasant movements in certain areas of the Philippines launch campaigns from land rent reduction to confiscation of land for free distribution to landless tenants.

De Lima said these struggles are the main content of their national democratic revolution, which is also set in their social and economic reforms proposal in the suspended formal negotiations between the NDFP and the Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP).

In the interview, De Lima also dismissed GRP Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process Carlito Galvez Jr.’s claim the proposed Comprehensive Agreement on Social and Economic Reforms (CASER) is obsolete.

Earlier, Galvez Jr. was quoted by a government website saying “CASER is based on an obsolete framework and is no longer relevant since it is largely based on the pre-industrialization and pre-globalization era.”

“Galvez does not know what he is talking about and is irrelevant to the issue of what is the character of the Philippine economy. We know for a fact that the Philippines is nonindustrial,” de Lima said.

De Lima pointed out that agriculture remains a major base of the Philippine economy, one that remains afflicted by “traditional feudal relations of production, by backward, non-mechanized, non-irrigated, and with low output.”

Composed mainly of two programs, namely agrarian reform and rural development as well as national industrialization, NDFP and GRP negotiators have actually agreed on substantial points such as free land distribution before former President Rodrigo Duterte ordered his administration’s  withdrawal from the negotiations in June 2017.

Various groups as well as former government negotiators have urged the current Marcos Jr. government to consider resuming peace negotiations with the NDFP.

The president has yet to officially issue any response to the demands, letting former generals in his administration to disavow peace talks resumption.

The NDFP for its part has consistently said it is always open to the resumption of peace negotiations with any GRP administration sincere in resolving the 54-year old civil war in the country. # (Raymund B. Villanueva)

Ex-GRP negotiator advises resumption of peace talks with NDFP

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A former Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP) peace negotiator advised the Ferdinand Marcos Jr. administration to resume peace talks with the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) to help solve many of the government’s problems at once.

In an online interview with journalist Christian Esguerra, veteran GRP peace negotiator Hernani Braganza said a good outcome in the talks would possibly result in a lasting ceasefire with the NDFP.

“This is an unsolicited advice: they resume the peace talks with the NDFP. Because, the first thing that may happen if things turn out well, there will be lasting ceasefire,” Braganza said in Filipino.

Braganza’s advice came after Esguerra asked him about Marcos’ signing of the New Agrarian Emancipation Act last July 7 relieving 610,054 agrarian reform beneficiaries of amortization fees.

Aside from being a formal and “backchannel” government peace negotiator under three successive administrations, Braganza also served as Department of Agrarian Reform secretary under the Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo government.

Branganza said the loan pardon program was actually a NDFP-GRP agreement in 2017 under a more comprehensive free land distribution concord.

“It is in one of our documents, free land distribution. Of course, when we say free, it will be the responsibility of the government for our farmers. It is the same as debt condonation. This was part of the peace talks,” he said.

Braganza said they duly submitted the document to Malacañan Palace and expressed regret that the previous Rodrigo Duterte government did not continue with the negotiations.

“If Presidente Duterte pushed through with the talks, this could have been part of it. It could have helped pacify Filipinos who take up arms,” he said.

Joma’s jest

Braganza said it is up to the Marcos Jr. government to take another look at the peace process if it wants to solve many problems at the same time.

He said it is obvious that poverty, lack of jobs and livelihood as well as opportunities for economic development pushes many Filipinos to join the armed struggle against social injustices.

The veteran peace negotiator added that if the government wishes to address social problems, “[it] might as well put in in a document that could end the armed conflict in a much shorter period.”

“[This,] rather than wait for them to lay down arms. If you can solve this by negotiating, that’s it. That’s the entire idea of it,” he said.

Braganza recalled a jest by the late NDFP chief political consultant Jose Maria Sison who told the government negotiators: “You don’t have to talk to us. The government only needs to do its job.”

“Most of all, Mr. Joma Sison, when he was still alive, signed that he will go home to the Philippines if the free land distribution agreement was signed by the GRP,” he said.

From Marcos to Marcos

In response to Esguerra’s question if the current political atmosphere is conducive to the resumption of the peace talks with the NDFP, Braganza said it all depends on a sitting president’s political will.

“Well, first of all, how many million votes did the president get? Thirty-one million. It is bigger than the previous president, so it is a huge political capital,” he said.

Second, the Marcos Jr. government enjoys control over the Senate and the House of Representatives, he cited. “How can you go wrong?” he asked.

Braganza, a student activist during Ferdinand Marcos Sr.’s reign, added that it would one of the better legacies of the current Marcos administration to end the armed conflict with the NDFP.

“[B]ecause majority of the problem of insurgency in the Philippines started with the implementation of martial law (by Marcos Sr.).  So, if it started then, because they have the same surnames, wouldn’t it be better if this one ends it?” he asked.

Braganza said it would not be impossible, saying peace tables with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, the Revolutionary Proletarian Army-Alex Boncayao Brigade and the Cordillera Peoples’ Liberation Army have successfully concluded under previous Manila governments.

“So it could be a good legacy for this administration to end what most of what started during the time of the father. It would be a good closure,” he said. # (Raymund B. Villanueva)

Peace advocates urge freedom for Fernandez, Lagtapon

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‘Frank’s life would be better used in peace-work and dialogue, rather than have him languishing behind bars’

A church-based peace advocacy group called on the Philippine government to free National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) peace consultant Frank Fernandez and wife Cleofe Lagtapon after their conviction of illegal gun possession last June 29.

In a statement, the group Pilgrims for Peace (PfP) said they were surprised at the Taguig Regional Trial Court Branch 266’s verdict, more so that both Fernandez and Lagtapon were elderly and under medical treatment.

“As peace advocates, we continue to clamor that the golden years of Frank’s life would be better used in peace-work and dialogue, rather than have him languishing behind bars,” PfP’s statement said.

“This is especially so as his conviction is alleged to have been orchestrated using manufactured evidence, planted at the time of his arrest,” the group added.

PfP cited the couple’s defense that they were already under custody hours before their announced arrest and were in fact taken to and from a military hospital to have their photos taken with planted evidence of guns and explosives at the house they were staying in.

The couple was arrested in Barangay Calumpang, Liliw, Laguna on March 24 2019 while undergoing medical treatment with their caretaker Ge-Ann Perez, herself a Hansen’s Disease patient.

Like other NDFP peace consultants and companions arrested before and after, the three were alleged to be in possession of firearms and ammunition.

Supposedly immune from arrest

The PfP statement was signed by former Iglesia Filipina Independiente Obispo Maximo Rhee Timbang, Roman Catholic Bishop Gerardo Alminaza, Sr. Maureen Catabian of the Religious of the Good Shepherd and Dr. Mike Pante of ACT for Peace.

Fernandez was among several Roman Catholic priests who left active priestly duties to join the underground revolutionary movement during the Ferdinand Marcos Sr. government in the early 1970s.

He served as a long-time spokesperson of the NDFP in Negros Island.

In 2017, Fernandez was included in the reconstituted list of consultants and resource persons that was deposited with the Bishop of Utrecht, the head of the global Old Catholic Church communion, in accordance with the Joint Agreement on Safety and Immunity Guarantees (JASIG) between the NDFP and the Government of the Republic of the Philippines.

With JASIG Document of Identification Number PP 978544, Fernandez should be immune from arrest, detention, threats and harassments, the NDFP said when he was arrested in 2019.

The 75-year old Fernandez is suffering from chronic artery disease, chronic stable angina, hypertension stage 2-uncontrolled, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and hyponatremia, among other illnesses.

The 65-year old Lagtapon also suffers from various illnesses brought about by advancing age.

“As a peace consultant of the GRP-NDFP peace process, we urge for respect of Frank’s JASIG protection as well as humanitarian considerations given his advanced age,” the PfP said.

“Let us continue to pray for former priest, now NDFP peace consultant, Frank Fernandez… Let us pray the peace processes can resume so that genuine peace can take root in our country,” the group urged further. # (Raymund B. Villanueva)

Taguig Court convicts NDFP’s Frank Fernandez, wife Cleofe Lagtapon of illegal gun possession

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National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) peace consultant Frank Fernandez and wife Cleofe Lagtapon were convicted of illegal possession of firearms by Branch 266 of the Taguig City Regional Trial Court (RTC), human rights group Karapatan reported.

Karapatan said that while the couple were acquitted from additional charges of illegal possession of explosives and violation of the elections gun ban at the time of their arrest, they were found guilty of what they asserted was the first of three “trumped-up charges.”

Their companion Ge-ann Perez, arrested and charged along with the elderly couple, is acquitted of all charges by the court.

The three were arrested in Barangay Calumpang, Liliw, Laguna on March 24 2019 and, like other NDFP peace consultants and companions arrested before and after, were reportedly found to be in possession of firearms, ammunition and grenades.

READ: PNP surfaces NDFP’s Frank Fernandez

At the time of their arrest, then Philippine National Police chief Oscar Albayalde claimed they found three caliber .45 pistols, three magazines with 15 live bullets and three grenades were in the couple’s possession.

They were then charged with violation of Commission on Election (Comelec) Resolution 10429 in relation to the Omnibus Election Code as well as violation of Republic Act 10591 (Illegal possession of firearms) and violation of Republic Act 9516 (Illegal possession of explosives), the PNP said.

A Roman Catholic priest, Fernandez took leave from his church in the 1970s, went underground and became a long-time NDFP spokesperson in Negros Island prior to their arrest.

The NDFP said Fernandez should not have been arrested as he is protected by the Joint Agreement on Safety and Immunity Guarantees between them and the Manila government with Document of Identification Number PP 978544.

Karapatan condemned the Fernandez and Lagtapon’s conviction, adding it supports the couple’s assertion that the trove of grenades and guns used against them were planted by arresting authorities.

The group said it was absurd that two elderly and sick individuals had the items in their possession.

Fernandez’ medical abstract by the Philippine Army General Hospital immediately after their arrest said he suffers from chronic artery disease, chronic stable angina, hypertension stage 2- uncontrolled, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and hyponatremia, among other illnesses.

Fernandez is 75 years old while Lagtapon is 65.

READ: Philippine Army holding Frank Fernandez incommunicado

“The inconsistencies in the details of their arrest based on the accounts of the arresting authorities further reveal this glaring travesty of justice,” Karapatan said.

“We reiterate the call for the immediate release of the Fernandez, Lagtapon and Perez, and all political prisoners subjected to these forms of political persecution,” Karapatan added. # (Raymund B. Villanueva)