HUMAN
RIGHTS WATCH
Soldiers on Killing
Rampage in Nueva Ecija
Walking home from
church, Pastor Andy Pawican was carrying his months-old child when
accosted by soldiers. Still holding his child, Andy went with them.
Gunshots were later heard, after which the soldiers took the child to
Andy’s wife. In a later meeting with the villagers, the soldiers admitted
that they killed Andy whom they accused of being a rebel. They warned the
people that the same fate would befall them if they do not cooperate with
the soldiers.
BY DEE AYROSO
Bulatlat
Soldiers in some
parts of Nueva Ecija make their presence felt in a way that does not
endear them to residents of the area.
Andy Pawican, 30,
dedicated his life to spreading the word of God. He was a licentiate
pastor of the United Church of Christ in the Philippines (UCCP) in Fatima
village, located in the mountainous town of Pantabangan, Nueva Ecija
province (around 180 kms. from Metro Manila).
Last May 21 at around
11 a.m., he was walking home from church with his family and another
church member when four armed men accosted him.
Introducing
themselves as New People’s Army (NPA) members, they said they were looking
for William Tuping, Andy’s village mate who lives near the UCCP chapel in
Sitio (sub-village) Maluyon. They then ordered Andy’s companions to go
ahead. Andy’s wife did not protest, thinking that he would not be harmed
since he was holding a baby.
At around 3 p.m., the
villagers heard successive gunshots. The four men turned out to be
soldiers and were seen with members of the 48th Infantry
Battalion of the Philippine Army (IB-PA) conducting a military operation
in Fatima.
The soldiers brought
the baby back to his wife but Andy was not seen alive again. At around 5
p.m., a villager found his body on the roadside, with a gunshot wound in
the right cheek.
The soldiers
initially claimed that Andy, a native of Ifugao, was a member of the NPA
who got killed in an encounter. They even paraded the body in the village.
In a later meeting with the villagers, the soldiers admitted that they
killed Andy. They warned the people that the same fate would befall them
if they do not cooperate with the soldiers.
Andy’s remains were
not brought to a funeral house until the next day (May 22). The soldiers
ordered 10 villagers to carry the body to the road. Only eight of the 10
men returned to the village. Peasants Rogel Marcial and Miguel Paltin,
both in their 30s, were ordered by the soldiers to board a motorcycle
driven by another soldier going to the military camp. The two have been
missing since.
In a press release,
the Promotion for Church People’s Response (PCPR) said that the military
targeted Andy because he chose to work in service of the people in a
remote village. In 2005, when military operations conducting hamletting
operations in several villages in Pantabangan, Andy managed to get through
with the relief goods for the people who had been prevented from leaving
their area.
Ransacked
The man wanted by the
soldiers, William Tuping, 42, was on his way to the town market to deliver
bananas when he heard the gunshots that killed Andy on May 21. He decided
to stay at the town proper, fearing the presence of the military in his
village.
When he went back to
his house on May 24, he found his house ransacked, his family’s belongings
gone, his family’s retail store emptied.
“Kinuha nila lahat
ng gamit, kaldero, mga sapatos, mahuhusay na pantalon, magagandang kumot,
pati mga kulambo,” (They took all our things, our pots, shoes, our
best pairs of pants and bed sheets, even the mosquito nets.) Tuping said
in an interview with Bulatlat. “Mas maganda pa kung nasunugan
ako, baka mayroon pa akong nailabas.” (It would have been better had a
fire struck, perhaps I would have saved something.)
Tuping said his store
contained goods such as rice, bread, coffee, canned goods, cigarettes and
other items worth some P10,000 ($188.08, based on an exchange rate of
P53.17 per US dollar). The villagers told him the soldiers brought the
goods to the village and distributed these to the people. The soldiers
reportedly threatened the villagers who would not accept the stolen goods
would be marked as rebel sympathizers.
The soldiers also
cooked and ate Tuping’s two dogs and several chickens, whose bones he
found littered in his kitchen. The soldiers did leave behind some pots,
which Tuping found to be filled with urine. “Trabaho ba naman iyan ng
matinong tao?” (Is that something a sane person would do?) he said.
A pastor of the
Pentecostal Church told Tuping that one of the soldiers identified only as
Lubosta told him to bring Tuping to the soldiers’ camp. If he does not, he
would suffer the same fate.
Given these
circumstances, some families who have relatives in other towns have left
the village, fearing the worst from the 48th IB PA.
Death threats
After Andy’s killing,
soldiers of the 48th IB PA under Lt. Elmer Taglinawan
threatened two other UCCP pastors in Cambitala village, also in
Pantabangan. Taglinawan himself talked to Pastor Virgilio Perido Sr. and
told him to “surrender” his two daughters, Pastor Beatriz, 34, the
secretary-general of the local chapter of Karapatan, a human rights
alliance; and Aprilyn, 26, an organizer of the urban poor group Kadamay.
In an interview with
Bulatlat, Perido said that from May 27 until he finally left his
home on June 3,
Taglinawan and his
men kept coming to his house, threatening that if he does not turn in his
daughters, the soldiers would “take care of them.”
“Kung hindi, kami
na ang bahala sa kanila, kung gusto ninyo mangyari sa kanila tulad ng iba
pang pinatay,” (If you don’t turn them in, we would take care of them,
if you want them to have the same fate as the others killed.) he quoted
Taglinawan as saying.
“Hinahamon ko
naman sila na kasuhan ang mga anak ko, mag-usap sila sa barangay, kung
talagang may ginawang masama. Pero ayaw ni Taglinawan,” (I challenged
them to file charges against my daughters, file a complaint with the
village council if they did anything wrong. But Taglinawan did not want
to.) Perido said.
Meanwhile, in Baloc
village, Sto. Domingo, another town in Nueva Ecija, Aglipayan priest
Renato Respicio received death threats by way of a letter dropped in the
donation box. Respicio is the priest at the Pro-Cathedral of St. Jerome of
the Iglesia Filipina Independiente in Sto. Domingo.
“Minamanmanan
namin lahat ng kilos nio…tigil na, di nio mapapababa si presidente arroyo
magpatayan lang tayo,” (We’re watching your every move…stop it, you
can’t bring the president down. Let us just kill each other.) said part of
the letter.
Earlier, on May 22,
Respicio’s secretary, Angelina Hasa also received a letter warning her not
to follow orders from the priest.
“Wag kang
magpagamit sa pari na yan, salot sa lipunan, kaaway ng gobyerno…di nila
kaya si Gloria, mabibigo lang balak nila..Anakpawis, Gabriela, KMU salot
sa lipunan, lumayo ka sa mga yan,” (Don’t let that priest use you,
he’s a menace to society, enemy of government… they can’t do anything to
Gloria, they will just fail…Anakpawis, Gabriela, KMU are a menace to
society, stay away from them.) the letter said.
Sr. Cecile Ruiz,
Karapatan-Gitnang Luson chair, said that the threats were consistent with
how the military tagged their group as “enemies” of the Arroyo
administration.
“There can be no
doubt that Maj. Gen. Jovito Palparan is behind these atrocities against
church workers and defenseless civilians. We strongly condemn this
state-sponsored terrorism and hold President Arroyo responsible for
allowing her security forces to terrorize the people,” Ruiz said. Palparan
is the commanding officer of the Army’s 7th Infantry Division
and accused of being behind the killings of activists.
Ruiz said that her
group and the Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan, or New Patriotic
Alliance)-Gitnang Luson are sending letters of appeal to legislators and
governors in the region to ask for help to put a stop to the killings.
Bulatlat
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