August 9 is celebrated as the International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples. In the Philippines, Republic Act No. 10689 made August 9 a special working holiday and declared as state policy the advancement of “the rights and collective well-being of indigenous peoples through the annual observance of the National Indigenous Peoples Day in the Philippines”.  The year 2025 marks the 10th anniversary of RA 10689 which legislated the National Indigenous Peoples Day commemoration in the Philippines.

But beyond the celebration and the holidays, how does the Philippines really treat its IPs?

In 2017, at the Indigenous Peoples’ Rights Act of 1997 (IPRA)’s 20th anniversary, 103 indigenous men, women and youth acting as representatives of 39 indigenous peoples from across the Philippines released a statement, heavily criticizing the flawed and ineffective implementation of the law, calling out the increasing human rights violations committed against their communities such as extrajudicial killings, displacements, threats, discrimination, and marginalization. Not much has changed since then.

Central to these violations is the continued assault on indigenous territories, many of which are rich in natural resources and biodiversity. This deep connection is reflected both in law and jurisprudence.

IPs as environmental defenders

Section 4 of IPRA describes the concept of ancestral lands/domains while recognizing the cultural and spiritual bond IPs have with the environment. In Sama, et al. v. People of the Philippines (2021), no less than the Supreme Court has recognized that “cultural identity of the indigenous peoples has long been inseparable from the environment” and that “no knowable benefit in an indigenous custom or cultural belief that truthfully permits plunder of the environment that they hold synonymous with their collective identity”. 

However, the IPs’ intrinsic relationship with nature has often caught them in the crossfire of development and environmental protection. IPs continue to experience various forms of human rights violations, often in connection with environmental conflicts. 

The decade of supposed celebration of Indigenous Peoples in the Philippines is stained with blood – from the killing of eight Lumad leaders in South Cotabato who opposed the renewal of an industrial coffee plantation inside ancestral lands  in 2018 to the killing of nine members of the Tumandok IP community in Panay who opposed the building of a mega-dam project in 2021. Violence faced by IPs in their struggle to defend the environment shows no signs of slowing down and has in fact trickled down to their allies and supporters. IP defender Niezel Velasco was charged with several criminal cases such as unjust vexation, estafa, and murder on different occasions from 2021 up to 2025, most of which have been dismissed for lack of evidence. On July 26, just days before the President’s State of the Nation Address, environmental and Indigenous Peoples’ rights advocates Rudolph Dela Cruz Espe and Rico Gonzaga Malubay were shot and killed in Banaybanay, Davao Oriental — a grim reflection of the real state of Indigenous Peoples in the Philippines.

Human Rights Defenders Protection and Environmental Defense Bills

Bills aimed to enhance the protection of human rights defenders have been filed several times across the years. Back in 2019, House Bill No. 9199 or Human Rights Defenders (HRD) Protection Bill was approved with a vote of 183-0. Unfortunately, its Senate counterpart did not receive the same support. In 2023, Rep. Edcel. C. Lagman and Makabayan bloc Reps. Raoul Manuel, France Castro, and Arlene Brosas, refiled the bills which was approved by the House Committee on Human Rights but did not progress in the plenary. The HRD bills sought to reaffirm fundamental rights of HRDs, create protection mechanisms, and to specifically criminalize violations of the identified rights of HRDs including the right against red tagging.  

In 2020, the Makabayan bloc filed House Bill No. 8170 in the 18th Congress, or the “Environmental Defense Bill” seeking to address human rights violations committed against environmental defenders. The bill defines environmental defenders broadly to include individuals and groups advocating for environmental protection, whether or not they self-identify as such.

It also outlines a comprehensive Bill of Environmental Rights, which includes access to environmental information by vulnerable groups including IPs, recognition of the right of IPs to self-determination and respect of their customary laws, participation in public affairs, and protection from Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation (SLAPP). The bill also improves mechanisms for corporate accountability by allowing for the lifting of the corporate veil to hold corporations and their officers personally liable. However, the Environmental Defense bill suffered worse fate than the HRD bills as it did not even pass the Committee level nor was it refiled in the subsequent Congress.

Beyond holidays

More than a celebration of IP rights, the 10th anniversary of the National Indigenous Peoples Day in the Philippines should serve as a reminder of the darker reality our IPs face amidst continuing oppression in their communities. If the government truly aims to advance the “rights and collective well-being of indigenous peoples“, then it should definitely do more than creating special holidays. The Philippines must move past token gestures and moral posturing and instead fulfill its obligations to the IPs. Legislative reforms that are essential to safeguarding the fundamental rights of IPs, such as the Human Rights Defenders Protection Bill and the Environmental Defense Bill, are not only long overdue, but urgently necessary. (RVO)

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