Private First Class Jullado (with mobile phone in right photo), admitted
to having taken part in bombing the village of Basey due, he said, to
rebel presence; among the affected people are the family in the left
photo.
Photos by Dabet
Castañeda
SAMAR Island –An old man and his son
pound palay (rice grains) on a lusong (huge wooden
container); two half-naked men build a house made of wood; while an
elderly woman, holding a large wooden basket at her back, gather fire wood
for cooking.
Townsfolk in this hilly barangay
(village) in the town of Basey are picking up the pieces and trying to
live a normal life once more after braving three waves of mass evacuations
last month.
But the tranquility that welcomed a
group of more than a hundred foreign and local delegates of the
International Solidarity Mission (ISM)-Philippines 2005 was rather eerie.
Before the second of group of
delegates (to which this reporter belonged) could reach its destination,
it had received information that the first group had experienced
harassments from soldiers of Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) on
their way to the place.
It was a 30-minute trek along
farmlands, houses made of cogon, with bamboo and nipa lining the cemented
pavement. From their doors and windows, people old and young alike watched
the ISM team pass by.
Military men in uniform were seated in
front of the houses.
From the top of a hill, one could see
a group of people assembled outside the Barangay Cancaiyas Elementary
School. The townsfolk came from eight different villages. The people
gathered to tell their stories, to the ISM team, of homes burned,
livelihood lost and kin hurt during the mass evacuations.
Evacuees
Fifty-one-year-old Editha Morales, a
native Samarnon, said that she has lived in this barangay since birth and
has never been forcefully evacuated from their home. “Not even during
martial law,” she said in Tagalog.
The Philippines was under martial rule
from 1972-1986 under the dictatorship of former President Ferdinand E.
Marcos.
“Malakas yung mga bomba,
nakakabingi. Akala namin tatamaan kami” (The sounds of bombs exploding
were deafening. We thought we would be hit), she said.
|
Basey evacuees
|
Aling Editha, her husband and her
three children abandoned their home in the morning of July 20, Wednesday,
after bombs were dropped in a nearby hinterland village. Taking all their
pieces of property, they headed for the gymnasium in the town proper of
Basey and stayed there for almost a week. Cancaiyas is roughly 10
kilometers from the town proper.
Her husband, a farmer who planted
palay (rice), coconut (for kopra) and root crops, took their
carabao to the foot of the hills where her husband could go back to
everyday to feed it. It was made to stay there until they went home on
Monday, July 26.
Most of the residents have since come
home save for some 40 families in Sitio (sub-village) Ogbok where all
households but two have fled to other villages.
Some families have fled to as far as
Montalban town in Rizal province, Luzon Island.
The human rights group Karapatan-Eastern
Visayas (Alliance for the Advancement of Peoples’ Rights-Eastern Visayas
Region) documented 40 cases of evacuations in this island affecting 2,433
individuals or 1,786 families.
Security for whom?
The aerial bombings were confirmed by
Private First Class (Pfc.) Jullado, who was present during the community
meeting between the villagers and the ISM. Jullado, who was in full battle
gear, refused to give his first name.
He said he was there together with
eight others from the 46th Infantry Battalion of the Philippine
Army (IB PA). They were sent specifically to “provide security” for the
ISM delegates.
2nd Lt. Proxian Marasig, commander, 46th IB PA Bravo Company
|
“Binomba namin yung lugar kasi may
kaaway kami dito” (We bombed the place because there were enemies
here), he said.
When asked who their enemies were, he
said, “Syempre yung mga NPA. Infiltrated kasi ang area na ito.”(Of
course the New People’s Army guerrillas. This area is infiltrated.)
Three of Jullado’s colleagues were not
in uniform. A commotion ensued between the ISM delegates and the soldiers
in civilian clothes when the soldiers tried to take pictures of the
delegates and the villagers.
Upon questioning, the ISM delegates
found that one of the soldiers in civilian clothes, who introduced himself
as a local villager, was the commanding officer of the 46th IB
PA Bravo Company.
|
While insisting he was not on official
duty, 2nd Lt. Proxian Malasig said he only went to the area to
visit his troops. The dark and lanky officer also said it was his
prerogative to wear civilian clothes as a security measure.
ISM delegates learned later that one
of the soldiers forcibly took a resident’s shirt and wore it to the
community meeting. Malasig had earlier named this soldier as Pfc. Sherwin
Dacanay.
During random interviews, residents
said Malasig and his men frequented their village wearing civilian
clothes. The villagers said the soldiers’ presence has sent a chilling
effect on them.
Hell and terror
The island of Samar has been subject
to intense counter-insurgency operations under the command of notorious
military officer Maj. Gen. Jovito Palparan. It has been six months since
he announced on local radio that he would “end all anti-government
rallies” in this island. This resulted in a long list of killings,
abductions, torture, harassments, and other human rights and international
humanitarian law violations.
In a forum Aug. 14 in the town of
Catbalogan, some of the victims and survivors testified about the inhumane
treatment they have suffered from the hands of soldiers.
Cristina Abalos, daughter of 67-year
old Patricio Abalos, spoke of the forcible abduction and disappearance of
her father. The older Abalos was abducted on March 28 by soldiers
allegedly led by 2Lt. Wilbert Basquiñas. Cristina’s testimony echoed the
stories of the families of the 31 persons who have disappeared in the
region during the last six months.
All the way from the town of Villareal,
Rosalina and Julius Calubid, wife and son of Constancio Calubid, related
how Constancio was tortured and abducted by soldiers in plain clothes on
the night of July 16. The victim disappeared and after 12 days was later
found dead along the riverbanks of a remote village three kilometers from
the town proper.
Karapatan-EV records reveal that 25
persons were summarily executed since Feb. 10 when Palparan officially
took his post as commanding officer of the 8th Infantry
Division (ID PA).
Political assassinations in this
region have targeted respected political activists, including human rights
and labor lawyer Fedelito Dacut and activist priest Rev. Edison Lapuz,
Iglesia Filipina Independiente (IFI or Independent Church of the
Philippines).
Pablo Dacutanan Jr., shared how he was
tortured by AFP soldiers in an apartment located in a densely populated
area before he was able to escape. Dacutanan was laughing throughout his
testimony, proof that his sufferings have affected his mental health as
well. There have been 31 cases of torture reported in this region.
Government officials have also been
threatened and harassed by the military. Samar Reps. Catalino Figueroa
(second district) and Reynaldo Uy (first district) have attested in
Congress to being harassed. Even barangay officials are regularly
terrorized.
For the period Feb. 10 to Aug. 4 (25
weeks or 175 days), Karapatan-EV has documented 513 cases of violations of
international humanitarian law.
Karapatan-EV secretary general Alex
Lagunzad said that these violations resulted from three military operation
plans (oplan): a) Oplan Kalinaw Visayas (literally, “Operational Plan
Peace-in-the-Visayas), the over-all counter-insurgency operations plan of
the 8th ID PA in the region, b) Oplan Gold Rush 8, a plan to
“neutralize” progressive people’s organizations, which the AFP considers
as legal fronts of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), and c)
Oplan Ligpit (literally, “Operational Plan Liquidate”), which aims to
execute about 36 leaders and members of progressive organizations who are
included in the Order of Battle (OB) list. This list was confirmed by
Palparan himself in a media briefing sometime in June.
In a newspaper report on Aug. 19,
Palparan said his six-month anti-insurgency campaign has been successful
and he is just about to neutralize “communist-terrorists” (CTs) in the
island.
Amid this
so-called success however are widows and orphans who have been denied
justice. For the villagers affected by military operations, it has been
six months of torment. Bulatlat
Photos by Dabet
Castañeda
Part 2:
Crushing Opposition to Mining Operations
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