HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH
Ka Bel: 24 Years Ago and Back
“I have been unjustly jailed
without seeing any hope for freedom and justice. But my resolve remains
strong, and I remain hopeful that the causes and the ends that we are
fighting for will triumph, along with the masses.” – "Unjustly" jailed party-list
congressman, Crispin Beltran
By Lisa Ito
Bulatlat
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Labor leader Crispin Beltran and wife Rosario in detention, 1980s, and
at "prison hospital" at present |
August 18, 2006
passed quietly and uneventfully in collective memory. But for Anakpawis
(Toiling Masses) Rep. Crispin “Ka Bel” Beltran and his wife Rosario “Ka
Osang” Soto-Beltran, it marked a day, exactly 24 years ago, when they
first tasted how it was to be detained under a dictatorship.
Ka Bel, now 73 and a
second-term party list solon, has seen worse days as a veteran activist.
But for Ka (kasama or comrade) Osang, Ka Bel’s continuing
detention at the Philippine Heart Center in Quezon City on charges of
rebellion and sedition by the Department of Justice (DoJ) is no different
from the torturous time when he was jailed as an up-and-coming labor
leader by the dictatorship, way back in 1982.
Victim of a labor
crackdown
The early 1980s were
tumultuous for the Philippine militant labor movement. Newly-founded
workers’ organizations held huge demonstrations against the dictatorship
while nationwide strikes over unfair labor practices and laws crippled
major industries in 1981 forcing the American Chamber of Commerce to sound
the alarm.
Reactions such as
this from the U.S. business community led the dictatorship to clamp down
further on the militant workers sector. On the eve of former President
Ferdinand Marcos’s state visit to the U.S. on August 13, 1982, a massive
labor crackdown was enforced to pre-empt a purported “September Terror
Plot” against the administration. At around 10:30 p.m., agents of the
Philippine Constabulary – Metropolitan Command (PC-Metrocom) arrested
Felixberto “Ka Bert” Olalia, then 78 and the first chair of Kilusang Mayo
Uno (KMU or May First Movement).
Beltran, then 49 and
acting secretary general of KMU, was able to dodge the dictatorship’s
dragnet that night. “Nang sumabog ang balita (ng crackdown) sa media,
nag-‘UG’ (underground) na ako.
Palipat-lipat kami at hindi na
umuwi sa aming mga bahay. Minsan,
naranasan naming matulog sa isang tindahan ng baboy sa Divisoria”
(When news of the crackdown came out in the media, I went ‘underground’.
We transferred from one place to another and didn’t go home. Once, we
spent the night at a meat shop in Divisoria), he recalls.
This mobility bought
a little more time for Beltran, who was the next target of the state
police. Ka Osang recalls how their cramped home in Gao, Fairview was
raided the day after.
“Agosto 14 nang
madaling-araw, sinalakay din ng mga armadong naka-damit sibilyan ang aming
bahay. Hinanap ang aking asawa’t tinutukan ng armalite sa tulugan ng aking
anak na lalaki at isang pamangkin. Hinalughog hanggang kasulok-sulokan ang
buong bahay, at nang walang makuha’t wala rin ang aking asawa’y, pilit na
pinaaamin na siya’y itinatago namin at kung saan,” she said. (Armed
men in civilian clothes raided our house early morning of August 14. They
were looking for my husband and even poked an armalite at the bed where my
son and a nephew were. They searched the entire house, and when they found
nothing and nobody, tried to force us into admitting that we were hiding
him and divulge his whereabouts.)
Beltran, however,
would eventually fall into the hands of the military four days later. At
around 6:30 p.m. on August 18, 1982, PC men led by Col. Rolando Abadilla
caught up with Beltran and arrested him during a press conference on the
labor crackdown, at the Jade Vine Restaurant along United Nations Avenue,
Manila.
The arrest happened
so fast, Beltran recalls, despite the security precautions he took. Less
than five minutes after he entered the restaurant, PC men barged in and
knocked him out, effecting his arrest and capture in a matter of seconds.
“Pinompyang ako (ni
Abadilla) gamit ang butt ng .45 caliber (na baril) at ng kanyang kaliwang
kamay...Nawalan ako ng malay, mga tunog lang ng siren ang naaalala ko.
Paggising ko, nabasa ko na nasa bandang Santolan na kami” (Using both
hands, Abadilla hit me between the ears with one hand using a butt of a
.45 caliber gun…I lost consciousness and all I heard next were the sounds
of a siren. When I woke up, I saw that we were the Santolan), he said.
“Alam ko na
papunta na ako sa Crame,” he said. (I knew that I was going to Camp
Crame.)
Period of trials
His arrest on August
18 plunged Ka Bel and Ka Osang into one of the most difficult and
nightmarish periods of their lives that neither would forget two decades
after.
Charged with inciting
to sedition and for conspiracy to commit rebellion (exactly the same
charges leveled against Beltran today) “in connection with a reported plan
of subversives to launch bombings, strikes, and other terroristic
activities,” Ka Bel together with Ka Bert was jailed in solitary
isolation, in 2 x 4 meter cells inside Camp Crame, the PC ‘s national
headquarters.
Three months later,
Beltran was transferred to the PC Stockade as the legal battle for liberty
dragged on at a torturous pace. Of the 52 political detainees at the
Stockade, 35 were trade unionists, including PISTON leader Menardo Roda.
Many other activists languished in jail at Bicutan, Fort Bonifacio, and
Camp Aguinaldo, including Satur Ocampo, now Bayan Muna (people first)
congressman.
Beltran says that he
was more fortunate than the other detainees, who were subjected to intense
physical torture while in confinement.
“We, the trade union
detainees, were spared the taste of physical torture,” Beltran wrote in a
letter Feb. 18, 1984. “But we got dosages of psychological torture in many
forms. One is the usual prodding, either directly said to us or through
our relatives, that at least we forget about all our principles and
organizations and cooperate or switch loyalty to the fascist camp, point a
finger of accusation against our fellow trade unionists and gain immediate
liberty plus a good lifestyle.”
Jail conditions were
deplorable, too. “We have been treated as maximum security prisoners…One
was in leg irons. Food rations are so inferior in quality and quantity as
to be rejected even by our puppy. Ventilation, sanitation, water supply
and lighting facilities have been dismal,” he recalled. “We sometimes have
to contend with some abusive and rude jail custodians as well as maintain
a respectable relationship between us and the common criminals, mostly PC-INP
and military personnel with charges like robbery-holdup with murder, rape
and drugs,” he added.
Family woes
For Ka Osang,
Beltran’s incarceration was a period of extreme emotional and material
hardship for his family. At the time, there was an active demolition
threat against the GAO slum community where they lived. She also had to
wake up each day at around 4 a.m. to wash clothes or sell slippers and
other wares in the market for the children’s needs. Often having no more
money left for the fare to Camp Crame, she would walk all the way to the
headquarters from Fairview afterwards.
“Mantaking kahit
na hindi pa nakakulong at nasa hanap-buhay pa ang aming asawa’y talagang
dahop na, ngayon pa kaya?” she said (Even if they were not yet
imprisoned and were still working, we were already hard-up—how much more
today?).
But the poverty they
experienced paled in comparison to the emotional anguish Beltran’s absence
left on the family.
“Ang
pinaka-malupit na epekto ng detensyon ay nasa disoryentasyon ng pamilya,
lalo na sa mga musmos na bata: tanong nga ng aking bunso - ’Bakit matagal
na nang hindi siya pinauuwi? Guwardiyado pa sila ng mga nakabaril, bakit
Mama, makasalanan ba siya?”, she said (The most cruel effect of the
detention was the disorientation it brought to our families, especially to
our children: my youngest child asked - Why hasn’t he been allowed to go
home for so long? Armed men are even guarding him, why Mama, has he
committed any crime?)
Even so, they were
still more fortunate than other victims of the regime, Ka Osang said.
“Kaming mga
pamilya nila’y laging naging bahagi na ng pagpapahirap, pananakot, at
panunupil na dinadanas ng milyong mamamayan. Ngunit, mas magaan pa nga ang
paghihirap namin kung ihahambing sa ibang napakatagal na sa kulungan,
tinorture, at ang iba’y tuluyang pinatay,” Ka Osang said (The
political detainees’ families have always been part of the hardship,
harassment, and repression experienced by millions of people. Yet our
hardships are more bearable compared to those who have been "unjustly" jailed for so
long, tortured, and some even eventually murdered.)
Hunger strikes
“We waged our own
struggles behind bars,” Beltran says of his incarceration at Crame. In
protest against their unjust detention and continuing political
repression, the prisoners in the Crame stockade staged four fastings and
hunger strikes in three years.
Their hunger strikes
usually lasted for three days. But their longest protest was from December
1 to December 22, 1982, when they demanded the immediate release of the 35
trade union leaders, women political detainees, and an end to the arrests,
intimidation, tortures, salvaging and hamletting by the regime.
The protest fastings
eventually yielded political gains. “Of the original 52 political
prisoners in 1982, 36 have already regained temporary liberty, 30 of whom
are identified with the trade union group. They were released in trickles
from January 1 1983 to January 25, 1984,” Beltran wrote in February 1984.
The “poldets” (short
for political detainees) also tried to supplement their family needs
through craftsmaking. By February 1983, they started producing “tambo”
(a household sweeper) articles through a Cooperative Productive Project,
“in order to be less of a burden to our families who are already on the
brink of starvation”.
“Nadagdagan nito
ang kaunting kinikita sa aming paglalako ng palanggana at iba pang
karaniwang gamit ng pamilyang mahihirap,” Ka Osang says of their
efforts. (It contributed to the meager income we wives earned by selling
tubs and other items used by poor families.)
Hope for freedom
As the months of
detention dragged on, it became painfully evident to Ka Bel that justice
would be elusive under the dictatorship. The labor leader escaped from
prison in 1984 and sought refuge among the peasants of Central Luzon.
Beltran eventually
won back the liberty he risked his life for. After People Power toppled
the Marcos dictatorship in February 1986, he was offered general amnesty
by the new government. The charges of sedition and rebellion against him
were eventually dismissed by the courts for lack of merit.
Ka Bel went on with
the struggle for workers rights, assuming the leadership of the KMU after
Lando Olalia, Ka Bert’s son, was abducted and brutally murdered in
November 1986. He would later on head the KMU, the Bagong Alyansang
Makabayan, and the International League of Peoples’ Struggle (ILPS) as
chair before winning a seat in Congress under Bayan Muna in 2001 and AP in
2004.
The elder Olalia,
however, did not live to see freedom. With his health deteriorating after
two weeks in solitary confinement, Olalia was transferred to the Camp
Crame Hospital Room 1, exactly in the same room where Ka Bel spent nearly
two months in confinement last March. He was later transferred to the V.
Luna Hospital, where he died under house arrest on December 4, 1983.
History repeats
itself, they say. Twenty-four years after that fateful afternoon on August
18, 1982, Beltran finds himself in the late Felixberto Olalia’s shoes:
detained by a new dictatorship, struggling against illness under police
custody, falsely charged with rebellion, and yet firm on regaining freedom
and justice.
Nearly six months
have passed since Ka Bel was illegally arrested and arbitrarily detained
by the Arroyo administration on February 25, 2006, yet there are no
indications that the government is willing to set him free, or to even let
him attend Congress’ last 100 days of session. Despite yearning to escape
again like what he did in the 1980s, Ka Bel says that he will not do so in
deference to his oath of office as a duly-elected congressman.
Whenever Ka Osang
feels despondent over what seems to be another long struggle under a new
dictatorship, she always finds strength in a letter that Ka Bel wrote
while in the PC-INP Stockade on May 26, 1983:
“Mula noong ika-18th
ng Agosto 1982…ako’y nakakulong nang walang nababanaag na kalayaan at
katarungan. Ngunit nananatiling malakas ang aking kalooban at buhay ang
pag-asa na magwawagi ang simulain na ipinaglalaban natin, kasama ang
sambayanan,” he wrote (Since the 18th of August, 1982…I
have been unjustly jailed without seeing any hope for freedom and justice. But my
resolve remains strong, and I remain hopeful that the causes and the ends
that we are fighting for will triumph, along with the masses). Bulatlat
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