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Class love is what both revolutionary poet Kerima “Ka Ella” Tariman and activist-musician Ericson Acosta carried on—enduring the vast distance between them due to political tasks in the countryside. Sacrificing their life as a couple by dedicating themselves and their art to the toiling peasant masses and their fight for land.
“It seemed the shots were fired on different times…On his hand, that was way before the fatal shots,” Raquel Fortun said in a mix of English and Filipino.
Ericson's friends said he could have been in a different field or in the mainstream, working as a playwright or a screenwriter and living a comfortable life. But in the end, they said, he chose and embraced life together with the people and fighting together with them in their struggle.
The National Democratic Front in Negros (NDF-Negros) said peace consultant and poet Ericson Acosta and peasant organizer Joseph Jimenez were stabbed and hacked, belying claims of the military that the two died during gun fight in Kabankalan City last Nov. 30.
NDF-Negros spokesperson Bayani Obrero said in a statement that Acosta and a companion were captured alive at around two o’clock in the morning of November 30 but were announced as casualties in a “fake encounter” a few hours later.
BLOOD RUSH By SARAH RAYMUNDO Ericson Acosta, author of Mula Tarima Hanggang at Iba Pang Mga Tula at Awit (The University of the Philippines Press, 2015) spent twenty three months in prison. That is a lifetime to a dog, a long time for most of us, and a time to live...
“Ericson Acosta was physically in prison but his creative imagination and his political resistance soared above dismal conditions and made him free.”
By LUIS ADRIAN A. HIDALGO Bulatlat.com MANILA -- Nearly two years of detainment has tested his spirit, but that didn’t stop poet-activist Ericson Acosta from standing by his cause and principles. A week after the trumped-up charges were dropped due to insufficient...
By RONALYN V. OLEA
“We welcome the release of Acosta, finally, after two years of detention. What remains true is that no person should be held in detention, charged with trumped-up cases, and stripped of his rights because of his political beliefs. We demand the release of all sick and elderly political prisoners.” – Selda
By RONALYN V. OLEA
“After more than one year, it has been proven that the charges, which caused my detention for almost two years, were baseless.” – Ericson Acosta
By RONALYN V. OLEA Bulatlat.com MANILA –Poet-songwriter Ericson Acosta is happy to be out of the Calbayog sub-provincial jail in Samar where he had been detained for 23 months on trumped-up criminal charges. His freedom is temporary, though. And Acosta is aware his...
Poet, songwriter, singer, journalist and activist Ericson Acosta was illegally arrested in Northern Samar on February 13, 2011 while conducting research for peasant organizations. He has not been arraigned despite having spent more than two years in jail.
By ERICSON ACOSTA Political Prisoner Despite the grim reality of imprisonment, I have not, as of yet, been condemned to a total state of ignorance as far as current efforts of various committed art and cultural groups and alliances are concerned. Thanks largely to...
By INA ALLECO R. SILVERIO Bulatlat.com MANILA -- The worldwide association of writers PEN International marked the 31st Annual Day of the Imprisoned Writer last November 15. It was a day to recognize and support writers at risk, and for the last 31 years, the group...
By RONALYN V. OLEA Bulatlat.com MANILA – The family of political prisoner Ericson Acosta has been receiving text messages saying that Ericson or his parents might get killed on November 2, All Souls Day. Isaias Acosta, 79, father of Ericson, said his driver...
By TERENCE KRISHNA V. LOPEZ Bulatlat.com MANILA -- Starting in November, progressive cultural organization Sinagbayan restages its original production “Pitong Sundang: mga sayaw sa lupa at pakikibaka,” (Seven Bolos: Dances for land and the struggle) a dance theater...
By INA ALLECO R. SILVERIO
“If the government really wants real peace and is for human rights, as they continue to announce, it must release all political prisoners and stop political persecution against its perceived enemies.” – Marie Hilao-Enriquez, Karapatan
UP, artists reiterate call for release of Ericson Acosta (Photos by Ronalyn V. Olea and Fred E. Dabu)
By RONALYN V. OLEA Bulatlat.com MANILA – More groups added their voices to the call for the release of detained artist Ericson Acosta. Acosta, 39, was arrested on Feb. 13 last year by elements of the 34th Infantry Battalion (IB) of the Philippine Army in San Jorge,...
By RONALYN V. OLEA Bulatlat.com CALBAYOG CITY, Western Samar -- A dozen of fully armed soldiers in camouflage uniforms escorted political prisoner Ericson Acosta from the Calbayog Sub-Provincial Jail to the Hall of Justice, Dec. 8. Acosta attended this afternoon’s...
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