Today, Bayan Muna is set to file its candidacy papers before the Commission on Elections as it seeks for re-election in the 2022 polls. This despite the red-tagging and other attacks it was subjected to under President Rodrigo Duterte, including a state-sponsored “zero vote” campaign against Bayan Muna during the 2019 midterm elections where they still emerged victorious.
Karapatan Secretary General Cristina Palabay said the two former generals are facing complaints and allegations of human rights violations and war crimes. Their appointment, she added, only means that they are not going to be held accountable for these acts.
“There is no excuse for the State to commit any form of human rights violation against any of its citizens, including Human Rights Defenders. Thus, the red-tagging of Northern Dispatch as a creation of the CPP and its personnel as communist front personalities constitutes human rights violations.”
“Fear is still there, but the need to stand by our principles always wins. We also need to continue campaigning for the welfare of our fellow government workers.”
“Rather than listen to all the valid criticisms, DND continues to brush aside the damning evidence against them by escaping institutional accountability.”
Karapatan-Caraga said that Julieta Gomez and Niezel Velasco are both engaged humanitarian work over the years. In fact, the group said that “officers and personnel of some of government agencies in the region know them personally as they have coordinated activities particularly with the Department of Social Welfare and Development and local government units in the Surigao and Agusan provinces and several municipalities.”
“Release your incontrovertible evidence in public.”
“The victims live in constant fear for their lives, liberty and security. Adding insult to injury, even their families suffer the same. They deliberately singled out as the public is conditioned that they must have done something wrong to justify an extrajudicial punishment.”
Youth and student activists filed a complaint on Friday before the Commission on Human Rights and the National Bureau of Investigation, urging them to investigate the intensified red-tagging of their organizations and members amid the implementation of the Philippine terror law.
Ironically, cases against red-tagged individuals are being dismissed by government courts for lack of probable cause or because of insufficient evidence. Motions to quash search warrants were also granted by the courts, declaring whatever so-called evidence the police have acquired during the search as inadmissible.
“Simply put, the AFP and Philippine National Police (PNP) had no solid, intelligent basis before launching massive operations in a rural sitio in Nasugbu, Batangas in April 2020.”