Tricks of the light

Never Again

“No one should experience what the PC-INP (Philippine Constabulary-Integrated National Police) did to us while in detention at the PC Barracks in San Pedro Street, (Davao City).”

By Cong B. Corrales¹

IT WAS A SATURDAY, he recalled going to campus that fateful day wearing the prescribed army greens for their scheduled Reserve Officers' Training Corps (ROTC) formation.

“My classmates greeted me at the gates frantically to tell me that some of my friends were arrested earlier and that some have gone into hiding,” he said smiling—somehow amused at the turn of events.

Alfredo “Ka Paris” Mapano was barely an adult at 18 years old when strongman Ferdinand Edralin Marcos placed the entire country in a state of martial law through Proclamation No. 1082. However, he was already a member of the Samahang Demokratikong Kabataan (SDK)—a left-leaning student organization.

Marcos made the live television broadcast of the proclamation two days later—September 23, 1972.

He said the members of the now-defunct Philippine Constabulary-Integrated National Police (PC-INP), who patrolled their campus that Saturday, failed to notice him because Mapano—like the other students—was wearing fatigue.

“I went underground for three years,” Mapano said. He was captured in 1975 in his hometown in Davao Province.

“No one should experience what the PC-INP did to us while in detention at the PC Barracks in San Pedro Street, (Davao City). If the government is punishing us for fighting for what we believed in the why were the military who committed all those atrocities during martial law never held accountable,” lamented Mapano.

Currently detained at the Misamis Oriental Provincial Jail in Cagayan de Oro City, Mapano—now 58 years old—hopes President Benigno Simeon Aquino, III could understand people like him being a son of a political detainee.

President Aquino's father—the late Senator Benigno S. Aquino, Jr—was also jailed under criminal cases like illegal possession of firearms, murder and conspiracy to commit sedition, among other trumped up charges.

“Now that the son of probably the most famous victim of martial law (President Aquino) is in power, he should be in the best position to empathize with the detained political prisoners all over the country,” he said.

THIS PARTICULAR SATURDAY—August 1, 2009—Mapano was not as lucky as he was in Davao some 40 years ago.

The combined personnel of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group, National Intelligence Coordination Administration and the 4^th Infantry Division of the Philippine Army arrested Mapano while the latter was “on family integration leave” at a local apartelle in Barangay Carmen, Cagayan de Oro City.

Four years after his arrest and facing multiple criminal charges in various municipalities, Mapano hopes President Aquino would grant political detainees like him “general, unconditional, and omnibus amnesty.”

“I am old and I would like to spend my twilight years with my children if I'll be granted amnesty,” he said.

Alfredo “Ka Paris” Mapano—together with 10 other political detainees—is still detained. There are 385 political detainees currently languishing in jails across the country.

1This narrative is adapted from an interview inside the Misamis Oriental Provincial Jail on September 17, 2012 when Mapano led 10 other political detainees in an eight-day fasting to commemorate the martyrs of martial law and to drum up support for a general, unconditional, and omnibus amnesty. Excerpts of the narrative first appeared on TV5's online news portal—Interaksyon.com—on September 17, 2012.

Sights & Sounds: One Million People March

AUGUST 26 was memorable because it was the day when hundreds of thousands of Filipinos, many of them “unorganized,” spilled out into the streets to express their derision over the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF), otherwise known as the pork barrel.

The activity was sparked in part by reports that some P10 billion in pork barrel funds had been channeled into the pockets of middlemen and legislators through the use of ghost nongovernment organizations.

With the very high-profile surrender of Janet Lim-Napoles to President Benigno S. Aquino III himself, the issues appear to have changed, and the mood appears to have shifted. Now, social media is a-buzz with how government would or should prosecute those guilty of squirreling away public funds to very private pockets. And so the question: Regardless of who is hauled off to court, will the pork remain?

Lest the public forgets, the issue may not just be how the pork barrel is misused; rather, it is, more importantly, about the continuing politics of patronage, and how those whose main function should be legislation have also taken on the task of appropriation. It is the politics of give-and-take, the politics of wheeling and dealing, and a system of perpetuated dependence.

When the President announced he was abolishing the pork barrel, what he really meant was that he was merely reworking the mechanism of pork. And so, despite the anger at the Luneta, the Presidential ‘abolition,’ and that high-profile ‘surrender,’ pork still remains as pork, allowing the smartest and the craftiest among us to bring home the bacon while the rest are grateful to have been left with the scraps.

Abolish pork, rechannel the people’s money to basic social services

The Concerned Artists of the Philippines (CAP) today joins thousands of other Filipinos in calling for the abolition of the presidential and congressional pork barrel funds and the rechanneling of the people’s money to basic social services.

We reject this system of funding driven by patronage politics: a system riddled with secrecy, discretionary abuse, lack of oversight and transparency. We reject this plunder of the people’s money. Clearly, the pork barrel funds do not go to addressing the people’s basic human rights and needs, such as affordable and nutritious food, stable and sustainable employment, housing and transportation services, and accessible medical and social services.

Recent events unmasked the corruption, depravity and crookedness of the pork barrel system. Janet Napoles’ P10 billion scam pales in comparison to the funds siphoned off through the P25 billion individual Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) for senators and congressmen and the P1.3 trillion to 1.5 trillion Presidential lump sum discretionary fund that makes up more than half of the country’s national budget for the year.

Many scandals and controversies underscoring the extent of the problem have erupted over the past years in different Presidential administrations. Like his predecessors, President B.S. Aquino III has done nothing to resolutely abolish this system and work for substantial reforms. Instead, his administration has recently attempted to retain the pork barrel funds: using new terms and jargon to mask the same old system of patronage-driven public funding.

We are tired of such linguistic tricks and double talk. Let us call a spade a spade: pork barrel has long become a loot bag for corruption by bureaucrats. It has to go.

We call on fellow concerned artists and cultural workers to unite in calling for the abolition of the pork barrel system. We demand that the administration rechannel the people’s money to where it rightfully belongs: to jobs, land, education, social services and justice for the Filipino people.


The Concerned Artists of the Philippines is an organization of writers, artists and cultural workers committed to the principles of freedom, justice and democracy.It was founded in 1983 to unite Filipino artists against the dictatorial regime of then President Ferdinand Marcos who imposed repressive laws that curtailed freedom of expression.

Palasukong Heneral

EBIDENSYA. Ginamit pa ng palasukong heneral ang ngalan ng bayan sa kanyang desisyon na "barilin ang magkapatid" na Bonifacio.

Tigbas Journalism: National Paper Version

So what's the point here?

Posting a news article only to take it down? Napasok na sa ATM ang bayad?

Proper use by a few can’t compensate for plunder of the many (Or why, despite using it in the past, we want the pork barrel abolished) | Teddy Casiño

Proper use by a few can’t compensate for plunder of the many (Or why, despite using it in the past, we want the pork barrel abolished) | Teddy Casiño

NCCP joins calls vs pork barrel

THE NATIONAL COUNCIL OF CHURCHES IN THE PHILIPPINES (NCCP), has joined the swelling public call to junk the Priority Development Assistance Funds (PDAF)--more popularly known as pork barrel--of legislators and other high ranking national executive officials.

In a statement released to the media, the NCCP also expressed disgust over President Benigno S. Aquino III’ refusal to remove the pork barrel, despite reports that some P10 billion in pork funds were laundered by a middleman through fake nongovernment organizations and rechanneled back to legislators.

NCCP Chair, The Most Rev. Ephraim S. Fajutagana cited a PCIJ report in July 2

2, this year, quoting Budget Secretary Florencio Abad as acknowledging “that the context of pork is ‘patronage politics,’ and the logic that drives the selection of projects and the disbursement of many politicians’ pork funds, ‘pautakan lang ‘yan’ or ‘just play it smart.’”

“Thus, there is every reason to be upset that the President who was elected via an anti-corruption drive and a platform of "daang matuwid" is not keen on removing this scourge."  Instead, it will remain and may even be increased,” the NCCP statement titled: Scrap The Pork Barrel, The Fount of Patronage Politics, said.

Comprised of 10 main Protestant and non-Roman Catholic denominations and 10 service-oriented organizations in the country, the NCCP represents nearly 12 million followers. It is a member of the World Council of Churches (WCC) and the Christian Conference of Asia (CCA).

Fajutagana added in the statement that “the amount involved, the outrageous sense of betrayal felt by the general public and the total insensitivity of those involved to the greater majority of the people boggle the mind.

“The scandal provokes sadness and anger."  Sadness at the plight of the people in the hands of its leaders.  Anger over the way people's taxes have been misused,” the NCCP statement continues.

The NCCP also cited the PCIJ’s report on President Benigno Simeon Aquino III allocating its office with around Php 317.5 billion for special purpose funds and Php 117.5 billion for unprogrammed funds in the proposed General Appropriation Act of 2013. “(The) disbursement record on these funds have hardly been published online or disclosed to the citizens, despite repeated requests,” the NCCP statement quoted the PCIJ report.

“There is neither justification for the misuse of public funds by leaders while the majority of the people wallow in want and vulnerability to disasters, nor any moral ground in the failure of our leaders to be accountable,” the NCCP statement reads.

The NCCP proposed, instead, that pork barrel funds be allotted directly for education, health, housing and other social services and called for vigilance in monitoring the clamor for investigation not to be “muddled by the patronage system.”

“The National Council of Churches in the Philippines joins the groundswell to scrap the pork barrel system…Let us remain focused on the issue of corruption in high places diverted as we are often by other issues,” Fajutagana called on to its leaders.

“Take heed that callous insensitivity and betrayal of the public trust has led many of our people from imploring arms to defiant clenched fists.  The downfall of the foolish is swift,” the NCCP statement said.

Fatter & Bigger | Money Politics

Fatter & Bigger | Money Politics

People's Clamor: Freedom of Information Act

Maguindanao: A case study for justice and accountability

“Those who have less in life should have more in law.”Ramon del Fierro Magsaysay,7th President Republic of the Philippines

WITH THESE WORDS, Magsaysay tried to set the tone for a more socially-attuned administration of justice. Yet 56 after Magsaysay’s death, his words remain a mere slogan.

On November 23, 2009, 58 people—32 of whom were media workers—were waylaid in what has become known throughout the world as the Maguindanao Massacre, the worst case of election violence in the country, and the biggest case of violence against media men in the world. The incident has caught the country flat-footed, yet it also exposed several long-festering, and in many aspects, long-known yet unaddressed issues.

On one hand. the incident served as a grisly wake-up call for both national government and local and international civil societies on the issues of election violence, clan politics and dynamics, and violence against media. On the other hand, ending impunity became the priority mission of both the Philippine government and civil societies.

In coordination with United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and Libertas, a legal policy non-government organization, the Commission on Human Rights of the Philippines (CHRP) launched a research project that dissected the massacre case as a way to understand these issues and offer recommendations for reforms in the country’s judicial system.


The research project output is a book entitled “Maguindanao Massacre: Case Study for Breaking Impunity, Increasing Accountability, and Broadening Access to Justice.” It is a compendium of interviews, focus group discussions and dialogues with “family members of the Maguindanao Massacre victims, key informants who are private or public prosecutors, officials from the security sector, relevant government agencies, and representatives of civil society organizations (CSOs) and media organizations.”

At the crux of the case study is the fact there is still no clear-cut definition of extrajudicial killing (EJK) especially for state players prosecuting the criminal act. 

The study posits that a good definition is important to set this specific criminal act apart from the other crimes. It further suggests that this particular crime be called “unexplained killing” and “to let it cover both state and non-state perpetrators.” In this way, the study broadened its scope of coverage to be more inclusive of other similar cases of EJKs, not just in Maguindanao or Mindanao, but all over the country as well.

Red-tagging of this type of crime, or identifying specific cases for special attention, also puts “value” since red-tagged cases are more closely monitored by the justice department at the regional level. The label also attracts more public attention, thereby potentially increasing the confidence level of the witnesses. “It is suggested that red-tagging be done at the point of filing information in court, and that red-tagged cases no longer be raffled. Aside from special handling by the prosecution, this will also facilitate human rights documentation and monitoring,” the case study reads.

The case study proposes that special courts be designated to hear this type of crime continuously. Study proponents also proposed—by way of citing one of the observation of its key informants—the resumption of peace negotiations between the Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GPH) and the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP), because “while peace talks are ongoing, extrajudicial killings are seen to slow down and become intermittent.” In order to further speed up the court processes on EJKs and other human rights violation cases, the case study also proposes there be mechanisms in the rules of court to allow the perpetuation of testimonies of witnesses.

According to the case study, key informants from both the government and civil societies agree that there should be an enabling law on command responsibility to exact criminal liability and for command responsibility to be applicable to all criminal offenses under the country’s Revised Penal Code. The case study also recommended that there should be “transparency in the conduct of internal investigations and in the military justice system.”

Presently, the rules on command responsibility in the Philippines cover only as high as two degrees. However, a respondent from the Philippine Army conceded that—with respect to civilian supremacy over state security forces—court martial will surrender the “subject and the case even if there is a separate crime or administrative case arising under the Articles of War,” provided that there will be clear parameters.

Even though the Philippine Senate had not yet given its concurrence to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (the Rome Statute) pursuant to Article VII of the Constitution when—the case study was prepared (2010 to 2011), on August 30, 2011, the Philippine Senate gave its concurrence to the Rome Statute. The Rome Statute, among others, defines the coverage of the doctrine of command responsibility to all state signatories of the international.

Other recommendations put forward by the study include:

• Requiring a human rights clearance process for personnel in all law enforcement agencies.
  
  
  
  
• Enhancing and increasing coverage of the Witness Protection Program (WPP)
  
• Training of paralegals on investigation and legal support in the prosecution of cases
  
• More inter-agency cooperation and evidence-sharing among agencies involved in the investigation and prosecution of the cases
  
• Initiation of administrative cases involving human rights violations by government agencies DESPITE the absence of private complainants.
  
• More effective firearms control through improved logistics management system by the Armed Forces of the Philippines.
  
• More concrete measures to depoliticize the local police force.
  
• Engagement of the Anti-Money Laundering Council in cases involving HRVs.
  

The recommendations for more effecive firearms control and the need to depoliticze the local police forces stood out starkly against the backdrop of the Maguindanao Massacre. The Ampatuan clan, the family accused of masterminding the massacre, has been accused of amassing firearms and ammunition through the help of regional and national patrons. In effect, the Ampatuan clan had been able to build its own legal private army using both government arms and ammunition.


As well, the clan has been accused of using the local police force in Maguindanao in carrying out the massacre. Under the Local Government Code, the local government units have operational control over the local police forces. In the case of the Maguindanao Massacre, the local police units were said to have been compromised by the clan through because the clan had full control over the appointments and perks of the local police officers.

During the course of the case study, it was also recommended that there should be a “community and peer support in the prosecution of criminal cases” and a “rationalized and integrated financial and other support for victims of atrocious crimes, including families of the Maguinndanao Massacre victims.” These recommendations stem from the outcome of a series of FGDs with the families of the massacre victims.

“In this respect, a cohesive financial support program with support coming from various sources may be rationalized and administered just by one agency, perhaps the CHRP or the DSWD, so that the families need only coordinate with one agency, Requirements can be streamlined by such agency, so that the families need not undergo repetitive processes for screening, which merely add to the famlies’ difficulty and frustration,” the case study recommends.

FIGHTING WIDOW. Mrs. Edita Tiamzon, widow of UNTV Daniel who was one of the journalists killed in the grisly Ampatuan Massacre. congcorrales © 2013.

The most recent case in point of this was when news that a number of the families of massacre victims have allegedly opted to settle with massacre prime suspects of the Ampatuan clan. Legal counsel Harry Roque of the Center for International law posted in his blog that the families of 14 massacre victims had reportedly signed a written authority with a “close associate” of the Ampatuans to broker a settlement with the accused sometime in February, this year.

Roque’s law firm is representing four of the 14 families who supposedly opted to settle. However, he claimed that the “settlement” was made without his knowledge and that he got wind of the settlement deal from one of his clients.

Although the news of the 14 families of massacre victims considering a settlement with the Ampatuans may come as a shock for most who have been following the massacre case, National Union of Journalists of the Philippines (NUJP) national chair Rowena Caranza-Paraan said that the move is not “surprising” and that it should not paint the families of the massacre victims as ”sellouts.”

Caranza-Paraan said that there are two main factors that made the families tempted to strike a settlement deal—the snail’s pace of the court trial and families’ lack of sources of income.

“It would always be the decision of the victims' families. But whether some of them decide to accept a settlement or not, the search for justice for those killed will continue because many of them will never settle,” Caranza-Paraan said.

As observed in the prosecution of EJK and other human rights violations cases in the country, testimonial evidences play a crucial role. When witnesses and families of massacre victims are killed, harassed and often times slapped with trumped up retaliatory charges in court quicker than the respondents of the cases are arrested, then it negates the whole judicial process.

“Hence, there is critical need to secure witnesses. Unfortunately, one common observation is the lack of funds and insufficient of support for witnesses under the Witness Protection Program (WPP),” the case study points out. Thus, the case study also recommends that the justice department’s Witness Protection Program (WPP) be enhanced and its coverage increased.


“Truly, the Maguindanao Massacre was an unspeakable crime. It represents all that is evil in our political system. It shows what is dysfunctional in our legal processes. The only good that can come out of it is that it compels us to train our sights on these infirmities, and galvanizes our resolve as a nation to address it. The above recommendations are made in this light, so that the lost lives of the victims may not be put to naught,” the case study reads in part.―congcorrales for pcij.org/blog © 2013.

END IMPUNITY NOW. Justice remains elusive for the families of the Ampatuan Massacre victims and the continuing reign of impunity in the Philippines. photo by congcorrales©2013

Take a look inside my heart (cover)

42nd Maguindanao Massacre Monthly Memorial

Never forget: The Ampatuan massacre « The PCIJ Blog

Never forget: The Ampatuan massacre « The PCIJ Blog

Ampatuan suspects plead not guilty to murder of 58th victim « The PCIJ Blog

Ampatuan suspects plead not guilty to murder of 58th victim « The PCIJ Blog

Owning up when outed

http://pcij.org/blog/2013/04/14/owning-up-when-outed

Init, ulan ug ang container van

Taliwala sa init ug ulan
Among gihulatan
Abzbin nga grabe ka langan

BOC, ubang opisyales tanan
Kolektibo ug hugot nga nadesisyonan
Maski langan Abzbin hulatan

Mga taga radyo ug pamantalaan
Murag mga itoy nga nangapukan
Mga dedlayn wala nahuna-huna-an
Sa mga opisyales nga gusto
Mosikat sa telebisyon lamang

Kay telebisyon ra diay inyong ganahan
Hinaut ayaw na mi'g istorbohang tanan
Ayaw mi tawagi, adlaw'ng tanan
Ayaw mi kontaka, adlaw'ng tanan

Ode to horses of Troy

Unite! Oh, paladins of Mother Earth

Let their maculate aggress be for naught

They’re wolves in ewe’s fleece, cowardly and guileful

Scuttlebutt, Trojan horses, chicane-sleuths

Chesty hubris of a bruised ego

Grown tender, deluded of bygone glories

Heed not the hoggish imp’s salvo

Our crusade transcends his inanities

The imp’s derogation, we shall overcome

rooftops

rooftops

The storm that stole Christmas

AS THE INCESSANT RAIN DRUMMED ANGRILY on the tin roof of their two-storey house, Floresa Avenida, 31 years old, married with four children, was anxiously listening to her radio for updates of the tropical storm Washi—locally known as Sendong.

It was only 8:00 pm, but it had been raining since 2:00 pm, that fateful Friday, 16 December 2012.

“The radio announcer said that flood waters have begun seeping in barangay Cugman, Cagayan de Oro City” she said. The Avenidos have resided at Zone 7, Sitio Acacia, barangay Carmen—one of the hard-hit villages—since her father migrated to the city in the early ‘50s from Bohol.

“It took only five minutes for the flood water to reach the second floor of our house,” she said. By the time she was able to gather her wits, the water was already waist-deep in their second floor.

“We stacked our chairs on top of each other on our dining table to serve as our ladder. I hammered into the ceiling and out of our roof,” said Avenido. She added that while she was doing this, her husband held their dining table while their three children were holding to his belt.

Like a thief in the night

Barely a week before Christmas, tropical storm Washi—locally known as Sendong—reached landfall on the east coast of Mindanao on the afternoon of December 16, 2011. Washi claimed 1,472 lives, injured 1,748 persons and 1,074 still missing, now feared dead in the worst-hit provinces of Lanao del Norte, Misamis Oriental and Bukidnon, in Northern Mindanao¹.

According to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA) Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission satellite, Washi brought with it rainfall totals “on the order of 200 to over 500 mm—approximately eight to 10 inches².” By 10:00 pm of the same day, the eye of the storm was hovering above Cagayan de Oro City, also affecting its neighboring Iligan City—a 45-minute bus ride west of Cagayan de Oro.

As of December 21, 2012, the Department of Social Welfare and Development's Disaster Report states that Washi has damaged 39,404 houses and displaced 69,753 families or 385,800 persons.

Survivors

“We huddled together like a ball on top of the roof as the stinging rain and biting winds battered our bodies,” Floresa Avenida recalled as her husband handed her their children one by one.

“There were debris whizzing by us. Some of it wounded my children,” she said.

Avenido said they stayed at their rooftop in the next four hours. However, their two-storey house began to sway with the torrents. Squinting—to see through the rain—she saw their neighbors were also on their rooftops and were forming a human chain to transfer to a higher roof.

“Linking our arms, we transferred from one roof to another until we reached to the highest roof in the neighborhood,” she said.

At 8:00 am, Saturday (18 December), Floresa's heartbeat raced upon seeing an orange rubber boat approaching them. She heaved a big sigh of relief—they have made it.

__________

1Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD 10) Washi Disaster Report, as of December 21, 2012. (http://www.fo10.dswd.gov.ph/index.php?option=com_wrapper&view=wrapper&Itemid=149)

2“...but the highest amounts are along the northwest coast, where totals are on the order of 300 to over 400 mm (approximately 12 to over 16 inches),” Steve Lang of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center reported.