CIEL Statement of Solidarity with UN Special Rapporteur Vicky Tauli-Corpuz
Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL) is deeply concerned with the reports that UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Vicky Tauli-Corpuz, along with other human rights defenders, has been accused of being a terrorist by the Philippine government. This appears to be a blatant attempt to silence and criminalize Vicky Tauli-Corpuz and others for their work to protect and defend the rights of indigenous peoples. Around the world, environmental and human rights defenders are being increasingly targeted by governments and companies seeking to silence them and undermine their important work. This retaliatory step by the government of the Philippines threatens the security and safety of these people. CIEL condemns the use of threats to silence indigenous leaders and environmental human rights defenders who work to protect and promote the human rights of the most vulnerable. CIEL stands with Vicky Tauli-Corpuz’s fellow UN Special Rapporteurs and the many organizations and people who have already condemned this action by the government.
Karapatan condemns threats harassment vs fact-finding mission in Mindanao
As the three-day International Fact Finding and Solidarity Mission in three regions in Mindanao is concluded today, Karapatan scored the Armed Forces of the Philippines and the Philippine National Police for the numerous cases of threats and harassment faced by participants to the said mission.
“Either these are proof of the State forces’ paranoia overdrive or it is clear evidence that the Duterte administration has much to hide and cover up in its continuing implementation of martial law and counterinsurgency program Oplan Kapayapaan in Mindanao,” said Karapatan Secretary General Cristina Palabay.
Martial Law sa Mindanao | Mabuting mamatay na may ipinaglalaban
“Mabuting mamatay ka na nandyan sa katarungan at hustisya ng bayan.”
Ganito sinalag ni Carlos Trageya nang sabihan siya ng mga militar na babarilin siya kapag ipinagpatuloy niya ang katigasan ng kanyang ulo at magpumilit na hindi sumuko.
Para sa kanya walang dahilan upang sumuko, dahil naniniwala siyang walang kasalanan ang kanyang paglaban. Isang aktibong lider-magsasaka ng Kilusang Mambubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) si Carlos.
Sa ngayon, pangunahing kampanya nila ang panawagan ng mga biktima ng Bagyong Pablo. Dahil hanggang ngayon daw ay marami pa ring walang masilungang bahay partikular na ang mga Agri Workers, mula nang humagupit ang bagyo sa kanilang probinsya. Inaangkin pa raw ‘di umano ng mga Local Government Unit (LGU’s) ang mga bahay na dapat ay para sa mga biktima.
Bukod pa sa suliraning ibinigay ng unos na ito, dumadagdag pa sa problema nila ang mga militar.
Patuloy raw ang mga itong nanakot at nanghaharass sa kanilang lugar, lalo na sa mga lider magsasaka. Isa pa nga raw na miyembro ng Compostela Farmers Association ang pinaslang ng Military Intelligence Batallion (MIB).
Ayon pa kay Carlos, mismong ang MIB daw ay umaming sila ang pumatay dito. Dumoble pa ang kapangyarihan ng mga militar nang magdeklara ang kasalukuyang administrasyon ng Batas Militar sa buong Mindanao. Pangunahing target nila ang mga lider ng mga iba’t ibang organisasyon. Halos buwan-buwan daw ay hindi na bago ang balitang mayroon na namang pinatay sa hanay ng mga aktibista. Hinuha nila, kaya raw pilit na umaabante ang hukbo ng gobyerno sa Mindanao ay upang protektahan ang mga dambuhalang mga minahan, gaya na lamang ng Agusan Mining Corp.
Ayon sa Karapatan, 80 sa 126 na kaso ng pampulitikang pamamaslang ay nanggagaling sa Mindanao. Kasama dito ang 9 kaso sa Northern Mindanao; 10 sa Caraga; 13 sa SoCSKSargen; 28 sa Southern Mindanao; at 10 sa ARMM.
Karamihan ng mga biktima ay mga magsasaka at katutubo. Sa ilalim ng kontra-insurhensyang programa ng gubyerno na Oplan Kapayapaan, pinaparatangan ang mga magsasaka at katutubo na mga myembro o tagasuporta ng New People’s Army.
Patuloy umanong siyang titindig sa kabila ng mga bantang ito. Dahil ang tanging isinisigaw lang naman nila ay katarungan, hustisya ng mamamayan, pigilan ang pagkawasak ng kalikasan,proteksyon sa mga katutubo at lupang bubungkalin para sa mga magsasaka.
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CHRP-UK: Letter of Concern to Duterte re Tagging of Noted Human Rights Defenders as ‘Terrorists’
14 March 2018
President Rodrigo Duterte
President of the Republic Malacañang Palace,
JP Laurel St., San Miguel, Manila
The Philippines
E-mail: op@president.gov.ph
Letter of concern regarding the tagging of noted human rights defenders as ‘terrorists’
Dear President Duterte,
We wish to add our voices to those condemning the recent filing, on 21 February 2018, of a legal petition to have a number of organizations, associations, and leaders declared as terrorists and outlaws pursuant to the National Security Act of 2007.
FACT-FINDING MISSION
Australian missionary Sr. Patricia Fox, works with human rights workers in compiling cases of human rights violations recorded during the International Fact-finding and Solidarity Mission at Madaum, Tagum City on Saturday, April 7, 2018. (Mara S. Genotiva/davaotoday.com)
In defense of the Aeta
There is a problem when we accept teledramas as truth, such as episodes of Maalaala Mo Kaya (MMK). Created for television as feel-good TV, they tend to present deodorized and oversimplified stories of victory over poverty and insurmountable odds. As such, they gloss over many important aspects of the continuing struggle of marginalized people like peasants or indigenous people. The reality is that most people born into poverty can struggle their entire life and yet still die dirt-poor. At the very least, teledramas like MMK present idealized stories of people’s personal histories. It can even be argued that what they present are fantasies.
For the past few days, my Facebook feed has been on fire with friends’ reactions to an MMK episode involving the life of Norman King and his father, Roman King. Many people know Norman as the first Aeta who graduated from the University of the Philippines-Manila, thus earning the admiration of many people. I know Norman as a school mate and acquaintance.
Two of my friends who expressed their criticism of the episode are involved in community organizing. One is a peasant organizer and advocate based in Central Luzon whose work involves close coordination with the Aeta community in Pampanga. The second is a writer who had the chance to immerse with the Aetas recently. Both say that the Kings’ life story was heavily revised. Roman King was portrayed as a benevolent leader, someone who was brave enough to defend their tribal community from a company who wanted to build a geothermal plant within their ancestral domain. He was portrayed as an admirable chieftain who had nothing but the tribe’s best interests at heart.
After the episode aired, the Central Luzon Aeta Association (CLAA), a regional organization of Aeta people in Central Luzon issued a statement condemning the controversial revisions of Roman King’s life in the MMK episode. CLAA asserted that contrary to MMK’s depiction of Roman King as their community’s heroic Aeta leader, he was instead a tribal “dealer” who sold off pieces of their ancestral lands to both foreign and local investors. Among the alleged and (they say) well-known misdeeds of King was signing the Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) allowing the construction of the Puning Hot Spring high-class resort in Porac, Pampanga. It led to the displacement of dozens of Aeta families. Built on a huge chunk of ancestral land, the Hot Spring was portrayed on national television as a success for Aetas since it would supposedly generate employment. In reality, however, it pushed them deeper into poverty.
A few days after, Norman posted a Facebook status warning people about CLAA’s statement. Among his arguments, and those of others that have come to his defense, three key points must be discussed with more depth: (1) there was a strong accusation that those who question MMK’s depiction of the Kings’ lives, and consequently, those who support CLAA are trying to tear their communities apart, either out of envy or boredom; (2) that non-indigenous peoples who are genuine indigenous people (IP) advocates cannot and should not interfere with Aeta disputes and proceedings, because they are not from their communities and do not know their customary laws; and (3) that CLAA should name the Aetas who accuse the Kings of betrayal, and that if they cannot, then the organization must be fabricating lies.
Echoes of this kind of thinking reverberate in social media, and even beyond it. But where do these perspectives and sentiments come from? And what are their deeper implications? As both an IP advocate and a part of the middle-class, I struggle to unpack this issue and define what being a genuine IP advocate means to me.
What we are seeing in the sentiments from Norman King’s Facebook post is a form of cultural fundamentalism. Prof. Aya Ragragio, my favorite anthropology professor, noticed a similar trend affecting some Mindanao communities. Konrad Kottak described “fundamentalism” as an anti-modernist movement “wherein fundamentalists perceive a dilution, or even corruption, of their beliefs and way of life within the modern mainstream, leading them to seek a return to “an earlier, purer” way of life.” Prof. Ragragio draws an example of this in the tendency of tribal leaders in connivance with the Philippine army to insist on the principle of “kanya-kanya”; or the idea that no tribe or village (or support group) must meddle with the affairs of their neighbors. This type of thinking promoted by the State implies that there is only one way of being a “true” Aeta, or Lumad, or an IP: that you must adhere to your tribe’s laws and way of life at all times, and resist the intervention of people outside your community. Any deviation from this would mean that your tribe is being controlled, contaminated, or manipulated, as in the case of the State narrative against the Lumad during their Lakbayan ng Pambansang Minorya caravan to Manila.
Art work courtesy of Kamandag
Another alarming notion that emerges insinuates that CLAA and its supporters who challenge MMK’s accounting of their lives are causing a harmful division among their tribe. This signifies how people still see indigenous communities in this day and age: a monolith. But this impression that all Aetas think alike, or that the Aeta community has just one shared view of what is right and good for their community is not only insulting, but also essentializing. As advocates, there is a need to accept the anthropological fact that even within tribal communities, contradictions and disagreements exist. To fully and genuinely understand indigenous peoples, we need to realize first that they are not unchanging communities of peoples. They are a vibrant, dynamic, complex peoples whose tribal customs are not always “pristine” or fixed.
Another insult to indigenous peoples’ struggles would be the perspective that IPs are forever unerring and faultless and are immune to the promise of wealth and power. In Mindanao, AFP-powered paramilitary groups brag of Lumad members among their ranks. Some even admitted to killing their own relatives. And as recently exposed by CLAA, displaced Aeta communities in Pampanga have pointed their fingers at Roman King and his cohorts as land brokers of their very own ancestral domain.
Lastly, in our attempt to challenge what genuine IP advocacy means, there is a need for reflexivity when we talk about the case of Norman King. While we celebrate his achievements with him, we must also remember the thousands of indigenous children who have not lucked out on scholarships and financial aid to pursue education. Singular achievements must be recognized for what they are. But our bigger dream is for a time to come when indigenous students finishing college is no longer unique or a newsworthy event – because this becomes the norm.
The elephant in the room is that by and large, state provision and support for free and quality education for indigenous children remains an unrealized dream for most. It has to be said that IPs do not need our charity and token advocacy; they have long asserted and fought for their right to ancestral domain and self-determination. Because of lack of schools, they built their own alternative schools, they organized themselves despite state terror and fascism. If we want to be genuine IP advocates, we need to listen. When they tell us their stories of struggle for quality education for all, we must listen. Of their resistance against big transnational mining and land-grabbing companies, we must listen. Even and especially when it means challenging our trite notions of indigenous culture; even and especially when it makes us uncomfortable; and even and especially when we realize that not all IP struggles fit the romanticized and idealized mold of MMK teledramas, we must listen.
To stand in solidarity with the indigenous peoples means challenging MMK-type of narratives, and disputing the establishment’s notion of IP advocacy.
Going back to MMK, and with my points on token advocacy, I think it should now be clear how the series of Saturday night stories that MMK rations propagate the problematic view of how hard work inevitably leads to success – for contractual workers, peasant farmers, urban poor, and indigenous peoples alike. It blatantly disregards the fact that there will always be socio-political realities and structures in place to keep the poor poor. It ignores the hard truth that even when our indigenous peoples break their backs working, and struggling, no MMK happy ending is ready for their taking.