On February 2, 2021, the Supreme Court will hold oral arguments on the petition against the Anti- Terrorism Law (ATL) of 2020. With a total of 37 petitions against the said law. It is considered as the most contested and highly divisive law since the Cybercrime Prevention Act.  Petitioners composed mainly    of lawyers and their alternatives will argue against certain provisions of ATL specially Section 4 which expanded the definition of “terrorism”. The Petitioners claim that the definition of terrorism in Section 4 makes it easy to the government to penalize any form of dissent, putting activities, including union leaders at most risk.

In the midst of health crisis and worsening socio- economic problems, the government should instead focus on prioritizing quality, safe, and effective mass vaccination to the populace. The Philippines are way behind Asian countries in implementing mass vaccination. The economic impact of COVID-19 has affected millions of workers in the country. Just recently, the country experienced an 8.3% contraction in gross domestic product (GDP) in the 4th quarter of 2020 and even worse -9.5% for the whole year of 2020, the largest drop in government data going to 1946. Prices of basic commodities particularly meat and vegetables skyrocketed in the past week s making it all the more difficult for poor families to buy their basic needs.CWS believes that the ATL will only aggravate   the social and economic suffering of the Filipino people. Recent incidents’ of red-tagging by government agents against church and health workers in Negros resulted to the killings. Last week, death treats sent via text messages were sent to union leaders and prominent activist in Cebu. The perpetuators of this killings, threats, intimidations and harassment are emboldened to continue their criminal acts because of ATL.

We invite church people- religious, priests, bishops and lay workers to gather in prayer in their respective communities during this historic day. Let us join hands in prayer   for our magistrates in the Supreme Court that GOD may enlighten   their hearts and minds  to heed the voice of the people, defend the truth, and junk the dreaded  terror bill.   

 Signed:

On the Anti-Terrorism Law

Dear Your Honors, Justices of the Supreme Court,

We, members and networks of the National Clergy Discernment Group (NCDG), a group of Catholic priests and religious spread all over the Philippines, express our solidarity with our brothers and sisters of different faith-traditions and secular movements in opposing the Anti-Terrorism Act of 2020, also known as Republic Act No. 11479.  In so opposing, we add our reasoned conviction to these voices that urge you, members of the Supreme Court of the Philippines, to declare the unconstitutionality of R.A. 11479.

1.      Terrorism and Acts of Terror do not exist as a national reality in the Philippines, notwithstanding the very broad definition of Terrorism in the R.A. 11479.  If there are identified terrorists doing acts of terror, as identified by other Nation-States and the United Nations, in the Philippines, then these could only be a limited one confined to some small areas in Mindanao. One cannot make a law for the whole for the sake of a tiny exception. One cannot make a law for a non-existent phenomenon.

2.      R.A. 11479 in fact, by broadening the definition of Terrorism and its Terrorist Acts, creates and conjures Terrorism and Terrorist Acts.  Notwithstanding its expressed exemptions of Terrorism in Sec. 4 of this Terror Law, still this exceptionalism can be  curtailed, denied and suppressed under the same provisions of Sec. 4. The inconveniences created by advocacies and protest actions in various forms could be construed as acts intended to cause death, damage to public facility, interference with critical infrastructure, even with the use of weapons and inducing calamities.  Experience from the period of Martial Law and the Dictatorship until now must teach us a lesson: the imprisonment, disappearances and deaths of many workers for change, peace-builders, ecological advocates and human rights defenders continue to occur, as committed by the State security forces and the clandestine Death Squads with impunity.

3.   The Anti-Terrorism Council created by R.A. 11479 is at the heart of our opposition.  Notwithstanding the many so-called safeguards and legal procedures which, experience continue to show, have been constantly violated by those who are supposed to enforce them, the ATC exists as plenipotentiary body with the powers of the surveillance and intelligence team, the police and the military enforcer, the prosecutor and the judge, the jailer and the punisher – all at the same time.

4.      Already before as now, R.A. 11479 legitimizes the terror experienced by the people at the hand of the State, its Security Forces and the Death Squads.  Pointing at the  Communist Party of the Philippines – the New People’s Army – the National Democratic Front of the Philippines as terrorist enemies of the State, the military and police have lumped all legal, non-combatant and unarmed members of the National Democratic Movement as conspirators with the CPP-NPA-NDFP that seek the overthrow of the State.  In the guise of containing terrorist acts, they massacred the Tumandok tribes defending their ancestral land, massacred peasants crying out for land reform, jailed workers demanding just family wage, assassinated peace negotiators and human rights and ecological defenders, bombed the farms of the Lumad and closed their schools to throw them out of their land and to make them docile uncritical slaves of mining, logging and plantation companies.  And now, the red-tagging is obscenely led by the elements of the military and police, targeting the universities and schools, isolating their members for the kill, and in order to turn the bastion of critical thinking, the free laboratory of new ideas and the cultural arena of actions for freedom into prisons of submission and unfreedom.  Soon all types of opposition, critical thinking and movement for change will be classified as Terrorism and Terrorist Acts.

And so today, we ask you to invoke the Wisdom of History. “First they came for the Communists, and I did not speak out because I was not a Communist; they came for Socialists, and I did not speak out, because I was not a Socialist. Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out, because I was not a Trade Unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out, because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me, and there was no one left to speak for me.” – Pastor Martin Niemoeller.  “When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint.  When I ask why the poor have no food they call me a communist.” – Dom Helder Camara.  “

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach the good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.” – Jesus Christ, Luke 4:18-19.

Please, declare R.A. 11479, The Anti-Terror Act of 2020 unconstitutional. Now.

Signatories:

Most Reverend Narciso V. Abellana, MSC, D.D. – Bishop of Diocese of Romblon
Most Reverend Arturo Bastes, SVD, D.D. – Bishop Emeritus of Diocese of Sorsogon
Most Reverend Roberto Mallari, D.D. – Diocese of San Jose, Nueva Ecija
Fr. Noel Gatchalian, SVD
Fr. Ben Alforque, MSC
Fr. Amado L. Picardal CSsR
      Executive Co-Secretary       JPIC Commission-USG/UISG
      Rome, Italy 
Fr. Rico Ponce, O.Carm.
Fr. Manuel Vicente Catral – Archdiocese of Tuguegarao
Fr. Niño B. Etulle, SCJ
Fr. Wilfredo Dulay, MDJ
Fr. Tito Maratas, MSC
Fr. Domingo Barawid
Br. Armin Luistro, FSC – De La Salle Brothers – Philippines
Daniel Franklin Pilario, CM – Dean, St. Vincent School of Theology
Fr. Harlem F. Gozo – Diocese of Maasin
Fr. Joel Canuel, MDJ
Fr. Paul Medina, O.Carm.
Fr. Kenneth C. Masong
Fr. Eliseo Mercado, Jr. OMI
Professor – San Beda University Graduate School of Laws and Notre Dame University Graduate School
Fr. Edwin Borlasa, MSC
Fr. Cesar Ma. Talamayan, SSF – Servant Brothers of St. Francis
Fr. Rex Salvilla, CICM
Fr. Valentin Narcise, CICM
Fr. Ramon Caluza, CICM

(Revised January 2021)

Mahabagin at mapagmahal na Ama, nagsusumamo kami sa iyo  upang hilingin ang iyong patnubay laban sa Covid-19 na nagpapahirap sa marami at kumitil na ng mga buhay.

Tunghayan mo kami nang may pagmamahal at ipag-adya kami ng inyong mapaghilom na kamay mula sa takot sa kamatayan at karamdaman, itaguyod mo kami sa pag-asa at patatagin sa pananampalataya.

Gabayan mo ang mga dalubhasang naatasan na tumuklas ng mga lunas at paraan upang ihinto ang paglaganap nito. Nagpapasalamat kami sa mga bakunang naisulong sa patnubay ng iyong mga kamay.  Pagpalain mo ang aming mga pagsisikap na mawakasan ng mga bakuna ang pandemya sa aming bayan.

Patnubayan mo ang mga lumilingap sa maysakit upang ang kanilang pagkalinga ay malakipan ng husay at malasakit. Pagkalooban mo sila ng kalusugan sa isip at katawan, katatagan sa kanilang paninindigang maglingkod at ipagsanggalang sa karamdaman.

Itinataas namin ang mga nagdurusa. Makamtam nawa nila ang mabuting kalusugan. Lingapin mo rin ang mga kumakalinga sa kanila. Pagkamitin mo ng kapayapaang walang hanggan ang mga pumanaw na.

Pagkalooban mo kami ng biyaya na magtulong tulong tungo sa ikabubuti ng lahat. Pukawin sa amin ang pagmamalasakit sa mga nangangailangan. Sa pagdamay at malasakit namin sa bawat isa, malampasan nawa namin ang krisis na ito at lumago sa kabanalan at pagbabalik loob sa iyo.

Hinihiling naming ito sa pamamagitan ni Hesukristo na nabubuhay at naghaharing kasama mo at ng Espiritu Santo, Diyos, magpasawalang hangan. Amen.

Dumudulog kami sa iyong patnubay, Mahal na Ina ng Diyos. Pakinggan mo ang aming mga kahilingan sa aming pangangailangan at ipagadya mo kami sa lahat ng kasamaan, maluwalhati at pinagpalang Birhen. Amen.

Mahal na Birhen, mapagpagaling sa maysakit, ipanalangin mo kami.
San Jose, ipanalangin mo kami.
San Rafael Arkanghel, ipanalangin mo kami.
San Roque, ipanalangin mo kami.
San Lorenzo Ruiz, ipanalangin mo kami.
San Pedro Calungsod, ipanalangin mo kami.

Movement Against Tyranny Press Statement

January 29, 2021

The Movement Against Tyranny calls on the Filipino people to come to the defense of our institutions of higher learning, which are now under attack from officials of the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) and other rabid members of the Duterte administration.

This week, NTF-ELCAC spokesperson Gen. Antonio Parlade Jr. revived his list of 18 schools supposedly in cahoots with communists, which he first revealed in his infamous Red October plot expose of 2018.

Not to be outdone, presidential communications office undersecretary Lorraine Badoy, who is also an NTF-ELCAC spokesperson, came out with a longer list of 38 colleges and universities allegedly serving as recruitment grounds of the New People’s Army.

The pronouncements of Parlade and Badoy follow defense secretary Delfin Lorenzana’s unilateral and arbitrary abrogation of the UP-DND Accord which, for the last 30 years, have protected the country’s premier state university from illegal and unreasonable searches, arrests and surveillance, as well as prohibited state security forces from interfering in peaceful assemblies and protests in campus.

The security sector insists that such means of protecting academic freedom turns our campuses into breeding grounds of rebels and terrorists. This is not only an attack on the reputation of these schools but on academic freedom itself and the role of educational institutions in nurturing critical thinking among our youth.

The freedom to think and challenge the status quo is precisely what makes the academe a dynamic source of novel and radical solutions to such fundamental problems as mass poverty, underdevelopment, systemic corruption, rampant human rights abuses and blatant violations of our sovereignty. It is also this freedom that nurtures righteous dissent against all kinds of tyranny and oppression.

Thus, academic freedom is a key element in any democracy. This is precisely why the Constitution guarantees it. To impinge upon that freedom by stoking the fear of communism is straight out of the fascist playbook. Let us not play into the hands of those who would have us return to the dark days dictatorship. Let us defend academic freedom and say no to tyranny!#