“We ask the Supreme Court not to wait for red-tagging and death threats to materialize into extrajudicial killings, or detention, trumped-up charges and even abductions to become enforced disappearances.”
Related story: Rights group pushes for amendments to protective writ
By ANNE MARXZE D. UMIL
Bulatlat.com
MANILA – Activists from the Cordillera are appealing to the Supreme Court (SC) to overturn the Court of Appeals’ (CA) dismissal of its plea for writ of amparo after a series of harassment and vilification perpetrated by state agents.
A writ of amparo is a remedy available to any person whose right to life, liberty, and security has been violated or is threatened with violation by an unlawful act or omission of a public official or employee, or of a private individual or entity.
At least 24 petitioners, all members and leaders of the Cordillera Peoples Alliance (CPA), filed a petition for review on certiorari on Monday, June 19.
Among the petitioners are CPA leaders Windel Bolinget and Joanna Cariño, as well as Stephen Tauli who was abducted by alleged state security forces in August last year.
“We ask the Supreme Court not to wait for red-tagging and death threats to materialize into extrajudicial killings, or detention, trumped-up charges and even abductions to become enforced disappearances,” Bolinget said in a statement.
Bolinget added that human rights defenders are already facing grave risks thus the need for protection from the SC.
“The Writ of Amparo rules and procedures should cause the prevention of impunity, and ensure that the State and its forces should abide by its human rights obligations,” Bolinget added.
In October last year, the CA 17th Division dismissed the petition saying that there was no substantial evidence to establish allegations of state-sponsored harassment and dangerous threats to their lives. The group appealed the decision but it was still denied in April this year.
Bolinget lamented that after the junking of their plea for protection, the threats continued, and are even mounting.
“The Court of Appeals’ denial of our petition for a Writ of Amparo seemed to have emboldened the respondents to continue acts that violate our basic human rights,” Bolinget said.
He cited the trumped-up charges of rebellion filed against him and six other activists in Northern Luzon. This also includes the arrest of Jennifer Awingan of CPA Research Commission in January. In May this year, the charges against Awingan and others were junked by a local court.
Read: Abra court grants plea to junk rebellion raps vs 7 activists in Cordillera
He also decried the continued disinformation campaign against activists through SMNI.
At least 15 of the petitioners also narrated how they were subjected to harassment such as stalking, surveillance and home visits during the period of 2020 to 2022.
For one, Abraham Battawang, a tribal leader of Kagaluan, Pasil, Kalinga and a member of the Movement for the Advancement of Intertribal Unity and Development – an organization of tribal elders from Kalinga and Mountain Province, was visited by state agents at least seven times in his residence between February 2021 to January 2022.
Due to these incidents, Battawang’s daughters filed a petition for a writ of amparo before the court in Bontoc, Mountain Province in August 2021. The court decided in favor of Battawang’s daughters and issued a writ of amparo in April 2022.
The petitioners who were “visited’ by state forces were also able to confirm the identities of the so-called visitors.
Other threats expounded in the petition include:
1. Red tagging and vilification through social media (Facebook) and posters placed in public places and during community meetings organized by the police and the army.
2. The issuance by the Regional Law Enforcement Coordinating Committee (RLECC) of Resolution No. 6, S. 2021 which paved the conduct of house visitations of individuals identified as associated or members of “communist front organizations.”
3. Issuances of local government units/peace and order councils declaring the CPA as persona non grata.
4. Baseless and fabricated charges filed in court, which eventually were dismissed.
5. Encampment by Armed Forces of the Philippines within indigenous peoples villages, residential houses and occupation of civilian facilities like dap-ay and barangay hall buildings.
Respondents in the petition are the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC), Philippine National Police, Regional Law Enforcement Coordinating Committee in the Cordillera Administrative Region (RLECC-CAR), Philippine National Police Regional Office, National Intelligence Coordinating Agency (NICA), Philippine Army, and Department of Interior and Local Government-Cordillera Administrative Region (DILG-CAR).
The petitioners were assisted by the National Union of Peoples’ Lawyers. (RTS, RVO) 
