Groups call for release of Batangas activists

SAN PABLO CITY, Laguna – Progressive groups have reiterated their call for the immediate release of  activists Erlindo “Lino” Baez and Willy Capareño, as the Lucena court heard their case on June 16. 

Baez and Capareño were arrested on October 6, 2021 in Quezon province on charges of illegal possession of firearms and explosives. The two were engaged in community work in Sariaya when the house they were staying in was raided by around 50 combined elements of the Sariaya police and the Armed Forces of the Philippines’ 59th Infantry Battalion.

On June 16, the Lucena Regional Trial Court prosecuted witnesses for Baez and Capareño’s case. According to their lawyer Jobert Pahilga, there are “multiple irregularities that happened when they were arrested.”

“Firstly, there was no search warrant when state forces entered the house [Baez and Capareño] were staying in,” he said. “Secondly, the two rifles and one grenade supposedly found were not inventoried properly.” Pahilga noted that when Baez and Capareño were arrested, they were immediately taken to Camp Soledad Dolor in Candelaria, Quezon. Barangay officials were then brought in to act as witnesses during the inventory.

“Our question is, where did [the firearms and explosives] come from, and who held them from the moment Ka Lino and Ka Willy were arrested up to when they were taken into the camp?”  Pahilga asked. “There are many things that the police could not explain when it comes to the transfer of these supposed arms.”

Months before the arrest, they experienced harassment and intimidation. Baez was included in the 24 search warrants served on Bloody Sunday, March 7, 2021, which resulted in nine deaths and six arrests across the Southern Tagalog region. When he was arrested in Sariaya, he was charged with two counts of illegal possession: one for the March 7 warrant and another for alleged possession in Sariaya.

Reports from human rights watchdog Tanggol Batangan’s fact-finding mission at the time revealed that Baez and Capareño suffered “physical and mental torture” before they were detained in the Quezon District Jail in Pagbilao. The military also claimed that they were “high-ranking” members of the Communist Party of the Philippines.

Tanggol Batangan stressed that the two are “farmers, peasant organizers and human rights defenders.” Tanggol Batangan spokesperson Hailey Pecayo said that they were preparing a consultation with farmers in Sariaya when they were arrested.

“Stewards of human rights like Ka Lino and Ka Willie shouldn’t be placed under arrest,” Pecayo said. “If anybody should be arrested, it should be [former President Rodrigo] Duterte who orchestrated the … Bloody Sunday massacre.”

Not terrorists

Pahilga said that his clients were not terrorists. “I have been a lawyer for a long time, and I have known Ka Lino for a long time as well,” he said. “I have worked with him on many land dispute cases in Batangas and the Southern Tagalog region. He is an activist and human rights defender, not a terrorist.”

Although a Tanauan, Batangas court junked one charge of illegal possession of firearms and explosives owing to “irregularities in the search warrant” served on March 7 2021, his other charge in Sariaya still stands.

Baez’ son Ronilo also decried the sluggish judicial process. “We are calling on Judge Portia Martinez to act quickly and prosecute the case of my father,” he said. “We’ve been longing for him for almost four years.” Ronilo was himself a political prisoner, arrested in 2010 while immersing in a community in Taysan municipality, Batangas. He was arrested with fellow activists Romiel Canete and Maricon Montajes.

Appalling jail conditions

The slow judicial system was made worse by the appalling jail conditions in Quezon province. According to Tanggol Quezon, another human rights group, Quezon District Jail [QDJ] inmates “have no steady supply of [clean] water, inadequate food, and services given by the administration.”

“In all the days spent by the eight political detainees [in QDJ], they experienced relentless terror-tagging,” Tanggol Quezon’s spokesperson Paul Tagle said. “They are being branded as members of ‘communist-terrorist groups’, and because of this, their rights as [persons deprived of liberties] are being trampled.”

According to the group, the eight political detainees in QDJ are not allowed to join in morning exercises and other activities provided by either the jail or by non-government organizations. They are also given less time to call loved ones or paralegals, with only five minutes given to make calls. Jail officials also frequently deny visits from paralegals, which the group described as “being denied humanitarian access and legal aid.”

There are eight political prisoners in the QDJ aside from Baez and Capareño: labor leader Gavino Panganiban, peasant organizers Renante de Leon and George Agudez, indigenous Dumagat Christopher Bohol, and farmers Darwin Palo and Rico Endrinal.

Tanggol Quezon stressed that arrests against political prisoners are “arbitrary” and “given the veneer of fighting counter-insurgency.”

“These political detainees are farmers, indigenous people, environmental defenders, human rights workers, and people who work for the interests of the masses,” Tagle said. “It is only just that we stress the call to free all political prisoners.” (AMU, DAA)

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