GMA pre-judging case against soldiers -- Rep. Maza

Gabriela Women's Partylist Representative Liza Largoza-Maza today
decried GMA's statement last Saturday praising soldiers deployed in
Metro Manila communities for a 'job well done.' "GMA has put the
COMELEC under strain in judging the case filed against these soldiers
for violation of the Omnibus Election Code. " Maza said.

"This is a blatant disregard of due process. GMA should know better
than to comment on a case that is already being heard by the proper
court, in this case, the COMELEC. She is not only prejudging the
electioneering case against these soldiers, she has become an
accomplice in the violation of the Omnibus Election Code by these
soldiers. " Maza said.

Maza, together with other officials of the Gabriela Women's Party
trooped to the COMELEC office in Intramuros today for a hearing on the
said case.

Gabriela Women's Partylist has lodged a complaint of electioneering
by these soldiers to the Commission on Elections. Also included in the
complaint were AFP chief Hermogenes Esperon and Presidential legal
adviser Sergio Apostol.

According to Rep. Maza, the soldiers in question are the subject of
numerous complaints from residents in the area, and that there are
accounts and video footages of soldiers harassing residents and
members of Gabriela and other progressive partylist organizations and
preventing residents from supporting these progressive partylists.

"It is now up to COMELEC Chairman Benjamin Abalos if he and the
Commission will stand independently and rule fairly." Maza added. ###

--
*********************************************
DAVAO TODAY
Davao City, Mindanao, Philippines
http://www.davaotoday.com
*********************************************

CHED, gov’t washing hands on poor quality of education - Kabataan Partylist

DAVAO CITY - Kabataan Partylist today lambasted Commission on Higher
Education (CHED) Regional head Reynaldo Peña for his failure to
expound on how a number of student educators passed the tertiary
education.

A recent report revealed that only 30% of the public high school
teachers are competent to teach the english subject.

Peña expressed dismay yet admitted that it is understandable if
graduates of education courses pass the licensure exam blaming the
education course as a cheapest and easiest way to get a college
diploma.

It was however reported that Peña was not able to explain why in spite
of measures ensuring the quality of education graduates, a lot of them
can pass the licensure exams given that English comprise a part of all
courses.

According to Karla Hyasmind Apat, Vice-president for Mindanao of
Kabataan Partylist, Peña's statement shows that the government
officials themselves deny the fact that the poor quality of teachers
and students root from the government's neglect of basic social
services especially education.

"The degrading quality of graduates is not primarily caused by the
lack of interest of the students to study. It is rather caused by the
government's lack of interest to prioritize the education sector,"
Apat said.

The group believes that poor performance of students in education is
caused by the poor conditions in teaching methods and materials in
schools.

"Unless the government will start prioritizing education, not only
English proficiency but the Philippine education system will start to
rot," Apat said.

"Education agencies like the Department of Education and the CHED
should start admitting that the government lacks sincerity to answer
the people's immediate needs like education, health and housing." #

For reference:
Karla Hyasmind Apat. VP for Mindanao
0919.570.9285.

--
*********************************************
DAVAO TODAY
Davao City, Mindanao, Philippines
http://www.davaotoday.com
*********************************************

PIMENTEL COMMENDS ELECTION REGISTRAR FOR PURGE OF 20,000 FLYING VOTERS IN CAGAYAN DE ORO

The field election supervisor in Cagayan de Oro City
has been commended by Senate Minority Leader Aquilino
"Nene" Q. Pimentel, Jr. (PDP-Laban) for cracking down
on bogus voters in the city in a bold effort to make
the May 14 elections as clean and credible as
possible.

City election registrar Stalin Baguio was praised by
Pimentel for cleansing the voters' list of about
20,000 flying voters.

Pimentel, who hails from Cagayan de Oro, said the
existence of a huge number of flying voters has been
the bane of the electoral process in the city for a
long-time now but it was only Mr. Baguio who seized
the initiative in striking them out from the
masterlist of registered, qualified voters.

The lone senator from Mindanao said he himself
personally verified and confirmed the existence of
20,000 flying voters and double registrants in the
records of the Comelec-Cagayan de Oro office during
the weeks preceding the May, 2001 elections.

Pimentel said there were even some teenagers who came
forward, admitting that they were able to register as
flying voters in Cagayan de Oro although they were
residents of different towns of Misamis Oriental and
nearby provinces like Lanao del Norte and Bukidnon.

He said the self-confessed flying voters even
signified their willingness to testify before the
Comelec or the Senate to reveal the truth behind the
scam.

Pimentel said the admission of thousands of flying
voters into the roster of qualified voters could not
have been made possible without the connivance of
corrupt Comelec officials with unscrupulous
politicians and their political operators.

He said the investigation and purging of the fake and
flying voters from the official list were foiled by
highly-placed Comelec officials, both in Northern
Mindanao and in the Comelec office in Manila, who were
probably part of the election fraud syndicate
responsible for the anomaly.

"That is why we are saying that election registrar
Stalin Baguio achieved quite a feat in delisting some
20,000 flying voters from the official roster. This is
a good example of sanitizing the voters list of
spurious registrants which can be replicated in other
areas," Pimentel said.

The opposition leader also voiced suspicion that some
top Cagayan de Oro political leaders had something to
do with the listing of the flying voters which gave
them an undue advantage over their opponents in past
elections, enabling them to entrench themselves in
power even if they no longer enjoyed the trust of
majority of their constituents.
-o0o-

Supreme Court to decide on Satur’s liberty on Tuesday

The Supreme Court will issue a decision on Tuesday (April 3) on the
temporary liberty of detained Bayan Muna President and House Deputy
Minority Leader Satur C. Ocampo.

This was one of the outcomes of the oral arguments yesterday before
the tribunal, where former United Nations Ad Litem Judge Romeo T.
Capulong defended Ocampo's petition for certiorari against
Solicitor-General Agnes Devanadera.

Capulong was flanked by lawyers Rachel Pastores and Ameh Sato, both of
the Public Interest Law Center.

In his oral arguments, Capulong presented seven compelling reasons why
the court should grant Ocampo's petition which seeks to nullify the
murder case and to quash the arrest warrant issued him by a local
court in Hilongos, Leyte.

According to Bayan Muna General Counsel Neri Javier Colmenares, the
oral arguments resulted in two victories for Ocampo.

"The justices observed that the Information filed against Ocampo were
fatally flawed, and that the offenses imputed against Ocampo may very
well be absorbed by the pending rebellion case in Makati City in
accordance with the Hernandez doctrine," said Colmenares.

Colmenares also pointed out that the solicitor-general rejected all
possibility of Ocampo's release even as the justices themselves raised
the prospects that the court may order the solon's temporary release,
release on bail, or reinvestigation of the charge against him . "Ayaw
lang talagang palayain si Satur at gusto nilang makalaboso siya kahit
pa walang batayan."

One justice went so far as to lecture Devanadera on a legal basis for
Ocampo's possible release: "Since we may find the Information to be
defective and thus pave the way for a reinvestigation, the warrant of
arrest would have no basis whatsoever."

Reacting to the solicitor-general's assertion that Ocampo's petition
at the Supreme Court was illegal and that the activist leader should
have availed himself of remedies in the Hilongos, Leyte court,
Colmenares said: "The government's counsel argues that instead of
going to the High Court, Ocampo should go to highly-militarized Leyte,
get imprisoned there, and risk his life merely to ask the local judge
to quash the warrant he himself issued."

"That's not a remedy," said Colmenares. "That's suicide."

Replying to queries of justices why Ocampo rushed to the Supreme
Court, and not availed himself of remedies in the Hilongos, Leyte
court, the Court of Appeals and the Department of Justice, Capulong
pointed out that "the assailed Resolution of Prosecutor Rosulo Vivero
is dated February 16, 2007 and approved by respondent Prosecutor Merin
on February 21, 2007. The Information was filed on February 28, 2007
and the warrant of arrest was issued on March 6, 2007."

According to Capulong, "we received a copy of the Resolution by
registered mail by Judge Ephrem Abando on March 12, 2007. In short,
respondent prosecutors delayed the service of the assailed Resolution
by nineteen days counted from the date of approval by respondent Merin
on February 21, 2007 until actual receipt by petitioner via registered
mail."

"The delay in furnishing the petitioner a copy of the assailed
resolution was deliberate and intended to deprive petitioner of his
legal remedies to file a motion for reconsideration, a petition for
review in the Office of the Secretary of Justice and/or a petition for
certiorari and prohibition in the appellate courts. The scheme
deprived petitioner of his right to due process," said Capulong. ###

By praising troops in the city; “Gloria is also responsible for their electioneering activities”

MANILA -- The militant Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) and the
ANAKPAWIS party list group lambasted Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo for
praising troops deployed in urban areas for a job well and for not
pulling them out immediately.
According to Ka Willy Marbella, internal deputy secretary general of
KMP and ANAKPAWIS party list nominee, "Gloria has once again shown her
mastery of double talk, she has been saying for almost a week now that
the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) should now draw their pull
out plans for the urban deployment but now she is praising these
soldiers for a job well done, making no mention of any such pull out,"
"Action really speaks louder than words and Gloria's duplicity has
again been exposed. Her overwhelming dependency upon the AFP is also
evident in this situation. Gloria would not do anything to displease
her loyal generals. They have her by the neck and she follows their
whim. Essentially she is a lame duck president when it comes to the
military apparatus, that is why no soldier has been punished for the
spate of extra-judicial killings and the "Butcher" former Major
General Jovito Palparan has not been charged yet and is even running
for Congress," said Marbella.
"Due to her praise for the urban deployment, our view that she has a
hand in the electioneering activities of these urban soldiers has been
further bolstered. A video showing these soldiers campaigning against
ANAKPAWIS, Bayan Muna, Gabriela Women's Party and even KMP has been
taken last March 7 in Parola, Tondo, now it is obvious that what they
are doing has Gloria's approval," added the peasant leader.
"Gloria's candidates and her presidency would be the ones that would
suffer because of these deployments the residents will exact their
revenge at the elections. They are being terrorized so they cannot
speak out, that is why they are coming to us, we are also calling on
other leaders and citizens especially the Catholic Bishop's Conference
of the Philippines (CBCP) to also lend their voices to the people to
combat the increasing militarization of our communities," ended
Marbella. # # #

World's lawmakers seek freedom for Ocampo, Beltran; IPU probe team due April 18-21

MANILA – Thirty-seven legislators from across the world have joined
the growing clamor for the release of detained Bayan Muna Rep. Satur
Ocampo and Anakpawis Rep. Crispin Beltran.

Expressing support for the release of Ocampo and Beltran were four
senators (4) – Senator Sharon Carstairs of Canada, Senator Gavin
Marshall of Australia, British House of Lords Member David Alton, and
Senator Pierre Galand of Belgium – and thirty-three (33) Members of
Parliament (MP) from various countries.

Carstairs is the vice president of the committee on human rights of
parliamentarians of the Geneva-based Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU),
a worldwide organization of parliaments and legislatures

The IPU has decided to send a high-level team to Manila on April 18 to
21, or two weeks earlier than scheduled, to look into the plight of
Ocampo and Beltran. The IPU team will be led by the group's
secretary-general Anders Johnsson and Senator Carstairs ahead of the
IPU's general assembly in Bali, Indonesia, which will take up the
pending case of political persecution leveled against the Arroyo
government by the partylist representatives of Bayan Muna, Anakpawis,
and Gabriela.

Bayan Muna made the announcement as the nation waits for the Supreme
Court's ruling on Ocampo's petition for temporary liberty, which is
due on Tuesday (April 3).

The MPs who have joined the bandwagon seeking liberty for the two
activist solons include:

Marc Tarabella, member of the European Parliament representing Belgium;

Twenty-three MPs of Switzerland: Liliane Maury Pasquier , Maria
Roth-Bernasconi, Andre Daguet, Carlo Sommaruga, Didier Berberat, Fabio
Pedrina, Franco Cavalli, Franziska Teuscher, Géraldine Savary, Hans
Widmer, Jacqueline Fehr, Jean-Noél Rey, Liliane Pasquier Maury,
Margret Kiener Nellen, Marlyse Dormond Béguelin, Pierre Salvi, Roger
Nordmann, Ruth-Gaby Vermot-Mangold, Stéphane Rossini, Susanne
Leutenegger Oberholzer, Ursula Wyss, Valérie Garbani, and Vreni
Hubmann;

MP David Geerts of the Federal Parliament of Belgium; MP Rune Lund of
Denmark; MP Son Chhay of Cambodia; Legislator Leung Kwok-hung of the
Hong Kong Legislative Council; and

Six MPs of the Regional Parliament of Flanders, Belgium: Rudi Daems,
Vera Dua, Eloi Glorieux, Jos Stassen, Jef Tavernier, and Mieke Vogels
"All eyes are on the Arroyo government's persecution of Ka Satur and
Ka Bel who have since been detained on the basis of fabricated charges
and the denial of their rights to due process," said Bayan Muna Rep.
Teddy Casino.

Casino says the "the growing concern for Ka Satur and Ka Bel by the
world's parliamentarians only heightens the lack of concern of House
Speaker Jose de Venecia, who has not lifted a finger to defend two
Members of Congress from brazen political persecution."

"It is a fact that only military dictatorships, martial law regimes,
and military juntas are notorious for falsely charging and imprisoning
democratically-elected legislators, as in the case of Burma today and
the Philippines in 1972," said Casino. "This is not lost on
parliamentarians worldwide. The IPU, in fact, has called the attacks
on the Batasan 6 as 'attacks on the Philippine Congress itself' and
has consequently sought an end to the filing of trump charges.". ###

Reference:
Rep. Teddy Casino
0920-9035683

More WB loans shows support for Arroyo's campaign of repression

MANILA -- Anakpawis Representative and political detainee Crispin
Beltran today slammed anew the international finance institution the
World Bank and said that its continuing release of policy loans and
other financial aid to the Philippines is to be blamed for the
destructive dependence of the country on foreign aid which in turns
sinks the country deeper into debt.

According to the reports, the World Bank recently announced that it
will provide $600 million in annual assistance to the Philippines for
the next two years as a sign of confidence. The World Bank and the
Finance department signed the loan agreement for the $11-million
NPSTAP yesterday.

World Bank officials have said that the institution seeks to
reinforce and strengthen its support to the Macapagal-Arroyo
government which has supposedly undergone an "important change."

"What we see here is this infamous global finance institution aiding
and abetting the Macapagal-Arroyo administration's programs and
policies that wreak havoc in the economic lives of the Filipino
people. It is also highly doubtful that the WB is unaware of the
increasing international pressure on the Arroyo government to stop its
campaign of extrajudicial killings against political activists, human
rights advocates and journalists. By extension, the WB is supporting
not only the supposed economic reforms that the Arroyo government has
embarked on, but also the political and military measures it has
initiated to protect these same economic reforms, including those make
the Philippines even more dependent on the WB," said Beltran.

Beltran reiterated the call of patriotic economists and local
industrialists that the Philippines wean itself off foreign loans and
cut back on foreign debts allocations. He said that the Philippines'
reliance on foreign loans all the more tighten the control of the WB
and its allied international business and consortiums over the
Philippine economy.

"This is what's stunting local businesses, and ensuring that no
genuine local industries are built and maintained. Foreign
multilateral finance institutions like the WB and the International
Monetary Fund (IMF) keep the Philippines on a short leash, held
hostage to their demands and impositions when it comes to payment
collection and perks and benefits for foreign businesses," he said.

The activist lawmaker said that it was long overdue that the country's
relations and dependence on the WB be subjected to review and
assessment. "No doubt it will be revealed that the country's economic
backwardness is connected to the impositions of the WB and the
Philippine government's slavish obeisance to these same policies. The
Philippines has not benefited from its dealings from the WB but
instead sacrificed much of its economic resources in a one-sided
finance relationship."#

Free Satur! online petition

Dear friends,

Freedom, democracy and justice are under attack in the Philippines!

The government of Gloria Macapagal Arroyo has detained Bayan Muna
Representative Satur Ocampo on trumped-up charges of multiple murder.
The case stems from an invented charge that Ocampo allegedly ordered
the murder of 67 individuals in Leyte province in Eastern Philippines
in 1984 and 1985, when Ocampo was in military detention on orders of
the Marcos dictatorship.

Please sign the petition at http://freesatur.bayanmuna.net demanding
freedom for Ocampo.

Bayan Muna is the Philippines' most popular partylist organization
which topped the 2001 and 2004 partylist elections. It is now leading
the 2007 partylist elections as shown by public opinion polls. The
latest SWS poll says that Bayan Muna obtained 28 percent support
from the electorate and is assured of reelection in the May 14, 2007
elections.

Bayan Muna, a duly-accredited partylist organization composed of
civilians and non-combatants, has been tagged as one of the "enemies
of the state" for its oppositionist role, and the military has seen it
fit to make it a target in the counter-insurgency war against the New
People's Army.

Thus, 130 members of Bayan Muna have been killed by military death
squads since 2001. All in all, human rights group Karapatan has
documented 830 extrajudicial killings under Arroyo. The Permanent
Peoples Tribunal, the Inter-Parliamentary Union, the United Nations
special rapporteur on extrajudicial executions, and other
international faith-based and social action groups have urged the
Arroyo government to stop the bloody attacks and the political
persecution of Ocampo and progressive partylist representatives in
Congress.

Ocampo is a leader of the progressive mass movement opposing the
Arroyo government. In the House of Representatives, he is one of the
deputy leaders of the minority, and supported two impeachment
complaints against Arroyo.

Ocampo is a former business editor of the Manila Times, former vice
president of National Press Club and a prominent figure in the
resistance movement against the Marcos dictatorship. He was imprisoned
for nine years (1976-1985) under Marcos dictatorship and has never
been convicted by any court of law. He was a member of the class that
filed and won the landmark class-action suit against Marcos in the US
federal courts.

Your support is needed now. Please express your support by signing the
online petition at: http://freesatur.bayanmuna.net

Thank you very much.

Friends of Satur Ocampo
Manila, Philippines

AFP urged to stop intimidating youth party-list group

Genuine Opposition senatorial candidate Aquilino "Koko" Pimentel today
asked the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) to stop its apparent
campaign of intimidation against leaders and members of the
newly-formed Kabataan party-list organization and to respect their
rights to participate in the democratic process.

Pimentel was appalled by the reports that the AFP has sent letters to
the parents of Kabataan party list members inquiring about the
background and purpose of the group and voicing suspicion that they
may be engaged in activities that may be inimical to the security and
stability of society.

He said the Kabataan should be accorded the respect that befits a
legitimate organization that aims to encourage and guide its members
in actively contributing their expertise and energies to
nation-building, especially since it has been accredited by the
Commission on Elections as a party-list group.

"It would be a travesty of the democratic process if legal
organization like Kabataan are subjected to harassment and looked upon
with suspicion as if they are threats to society," the young Pimentel
said.

He said the AFP's practice of undergoing background check on peaceful
organization could not but have chilling effects on their members in
the wake of ongoing government-military hate campaign on militant,
leftist organizations.

The hate-campaign has degenerated into the extra-judicial killings of
leftist activists whom the security and military authorities have
tagged as enemies of the state.

Pimentel said it is lamentable that the AFP has gone to the extent of
deploying soldiers in urban poor communities in Metro Manila to check
the activities of leftist organizations and to dissuade the residents
from voting for them in the party-list elections in May.
-30-