Amnesty International to new president: Uphold human rights

CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY — An international human rights monitoring group has appealed anew to president-elect Benigno Simeon C. Aquino III to end the outgoing administration’s “culture of impunity.”

Aurora A. Parong, Amnesty International Philippines section director, aired the appeal during a visit in this city for the Northern Mindanao leg of the State of the World’s Human Rights Report launched on Friday.

“Here in Mindanao, particularly in Region 10 (Northern Mindanao), lawlessness, landlessness and poverty have become the triad leading to human rights violations. The justice gap is very real for [peasants] and indigenous peoples,” she said.

“We can never forget the plight of the Sumilao farmers [in Bukidnon province]. While they were awarded 83.89 hectares of land, the struggle to acquire the remaining 10.11 hectares to complete the 94 hectares is another story,” said Ms. Parong.

The case involved the claim of farmers over 144 hectares of ancestral land in Barangay San Vicente in Sumilao town. The struggle started in a 28-day fast in 1997, and was highlighted a decade later by a 1,700-kilometer march in over two months to Malacañang.

The farmers, San Miguel Corp., Office of the President, Department of Agrarian Reform and the Catholic Church signed a memorandum of agreement on March 29, 2008 giving the farmers their 144-hectare property.

Ms. Parong said Amnesty International has submitted a five-point human rights agenda to all presidential candidates before the May 10 elections.

The agenda includes integration of human rights in the Medium Term Development Plan and impartial investigation of all cases of extrajudicial executions and enforced disappearances.

According to the group’s report, rights of native tribesmen under the Indigenous People’s Rights Act — specifically free, prior and informed consent on developments in so-called ancestral domain — is disregarded by large-scale resource extractive corporations.

“Indigenous peoples have been displaced from their ancestral domains due to extractive industries forcing them out from their homes and sources of livelihood,” the report noted.

In his presentation, Carl Cesar C. Rebuta, a member of Amnesty International Philippines, called displaced natives as “investment refugees” since communities are displaced to “give way to development projects with promising package to host communities and local governments units for a time being undermining the long-term effects.”

Mr. Rebuta claimed the national government’s hand in “development aggression” in mineral-rich hinterland can be seen in its policies, which include cutting down processing time for mining permits, fast-tracking the issuance of environmental compliance certificates and undermining the process of prior consent from host indigenous communities. — Leonardo B. Corrales