GMA faces P5.4-million civil case

A religious group yesterday filed a civil suit against former President and now Pampanga Rep. Gloria Arroyo for the alleged human rights abuses against its members during her administration.

The United Church of Christ in the Philippines (UCCP), through its general secretary and executive director Bishop Norman Marizga and the alleged victims’ relatives, said it filed the suit against Arroyo for being the Commander-in Chief of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) when the political and extra-judicial killings were committed.

The complainants asked the Quezon City Regional Trial Court to order the former President to indemnify them with the amount of P1 million in moral damages as an organization, P500,000 each for the relatives of the six victims also in moral damages, P500,000 in exemplary damages, and P300,000 each for litigation and attorney’s fees or a total damage claim of P5.4 million.

Another plaintiff, Pastor Berlin Guerrero, is also seeking P300,000 moral damages for his alleged illegal arrest, detention and the torture he claimed to have

suffered in the hands of government soldiers.

The former president must be held criminally responsible as commander-in-chief of the military for the “extra-judicial” killings committed against the victims from 2003 until 2007, Marizga said.

He added that during the Arroyo administration, the military implemented a counter-insurgency campaign dubbed “Oplan Bantay Laya,” which sought to identify organizations that are critical of the government’s policies.

Marigza said the UCCP has been tagged by the military as a sectoral front of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP).

The alleged human rights victims who were all UCCP members were Joel Baclao, a disaster relief program coordinator in Bicol, who was shot to death on Nov. 10, 2004; Tacloban City Pastor Edison Lapuz who was killed on May 12, 2003; Noel Capulong, chairperson of the Christian Witness Program in Calamba who was killed on May 27, 2006 and Pastors Raul Domingo and Andy Pawican who were shot dead on Aug. 20, 2005 and May 21, 2006, respectively.

For his part, Guerrero alleged that he was abducted on May 27, 2007 while on his way to a local church in Malabanan, Sta. Rosa, Laguna, where he was detained for 16 months and hurt.

Marizga said they have documented human rights violations under Arroyo regime against its members which convinced them to file a civil suit against her and the military agents to hold them accountable.

The UCCP also claimed that there were at least 22 others in the organization who were either killed or suffered violent attacks from the military.

“As a result of the relentless persecution and brutalization and even of outright liquidation of numerous committed church pastors and church leaders of UCCP by the military under the presidential control and authority of Arroyo, what happened was that the work and ministry of UCCP, as a church and religious body and those of many local UCCP churches under its jurisdiction, had been brought under incalculable harm, hazard and great difficulty,” the UCCP said in its complaint.

The camp of Arroyo, for its part, said it still has to get a copy of the complaint before issuing a comment.

“(We) can’t comment till we see (a) copy of (the) complaint,” said Elena Bautista-Horn, spokesman and2 chief of staff of the Pampanga lawmaker, in a text message to the PNA. PNA, Arlie O. Calalo, Daily Tribune