“Allowing this administration, the added leeway and greater authority that come with a newer, more oppressive anti-terrorism law would open the floodgates to graver forms of abuses. The dangers that come with the Anti-Terrorism Bill are all too real to be ignored, and we cannot and should not wait until the final nail in the coffin has been hammered down.”
The students were subjected to abuse and intimidation, with one student choked by an officer in plainclothes while he was trying to explain. One student was also labelled as a “recruiter for the New Peoples’ Army.”
By DEE AYROSO
Various groups assailed today yet another attack against press freedom in the country, with a Manila court handing down a guilty verdict against Rappler’s CEO Maria Ressa and their former researcher Reynaldo Santos Jr.
The National Union of Journalists of the Philippines (NUJP) said the trial was “a test run for the latest weapon the State can now wield to intimidate and silence not only the media but all citizens who call out government abuse.”
Members of the religious community are among those who have opposed and joined the growing clamor to stop the signing into law the controversial anti-terror bill, saying this will threaten the people’s “hard won freedoms.”