“As Church, we are challenged by our present time and context to stand for truth… The Church will not and cannot be neutral on moral and ethical issues and concerns.”
Women's group Gabriela said the government should allocate zero-budget for agencies and instruments that “are at the forefront of silencing women and the rest of the Filipino people.
Abducted labor organizers Elizabeth 'Loi' Magbanua and Alipio 'Ador' Juat, campaigned for the release of the ten-thousand peso aid for workers and the urban poor. They have also been under surveillance due to their involvement in establishing a community network to fight threats of demolition in the Parola Compound in Tondo, Manila.
Amid increasing prices and alleged supply shortage of sugar, life remains bitter for the sugar workers of Negros.
“The petitioner humbly submits that the continued blocking of its website for more than 48 hours after respondent NTC has been officially served with the writ of preliminary injunction is an outright and inexcusable act of defying a lawful order of the Honorable Court.”
Since when did helping children become a crime?
Thousands of poor students and parents who flocked the Department of Social Welfare and Development local headquarters walked back home empty-handed and disappointed.
“Active since the Chico Dam struggle, he has persistently campaigned against dams, mines, and other forms of development aggression against the Cordillera peoples. For his committed work, he was wrongly red-tagged and subjected to surveillance and harassment."
A fishers group found the tambiolo system of distributing fuel aid unacceptable. "Fuel subsidy," they said, "is essential to every fisherfolk who bears the brunt of the cumulative oil price increases. It is not, and should not be a game of chances for our ailing fishing sector."
A group of martial law survivors decried the proposed renaming of a state university in the hometown of the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr., saying that it was an official government imprimatur to deodorize a shameful legacy.”
Is this alternate history? No. It is melodrama. It's the Marcoses using cinema to re-create themselves as family wronged by history. The problem with that is how the audience will take this, given that we have been fed with that soap-opera theme for decades of rich families being wronged.
“It is important to remember his life and resistance today, especially in the era of systematic defamation against the revolutionary movement. If he were alive today, he would become a victim of the terrorist-tagging spree of the NTF-ELCAC)."
"This award will encourage us even more, to continue our work defending human rights and civil liberties in the Philippines."
"We see this as another attempt to silence criticism and dissent against the state."
But what perhaps connects to the viewers are grief and the grim reality of state repression. When some activists were abducted, their torture scenes seem to be lifted straight from testimonies of Martial Law victims. Name every method and it gets shown here. Here, the film becomes art that disturbs those who had lived in the comfort that Martial Law.
But, the greatest preparation of them all is this, are we ready to accept and claim the comprehensive notion of salvation (economic, political, cultural, spiritual and environmental) that only comes from God? Are we ready to follow the way, the truth and the life who is Jesus Christ? We know we will die sometime, but we do not know exactly when. Did we address the things that truly matters, like love, forgiveness and reconciliation before we die?
If indeed the Marcos II administration intends to bring back the past by, among other means, making ROTC mandatory again, 21 years after it was made an NTSP elective, it could start by first instituting the needed reforms in the program to prevent or at least reduce the corruption, abuses and violence that many associate with it.
“Withdrawal from the Rome Statute does not discharge a state party from the obligations it has incurred as a member. Consequently, liability for the alleged summary killings and other atrocities committed in the course of the war on drugs [during the Duterte administration] is not nullified or negated.”
“There is nothing to fret about the proposed reimbursement of the P1.5 billion collected taxes from 700,000 poll workers who served during the last election. If at all, they should be thanked for their service, and this can help them make ends meet amid this crisis we are in."
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