Hundreds of supporters, family friends pay last respect to slain human rights journalist Teodoro ‘Ka Tudoy’ Escanilla during funeral rites in Barcelona, Sorsogon. BICOLTODAY.COM PHOTO
BARCELONA, Sorsogon — Karapatan-Sorsogon Spokesperson Teodoro “Ka Tudoy” Escanilla was laid to rest here in Barcelona, Sorsogon with flooded red flags in his funeral. He was the 69th victim of Extrajudicial Killing (EJK) in Bicol after his body bore two gunshot wounds in the stomach, one in the left shoulder and another in his right cheek in a massacre last week.
Karapatan National chair Marie Hilao-Enriquez said Bicol is taking the lead to fight human rights violations and exploitations in the country. As of July 2010 to March 2015, Bicol ranked first, seconded by Southern Mindanao with 35 EJKs and followed by Southern Tagalog with 22 EJKs under Noynoy Aquino government.
Karapatan slams the BS Aquino regime for hunting human rights workers after the recorded 1, 206 EJK under Arroyo regime. Karapatan documentation showed Escanilla had been under surveillance since 2003, including several encounters between him and the military units assigned in Sorsogon.
It’s heavy but a pride because he sacrificed his life for his sector according Enriquez. Escanilla came from a family of farmers but never had a chance to finish college due to poverty. Escanilla became member of Patriotic Youth (KM) and pressed against martial law. The 49th IB, currently based in Camarines Norte, beaten him and tortured him during ‘70s.
In 2011, Escanilla was falsely charged with frustrated murder and damage to property in a supposed raid conducted at a police station in the town of Barcelona. Escanilla had been a human rights worker since 1998 as part of the Sorsogon People’s Organization (SPO), a community-based human rights organization in Sorsogon province.
During his tenure as SPO president, the province became active in educational discussions and fact finding missions that gather data for serious violations of the military and other government security units.
He joined Karapatan-Sorsogon in 2006 as its spokesperson and served as anchor of a local radio program, “Pamana ng Lahi” (Legacy of our people) for 10 years.
Teodoro Escanilla, Radio anchorman and spokersperson of human rights group Karapatan in Sorsogon province. CONTRIBUTED PHOTO
There is a similar attack against human rights worker William Bugatti of the Cordillera Human Rights Alliance-Karapatan happened in Ifugao on March 5, 2014 and RomualdoPalispis, officer of the Justice and Peace Action Group based in Aurora province, on June 30, 2012 according to Karapatan.
Aside from the killings, Karapatan Secretary GeneralCristina Palabay said the government is more aggressive in criminalizing legitimate human rights work by filing trumped up criminal charges against leaders of human rights organizations and other political activists who assist victims of human rights violations, specifically those in Mindanao.
“HanimaySuazo, Secretary General of Karapatan-Southern Mindanao and Pastor Sadrach Sabella, Secretary General of Karapatan-SoCSKSarGen were among the 35 leaders of people’s organizations and human rights advocates falsely charged with kidnapping, serious illegal detention, violation of anti-trafficking law, Republic Act 9851 at anti-child abuse law,” Palabay said because of providing assistance to more than 1,200 evacuees from the hinterlands of Malapatan, Saranggani Province and those from the provinces of Davao del Norte and Bukidnon.
Some 70 other leaders of human rights organization and progressive groups, including Palabay and Jacqueline Ruiz of the Children Rehabilitation Center, were implicated in the same case.
http://bicoltoday.com/2015/08/30/bicol-recorded-highest-extrajudicial-killings-as-slain-human-rights-advocate-laid-to-rest/
Commie human rights propagandists exploit the funeral of one of their own. The leaders of KARAPATAN, the main Communist Party of the Philippines human rights front, exploit the death of their Sorsogon spokesperson Teodoro “Ka Tudoy” Escanilla. KARAPATAN leaders once again bandy about a bunch of uncorroborated (and probably fictitious) statistics with regard to extrajudicial killings in the Philippines with the intent of discrediting the Aquino administration and the Philippine military. In the case of "Ka Tudoy" there is no credible evidence of military involvement in his death nonetheless the modus operandi of KARAPATAN and other CPP fronts is to blame the military anyway.
ReplyDeleteBy the way, the article discloses that "Ka Tudoy" is not the innocent that KARAPATAN portrays him to be. The article notes that in the past he was a member of the Patriotic Youth (KM) organization. The Kilusang Makabayan (KM-Patriotic Youth), is a clandestine youth organization that is a member of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP), the underground political wing of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP). Over the years, Tudoy had steadily worked his way up the CPP human rights organization structure becoming the spokesperson for the Sorsogon chapter of KARAPATAN.
As an added note, all of the groups/individuals mentioned in the above article are engaged in CPP human rights propaganda activity.