DENR asked to probe slay

CALLS for justice ring out on Sunday during the burial of Gloria Capitan (inset), who fought to stop an open coal storage facility in Bataan. CONTRIBUTED PHOTO

CITY OF SAN FERNANDO—The family of an environmental activist, who was shot dead in front of her grandchildren at a videoke bar in Mariveles, Bataan province, on July 1, has pleaded to the Duterte administration to bring justice to the victim.

Gloria Capitan, 57, was shot in the head and neck by a gunman on a motorcycle at her videoke bar in Mariveles, but the police have not yet come up with leads that may help catch her killer.

Capitan was president of the Samahan ng Nagkakaisang Mamamayan ng Lucanin (SNML), which had been campaigning against the operation of an open coal storage facility in Lucanin village in Mariveles.

Capitan’s husband, Efren, is a Lucanin councilman.

The family appealed to President Duterte and Environment Secretary Gina Lopez during her burial on Sunday in Barangay Cabcaben in Mariveles. The burial drew 500 people who staged an indignation march, according to Derek Cabe, provincial coordinator of the Kilusan para sa Pambansang Demokrasya (KPD), which has been helping the SNML in the campaign to close the coal facility.

“My wife had no known enemy in the community except that she had been espousing a cause for a better environment [as president of the Samahan ng Nagkakaisang Mamamayan ng Lucanin],” Efren said.

She was killed in front of her grandchildren who were playing in the bar.

On Sunday at the funeral, Capitan’s son, Mar, expressed hope that the President would order the police to conduct a “thorough, fair and swift” investigation into the killing.

Capitan became the first noncriminal and nondrug-related victim of extrajudicial killing under the new administration, said Fidel Fababier, KPD vice chair.

In March 2015, the SNML petitioned the Lucanin village council, the Mariveles government and the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) to close the facility.

Coal activist Gloria Capitan was killed in front of her grand children on July 1 but the Bataan police have not found leads to her murderer. Capitan was leader of a group of residents who objected to the operations of a coal storage facility in Mariveles town. CONTRIBUTED PHOTO

The village council had issued the Seafront Shipyard and Port Terminal Services Corp. a certificate of clearance for its coal stockpile project there in January last year.

The SNML also complained to the Commission on Human Rights and Office of the Ombudsman against Lucanin officials and the Mariveles government for their “continued disregard of the people’s complaint and problems regarding the operation of coal storage.”

In a statement, Fababier said Capitan’s death “cannot be divorced from the issues she took up during her lifetime, such as the ill effects of coal plants and coal storage facilities in Bataan.”

In a separate statement, Reuben Muni, climate and energy campaigner of Greenpeace Southeast Asia, condemned the killing, calling it an “attempt to silence the growing opposition to coal-fired power generation not only in Bataan but also in other parts of the country.”

“This is a challenge to President Duterte’s drive against criminality, which shouldn’t be limited to stopping drug-related crimes but should also go after criminals who target activists standing up to powerful interests,” Muni said. Tonette Orejas and Greg Refraccion, Inquirer Central Luzon