DAVAO CITY—The interfaith group Exodus for Justice and Peace (EJP) called for an immediate pull-out of military troops from Arakan, North Cotabato, even as groups enraged over the killing of Italian priest Fr. Fausto Tentorio prepared for his burial.
“We denounce the worsening state of impunity in Arakan,” said Rev. Jurie Jaime, coconvener of EJP and secretary general of the Promotion of Church People’s Response, as a farmer Ramon Batoy was reportedly killed by soldiers in Sitio Upper Lumbo, Barangay Kabalantian only three days into Tentorio’s wake.
“Give the people time to grieve for Pops’ murder,” Jaime said. Batoy’s coffin was placed side by side Tentorio’s in Arakan town’s Mother of Perpetual Help Church.
Sunday afternoon, people in Arakan marched Tentorio’s remains to the new Notre Dame high school—a school building which the priest helped build in Barangay Duroluman three kilometers away. His wake will be held at the school before his body is transferred to Kidapawan City on Monday.
Rally
Farmers belonging to the Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas from Paquibato, Compostela Valley and Davao Oriental, converged for a rally outside the military camp in Panacan before proceeding to the Freedom Park in downtown area, where they will hold a night-long vigil before proceeding in a caravan to Kidapawan City, where they will pay tribute to the slain priest on the eve of his burial.
The military claimed the farmer Ramon Batoy was a New People’s Army (NPA) rebel killed in an encounter, but an EJP-led fact-finding report quoted Batoy’s wife Gemma as saying that her husband was killed when he refused the military entry to his house, prompting him to fight an officer with a bolo when the officer struck him with a rifle butt.
Jaime said people in Upper Lumbo had fled following the killing, leaving 48 houses empty.
People were worried that violence would intensify once the priest’s body is taken out of Arakan and the recruitment of the paramilitary group Bagani continues, Jaime said.
Bagani recruitment
Norma Capuyan, vice chair of the indigenous peoples’ group Kalumaran, said the military has stepped up the recruitment for the paramilitary group Bagani, especially in Barangay Dalag, near where police confiscated a sack full of long firearms only days before the priest’s murder. In his own account of his Oct. 6-7 ordeal eight years ago, Tentorio wrote that the paramilitary group hunting him “did not follow any law.”
Soldiers
Jaime said Batoy’s family was preparing to attend the wake of Tentorio when the soldiers came. After he was repeatedly hit by a rifle butt, Batoy reportedly hacked an Army officer’s neck with his bolo, prompting the other three soldiers to open fire. Two other villagers, Noli Badol, a sitio leader; and Celso Batoy, an elder brother of Ramon, were reportedly beaten and detained by the military.
In Iloilo city, bishops and priests in the Visayas have joined calls for justice for Tentorio.
In a statement, the Visayas Clergy Discernment Group (VCDG) also called on the Aquino government to investigate and find justice for Tentorio’s murder.
‘Culture of death’
“How he was murdered unmasks the culture of death that has pervaded Philippine society. His killing is another number added to the more than 50 victims of extra-judicial killings since President Benigno Aquino III took office,” according to the statement issued by Jaro Auxiliary Bishop Gerardo Alminaza, VCDG head convenor.
The Visayas-based clergy honored the slain priest for his work as a rural missionary and for devoting his life as an antimining and human rights advocate despite threats to his life.
“He helped and worked with the indigenous peoples in opposing the operation of large-scale plantations and mining which would harm them. As a human rights advocate, he joined in calling for justice for slain human rights workers and farmers in central Mindanao in 2002,” according to the statement.
The VCDG also called for justice for other slain and abducted priests including Fr. Cecilio Lucero, who was murdered in Northern Samar on Sept. 6, 2009; Fr. Nery Satur, who was shot dead in Bukidnon on Oct. 14, 1991; and Fr. Rudy Romano who remains missing after he was abducted on July 11, 1985 in Cebu.
No justice
It noted that most of the perpetrators of human rights violations against the clergy and other sectors have not been brought to justice.
In Kidapawan City, Interior Secretary Jesse Robredo on Friday said authorities were not rushing their investigation into the death of Tentorio to make sure that real justice would be served.
“We wanted to be sure and thorough in the investigation rather than running under a time frame. Authorities are also exhausting all means to give us quality and better result in their investigation,” he told reporters during a visit at the wake of Tentorio here.
Internal probe
The Department of Justice (DOJ) has asked the military’s Eastern Mindanao Command based in Davao City to conduct an internal investigation, an official said. “The DOJ wanted us to conduct a military probe. So when it is military probe, it is internal,” said Lt. Col. Leopoldo Galon, Eastmincom spokesperson. With reports from Carlo Agamon and Dennis Santos, Inquirer Mindanao; Nestor P. Burgos Jr., Inquirer Visayas