Catholic nuns gather to join various groups at the Mendiola to commemorate the International Human Rights Day in the country. INQUIRER/ MARIANNE BERMUDEZ
On a night of Christmas parties and heavy holiday traffic, motorcycle-riding gunmen took no break and found their targets.
Their attacks happened as the Philippines joined the world in marking International Human Rights Day, with hundreds of protesters turning up across the metropolis on Saturday to voice their concern over the growing number of extrajudicial killings under the government of President Duterte.
In Pasig City, separate attacks carried out from late Friday till the wee hours of Saturday killed three residents and critically wounded another, with the police saying that all the victims were on their watch list as drug peddlers and users.
Around 1:50 a.m. on Saturday, time stopped for watch repairman Ismael Pangcoga, 46, after armed suspects stormed his house on Afable Street, Barangay Sagad, as he was resting with his family. He died on the spot from several gunshot wounds to the body.
Two hours earlier, 45-year-old manicurist Evelyn Coloma was shot and critically wounded in Purok 2 in Barangay Pineda.
Coloma’s daughter was in the toilet when gunshots were heard. She rushed outside and saw her bloodied mother slumped on the ground and the gunmen fleeing on a motorbike.
Coloma remained under observation at the hospital as of Saturday. Like in Pangcoga’s case, the Pasig police said Coloma was also on the local list of users and pushers.
Around 11:30 p.m. Friday, 26-year-old Gerard John Amandi, was shot dead along Esguerra Street, Barangay Pinagbuhatan, also in Pasig.
Around 9:40 p.m., 32-year-old Jhonace Ryan Dotaro was shot dead on Villa Tupaz Street in Barangay San Joaquin while eating dinner with his partner. Four assailants barged into the house and shot him in the head and body, before escaping.
Hot spots
Barangays Pinagbuhatan, Sagad, Pineda and San Joaquin are considered hot spots of illegal drug activity in Pasig, where 112 cases of vigilante-style killings—which the police euphemistically call “deaths under investigation”—have been recorded since July.
Elsewhere in the metropolis, the families of three more men tagged by the police as drug suspects would be spending Christmas in mourning.
Medel Maglonat, 40, a notorious drug pusher in Parañaque City’s Marcelo Green barangay was gunned down around 8:45 a.m. on Friday by men on a motorbike.
In Pateros, two residents included on the watch list were also killed on Friday. The victims were identified as John Lester Certeza, 41, of P. Rosales Street, Barangay Sta. Ana; and a man known only as “Baton,” who was shot on M. Almeda Street, Barangay Sto. Rosario-Silangan.
Pateros police chief, Supt. Joel Villanueva, noted that the three attacks had something in common: They involved four motorcycle-riding hit men wearing helmets and bonnets.
As hundreds marched to mark Human Rights Day on Saturday, President Duterte’s office said it wanted the police to investigate the thousands of deaths blamed on vigilantes.
More than 5,000 people have been killed in the antidrug campaign, either by unknown vigilantes in drive-by shootings or by policemen who supposedly shot them for putting up a fight during arrests. Some have been found abandoned on the streets, their bodies mutilated.
The activists urged the government to put an end to the killings, warning that growing public discontent could lead to a fate similar to that of deposed dictator Ferdinand Marcos.
They said Mr. Duterte should concentrate on solving grinding poverty, which they claimed was the root cause of the drug menace.
“The vigilante groups are being prodded by his pronouncements that encourage impunity. If you say [to the police] that ‘I have your back, just do your job,’ that is an open encouragement for these violations to continue and for gross violations of the law [to be committed],” Karapatan secretary general Cristina Palabay told the Inquirer.
Palabay noted that it would be wise for Mr. Duterte to “rethink” now his government policies, particularly toward human rights, or else he would soon “face challenges in his presidency.”
“Historical experience showed us that even if open fascist rule exists, the citizens still fight back,” she said, pointing to the Filipinos’ triumphant struggle against the Marcos dictatorship three decades ago.
Under Marcos’ dictatorship, 3,257 were killed, 30,000 were tortured and 70,000 were arrested for opposing his mailed-fist rule. He and his family went into exile in Hawaii in February 1986 following a bloodless revolt.
In Defense of Human Rights and Dignity Movement (iDefend) stressed it was important for the public to speak up and become the “critical opposition,” which would urge the President to do what is right and proper.
“The number of those killed in ‘Oplan Tokhang’ has increased,” added Irma Balaba of the National Council of Churches of the Philippines. She said that while the poor were grieving, the police were “having a party shooting and killing.”
“It’s said that a regime that said it espouses change is showing signs of being a fascist state,” she said.
Reject
Assistant Communications Secretary Marie Banaag stressed the government rejects extrajudicial killings, which she claimed were all being investigated by police.
Mr. Duterte, who has lashed out at critics of his antidrug campaign, had said that the vigilante-style deaths were not state-sponsored and were due to in-fighting among rival drug gangs. He has bristled at international calls for him to observe human rights, cursing US President Barack Obama, the United Nations and the European Union.
He has since softened his tone after a phone conversation with US President-elect Donald Trump, whom he said supported his unrelenting and bloody campaign.
The President recently vented his ire on human rights defenders who he said blamed him for ordering the deaths. —WITH REPORTS FROM JOVIC YEE, LEILA SALAVERRIA AND KRISTINE FELISSE MANGUNAY