https://iclfi.org/pubs/wr/47/philippines
The Philippines is governed by an especially vicious breed of bourgeois oligarchs. Foreign finance capital drains the country’s wealth, while the ruling families rely on American money and guns to keep themselves in power and the impoverished workers and peasants under foot. Mass poverty and underdevelopment make it impossible to placate the masses with reforms, so the oligarchs respond to the most basic demands—land to the tiller, collective bargaining, even birth control—with harsh repression. The defense of courageous activists like Amanda Echanis and the Tacloban 5 is a vital part of the national liberation struggle against the bourgeois oligarchs, who work hand-in-glove with the U.S. empire to keep the people enslaved.
Hands Off the Tacloban 5!
Held without trial for six years, community journalist Frenchie Mae Cumpio and Mariel Domequil of Rural Missionaries of the Philippines were convicted in January of financing terrorism and sentenced to 12-18 years in prison. Their “crime” was to raise money for an independent radio program and for humanitarian aid.
Frenchie Mae and Mariel were arrested in midnight raids in Tacloban City in February 2020 alongside three other activists. Marissa Cabaljao, spokesperson for the climate justice group People’s Surge Network, and Mira Legion of the National Democratic alliance BAYAN have been released on bail, but Alexander Philip Abinguna from the Karapatan human rights organization remains behind bars facing fabricated charges of murder. The persecution of the Tacloban 5 is intended to silence their opposition to death-squad terror and the destruction of livelihoods brought about by imperialist impositions on the Philippines. Drop the charges against the Tacloban 5!
Amanda Echanis Is Free!
The Philippine left won a victory on January 14. Amanda Echanis, organizer for the National Democratic Amihan peasant women’s federation and acclaimed poet, was released after more than five years in prison. Amanda had been arrested—with her month-old baby—in December 2020, after security forces planted firearms, ammunition and explosives while carrying out a dawn search of her lodgings. Her frame-up was part of a brutal crackdown ordered by former president Rodrigo Duterte and carried out using military and police raids and planted evidence. While we celebrate Amanda’s freedom, she should never have spent a day in prison. Hundreds of political prisoners still languish behind prison walls. We extend them our solidarity and continue to demand their immediate release.
