by Deep Green Resistance News Service | Aug 31, 2012 | Obstruction & Occupation, Toxification
By Everglades Earth First!
In the climax of the 2012 Republican National Convention, protestors with Earth First! have blocked access roads to TECO’s Big Bend coal plant on the eastern shore of Tampa Bay. The environmental action group is citing corporate influence in politics and ecological impacts of fossil fuel dependency as reasons for the disruption.
This year’s RNC was funded by an estimated $55 million in corporate pay-offs, with corporations including the Tampa based-TECO Energy, along with Chevron, Duke Energy and Exxon Mobil.
According to a report by Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) last year, Florida is among the dirtiest states in power plant pollution. NRDC found TECO’s Big Bend plant to be in the state’s, “top three most polluting smoke stacks.”
Earth First! activists chose this day for their protest in order to highlight Mitt Romney’s plan to expand what the group calls the “energy empire” which favors the interest of big donors in oil, gas and coal industries.
Romney’s top energy policy advisor is the wealthiest oilman in the country and according to data analyzed by the Center for Responsive Politics, Romney has already raised more from mining interests than Bush or McCain raised from these industries in their entire campaigns.
Locally, TECO’s Big Bend plant has a long history of pollution. Along with being declared Florida’s number one dirtiest power plant by Florida Consumer Action Network, they were also documented discharging waste into Cobia Bay in Apollo Beach in years past.
But that’s not all. TECO has been called one of the nation’s worst offenders when it comes to mountaintop removal coal mining. In coal mining regions of the Appalachian Mountains, TECO has ruined entire communities to maximize their profits. Kentucky coalfield resident Doug Justice worked in the coal mines for 22 years and said “I have never seen an outfit treat a community the way TECO Coal has done us.”
In response to the devastation from floods caused be TECO’s mining in 2002, Granville Burke of Letcher County, Kentucky, had this to say: “I wish TECO had never started mining above our home. Protection for families like ours is supposed to come from the state and federal regulatory agencies, but instead they look the other way as coal companies destroy entire communities for the sake of profit.”
“Dirty energy becomes dirty politics. We can’t afford to stand by and watch it anymore. We have to fight back.” Said Rachel Kijewski, an organizer with the Earth First! movement in Florida.
From Earth First! Newswire: https://earthfirstnews.wordpress.com/2012/08/31/earth-first-blockades-coal-plant-at-rnc-in-tampa/#more-10126
by Deep Green Resistance News Service | Aug 24, 2012 | Mining & Drilling, Repression at Home
By Alison K. Grass / AlterNet
Eminent domain, the government’s right to condemn (or take) private land for “public use,” has at times been a highly contentious topic because it can displace people from their homes to make way for construction of different projects, like highways or roads, civic buildings and other types of public infrastructure. However, what some may not realize is that several states have granted eminent domain authority to certain private entities, including oil and gas companies. These companies are using it as a tool to seize private land, which increases profits and benefits their wallets.
According to the U.S. Constitution’s Fifth Amendment, in order to pursue eminent domain, the land must be taken for “public use” and the private property owners must receive “just compensation.”
No person shall be . . . deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
Traditionally, the “public use” provision referred to projects like roads, schools, parks and other public facilities that could be directly used by all. However, the meaning of “public use” has been loosely interpreted in recent years.
The controversial Kelo v. City of New London (2005) is credited with broadening the interpretation of “public use.” In this case, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of New London, deciding that the city could take private property and give it to another private entity for “economic development.” The Court decided that this met the “public use” provision of the Fifth Amendment. But despite taking the land and spending millions of taxpayer dollars on the proposed project, the plan never came to fruition and nothing was constructed.
Now it seems that the oil and gas industry is capitalizing on this this precedent-setting case.
A University of Minnesota Law professor describes this trend: “in many natural resource–rich areas of the country, however, the knock on the door is less likely to come from a government official and much more likely to come from a mining, oil, or gas company representative.”
The state legislature of North Carolina recently legalized fracking. Yet, what some residents may not know is that North Carolina’s eminent domain law allows some private entities to take private property for certain uses. This includes oil and gas companies who have been given the right to condemn land and construct pipelines for natural gas transportation. As a supervising attorney at the Duke Environmental Law and Policy Clinic points out, there could be even bigger implications. “If private companies engaged in these activities are designated as ‘public enterprises,’ then they may be able to take private property for purposes far beyond that of laying pipelines.”
In July, the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court ruled that provisions in Act 13, (which revised the Oil and Gas Act of 1984), aiming to prevent local zoning rules for gas drilling and fracking were unconstitutional. However the Court didn’t rule on the topic of eminent domain. This leaves open the possibility that oil and gas companies could pursue this as a method to take people’s land.
Meanwhile in Texas, TransCanada, the company that wants to build the Keystone XL Pipeline, is trying to grab private property from a small town, claiming they have eminent domain rights—and some residents are outraged.
The Kelo case broadened the interpretation of the “public use.” The city of New London took land from a private property owner so that they could give it to a private entity in the name of “economic development.” Unfortunately, oil and gas companies will now have this card to play when justifying land grabs.
From AlterNet: http://www.alternet.org/environment/how-some-states-are-giving-oil-and-gas-companies-right-take-your-land?paging=off
by Deep Green Resistance News Service | Aug 15, 2012 | Climate Change, Obstruction & Occupation
By Will Wooten / Waging Nonviolence
One year after more than 1,200 people were arrested in front of the White House during two weeks of sit-ins against the Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline, a coalition of Texas landowners and activists will attempt to physically halt its construction. Led by veteran climate justice organizers, participants ranging from environmentalists to Tea Partiers are preparing to lock arms for a sustained nonviolent civil disobedience campaign, beginning perhaps as early as this week.
The impetus for such action, which is being called the Tar Sands Blockade, goes back much further than last summer, however. In 2008 and 2009, small landowners along the pipeline’s route in rural Texas, Oklahoma and Nebraska started noticing survey stakes with orange tape marked “KXL.” They soon found out that TransCanada — the company building the pipeline — had eminent domain power over their property and that if they didn’t sign a contract allowing TransCanada to build, they would be taken to court.
Many landowners, feeling pushed into an impossible situation, signed the contracts. Some began organizing, doing community outreach to explain what was happening and building conservative support on the ground. Organizations such as Nacogdoches Stop Tarsands Oil Pipelines evolved out of conversations between landowners — first focusing around eminent domain, but then, when they learned that tar sands oil would be pumped through the pipeline, discussion started to include environmental impacts, such as toxic diluted bitumen and climate change.
By August 2011, the climate movement in the United States started to focus in on the Keystone XL with Tar Sands Action, a civil disobedience campaign led by Bill McKibben and members of 350.org. The 1,253 arrests in front of the White House helped raise the issue to a national level by stressing that President Obama could stop the pipeline by rejecting its permit to cross the U.S.–Canada border.
Weeks later, the Occupy movement emerged. While environmental issues were not at the forefront, many Occupy encampments passed resolutions opposing Keystone XL and took part in Tar Sands Action’s next rally in Washington, D.C., when, on November 6, 12,000 people encircled the White House. Days later President Obama denied the permit and, for the moment, Keystone XL was thought dead.
TransCanada then changed tactics and decided to split the pipeline into segments so that it could get a head start on construction while making inside deals in Washington to secure the necessary permit for crossing the border. In a sign of goodwill to the fossil fuel industry, President Obama went to Cushing, Oklahoma, and declared that he would “expedite” the permitting process for the Gulf Coast segment from Cushing to Houston and Port Arthur, Texas. While that ability was technically outside of his reach, it was a hint to the agencies responsible for such decisions. Perhaps not surprisingly, the Army Corps of Engineers then granted the three permits TransCanada needed to start construction — despite the absence of an environmental review.
The southern segment of the Keystone XL will be built in three different sections, simultaneously, with the goal of transporting tar sands oil currently stored in Cushing, Oklahoma, to refineries on the Gulf Coast, where it then can be shipped around the world. When Texas activists such as myself learned that this was happening despite the Tar Sands Action victory, we decided to form Tar Sands Blockade.
While landowners began organizing along the pipeline route in early 2012, climate justice activists with Rising Tide North Texas were looking for ways to bring wider attention to the pipeline’s impending construction. Many of us had been active Occupiers during the encampments and were disappointed with the movement’s inability to make the connection between economic justice and the climate. So we made a stronger effort to engage people on the community level.
As a result, Tar Sands Blockade is being informed by a variety of voices — from self-identified Tea Party members, flying Gadsden flags at the front of their long driveways, to Occupiers who slept at encampments across the country.
Several organizers with Tar Sands Blockade also participated in and organized for Tar Sands Action, including veteran climate justice activists from around the country. This diverse coalition has agreed on one simple call to action: The Keystone XL should not be built in Texas, and nonviolent direct action is required to stop it.
Other means of addressing the grievances of landowners and meeting the challenge of climate change have thus far failed. As Bill McKibben’s recent article “Global Warming’s Terrible New Math” made clear, the world has years, not decades, to confront the fossil fuel industry head on. Nonviolent direct action offers the best chance of victory, not just for the Tar Sands Blockade but for other fossil fuel extraction movements, such as those opposing fracking, mountaintop removal and coal exports — all of which have been active in what’s being called a Climate Summer of Solidarity.
That solidarity will take on greater meaning in a matter of days when construction on the pipeline is expected to begin and landowners will be bringing ice to the encampments to help alleviate the extreme Texas heat, as well as thanking everyone for defending the home they’ve built over decades. Activists will respond by holding the blockade for as long as possible, through the summer and likely into the fall. This could be an important moment for the entire climate movement, setting the stage for future actions and alliances — not to mention giving new meaning to the words “Don’t mess with Texas.”
From Waging Nonviolence: http://wagingnonviolence.org/2012/08/dont-mess-with-texas-tar-sands-blockade/
by Deep Green Resistance News Service | Jul 31, 2012 | ACTION, Mining & Drilling, Protests & Symbolic Acts, Toxification
By Peter Rugh / Waging Nonviolence
The war came home this weekend, as thousands of people whose land has been under siege by the U.S. government and corporate interests gathered in Washington, D.C. No, they weren’t victims of drone attacks or 10-plus years of fighting in Afghanistan. They were ordinary Americans, whose neighborhoods, townships and states have been struggling to put an end to fracking, a destructive form of natural gas drilling.
These veterans of the frack war were in Washington for a national convergence called Stop the Frack Attack. Over the course of two days, they held teach-ins and strategy sessions on ways to bring relief to their communities through collective action, before ending on Saturday with the first ever national march and rally against fracking. Many hailed the event as an important step to building a broad, grassroots movement to ban the drilling practice.
“I’m going to dream big,” said Jennie Scheibach with NonToxic Ohio, a group fighting the spread of fracking in northern Ohio and the disposal of fracking waste in the state’s rivers. “Standing together, rising up together, we can stop this.”
Jennie wasn’t alone. Thousands of people from across the country, from voluminous backgrounds, joined in common cause in D.C. over the weekend, raising the call for an end to fracking.
Lori New Breast of the Blackfoot Nation, whose homeland encompasses parts of Montana, Alberta, and Saskatchewan, took part in the rally. She said her community is mobilizing to reject fracking. “Oil companies would like you to think that that land is unoccupied and that we are gone. But as the care takers of the headwaters of the continent, we are still here. We do not want fracking. It is a threat to our cultural way of life.”
Members of Occupy Wall Street Environmental Solidarity were also on hand in D.C. as well, carrying banners that read, “Safe Fracking is a Lie; Occupy! Resist!” and “Frack Wall Street, Not Our Water!”
Meanwhile, suburban mothers like Vicky Bastidas, who brought her three teenage daughters to the rally, were present. She and her family have been fighting frackers from drilling near schools and playgrounds in their home town of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Vicky said she was heartened by a recent court decision that overturned a law barring local municipalities from banning fracking and now looks forward to passing a ban in her town.
The decision might have come too late to reverse much of the long-term damage that the unimpeded invasion of drilling has done to Pennsylvania, but nonetheless it grants Pennsylvanians a chance to set up legal barricades against the fracking bombardment. Bastidas had a message from her family to Governor Corbett and lawmakers like him: “Our water is not for sale. We can live without oil. We can live without gas. But we cannot live without water.”
This was a widespread sentiment among the approximately 4,000 demonstrators who marched from the Capitol building to the headquarters of the American Petroleum Institute (API), the oil and gas industry’s lobbying arm. Along the way they made a brief stop at the home base of the American Natural Gas Alliance (ANGA), where Delaware Riverkeeper Maya Van Rossum held up a murky, brown libation of chemical diarrhea in a clear plastic jug.
“This is frack water,” she said. “We don’t want it in our communities. We can’t drink it safely. We’re giving it back to the drillers. I bet they won’t drink it!” Uniformed in hazmat suits, Van Rossum and several of her colleagues with Delaware Riverkeeper chanted “shame” and pounded on ANGA’s doors, but a representative of the Alliance failed to appear for a taste test.
Next, demonstrators flooded the courtyard of API’s home office. “The water, the water, the water is on fire,” they hollered in unison, “We don’t need no fracking let the corporations burn.” Members of the crowd set down a 10-foot replica of a fracking rig made of bamboo and canvas at API’s door and tipped it over. The move was a symbolic representation of what they hope the burgeoning movement against fracking can accomplish nationally.
The action also pointed toward another tipping point, that of the climate, which has been driven to the brink of near collapse by the fossil fuel industry with the support of politicians, including President Barack Obama, who received $884,000 in campaign donations from the oil and gas industry in 2008. Given such a payout, it should not be surprising that Obama signed a little-noticed executive order earlier this year establishing an intergovernmental task force for the support of “unconventional” gas drilling — in other words fracking.
With the stroke of a pen, Obama picked a side in a war that began under his predecessor’s administration. In 2005, lawmakers on Capitol Hill approved the Energy Policy Act, a bill championed by then-Vice President and former Halliburton executive Dick Cheney that exempted frackers from the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) and the Clean Water Act (CWA). The fracking amendments gave the world’s wealthiest energy corporations license to invade some of America’s poorest counties, poison their drinking water, foul their air and putrefy their soil. For each frack site, and there are now tens of thousands across America, drillers pump millions of gallons of water, sand and toxic chemicals into the land in order to draw oil and gas from shale rock.
Since the frack boom began, impoverished, cloistered communities sitting on millions of dollars worth of shale gas — from Pennsylvania to Wyoming, from indigenous tribal lands in Montana to the Texas border — have become ground zeros for fracking. In most cases, they are offered a short-term cash prize for land rights or desperately needed jobs in return for long-term ecological devastation. Such a strategy for prosperity, critics contend, would have left mountaintop removal strongholds in Appalachia looking like Beverly Hills long ago.
Instead, it seems the only pockets being lined are those of the corporate executives and politicians. In 2010, the fracking industry raked in $76 billion in revenues. Meanwhile, the Obama 2012 campaign is set to bring in more from oil and gas lobbyists than was raised in the previous election. If there’s hope in matching corporate campaign donations, though, it’s not with money, but rather a national movement, comprised of the diverse voices of dissent that marched through Washington on Saturday.
by Deep Green Resistance News Service | Jul 18, 2012 | Mining & Drilling, Repression at Home
By Human Rights Watch
The Philippine government’s failure to address threats and killings of environmental advocates worsens a climate of lawlessness just as the Aquino administration is pushing for new mining investments.
On July 2, 2012, President Benigno Aquino III signed Executive Order No. 79, which aims to institutionalize reforms in the Philippine mining sector by “providing policies and guidelines to ensure environmental protection and responsible mining.” However, the executive order is silent on the issue of human rights abuses arising from mining investments and on the deployment of paramilitaries at the mines.
“President Aquino has enacted decrees to encourage mining investment in the Philippines but has done little to stop attacks on environmental advocates,” said Elaine Pearson, deputy Asia director. “He should recognize that respecting human rights is crucial for economic development.”
The government should redouble its investigations into attacks on advocates, particularly when evidence points to the involvement of the military or paramilitary forces, arrest and prosecute all those responsible, and protect witnesses at risk.
Human Rights Watch has documented three cases since October 2011 in which critics of mining and energy projects have been killed, allegedly by paramilitary forces under military control. The activists had been vocal in opposing mining and energy operations which they said threatened the environment and would displace tribal communities from their land.
Margarito J. Cabal, 47, an organizer of a group opposing a hydroelectric dam in Bukidnon province, was gunned down on May 9, 2012. Relatives allege that the police have not investigated the killing, and no suspect has been arrested. Cabal had told relatives that he was under military surveillance and had been called to meet the military regarding his activities.
On March 5, a leader of a paramilitary group with a dozen of his men allegedly shot dead Jimmy Liguyon, a village chief in Dao, San Fernando town, Bukidnon province, in front of family members. Relatives said he was killed because he refused to sign an agreement needed to secure a mining investment, and that he had been under military surveillance. The main suspect, the leader of a group called the New Indigenous People’s Army for Reforms, faces a warrant for his arrest, but has been seen going about his usual business in the village.
The local paramilitary group Bagani (“tribal warriors”), reportedly under military control, was allegedly responsible for the fatal shooting of Italian priest Father Fausto Tentorio, 59, in Arakan, North Cotabato province on October 17, 2011. Fr. Tentorio was a long-time advocate of tribal rights and opposed mining in the area. No one has been arrested for the killing, although the National Bureau of Investigation has recommended charges against four suspects. Tentorio’s colleagues have alleged that some suspects with military ties have been deliberately left out of the case, and two witnesses and their families are in hiding while others have been threatened.
“While mining and other environmentally sensitive projects promise economic benefits for Filipinos, they should not come at the expense of basic rights, particularly the lives of environmental advocates,” Pearson said. “The Aquino government should ensure that those responsible for these attacks are brought to justice.”
Many mining investments in the Philippines are in areas with large indigenous populations or are controlled by tribal groups. Philippine law requires the “free and prior informed consent” of the local tribal communities for these investments to proceed. This often has divided tribal communities, some of whom back investors with the support of the military to acquire the necessary permits, while tribal factions opposed to the investments sometimes get support from the communist New People’s Army or other armed groups. This has resulted in proxy conflicts pitting tribal groups against each other, resulting in numerous rights abuses.
Media and local human rights and environmental groups have reported other attacks against anti-mining and environmental advocates. Sister Stella Matutina, a Benedictine nun who led a grassroots campaign to oppose destructive mining in Davao Oriental, told Human Rights Watch that she continues to fear for her life as the military persists in vilifying her as a communist. She and her fellow advocates say that she is being targeted because of her opposition to mining in the province.
And even in cases where suspects have been identified and face an arrest warrant, they may go unpunished. For instance, former Palawan governor Joel Reyes remains at large despite an arrest warrant for his role in the killing of journalist and environmentalist Gerry Ortega on January 24, 2011.
On July 9, the United Nations special envoys on human rights defenders and on extrajudicial executions issued a joint statement criticizing the Aquino administration for the attacks on human rights and environmental defenders, saying these abuses “have increased significantly over the past few months.”
Human Rights Watch reiterated its call to President Aquino to ban all paramilitary forces in the Philippines because of their long and continuing history of serious human rights violations. Aquino has backtracked from earlier pledges to dismantle paramilitaries, saying that getting rid of military-supervised groups “is not the solution.” The government claims that paramilitary forces are now better trained and better regulated than in the past. Until such groups are banned, Aquino should revoke a 2011 directive that permits these forces to provide security for mining companies.
“Aquino should disband paramilitary groups that are being used to divide tribal communities and instill fear among the residents,” Pearson said. “The government crucially needs to hold accountable the military officers who are behind these abusive forces.”
Killings of Environmental Advocates Investigated by Human Rights Watch
Anti-Dam Activist Gunned Down
At approximately 6:30 p.m. on May 9, 2012, Margarito J. Cabal, 47, was shot dead by two men riding a motorcycle near his boarding house in Kibawe town, Bukidnon province. According to a police report seen by Cabal’s relatives, one of the assailants wore a motorcycle helmet, and the other a balaclava that covered his face; their motorcycle had no license plate.
Cabal was an organizer for Save Pulangi Alliance, which opposes the construction of a hydroelectric dam in the area, and a government employee for the mayor’s office. He is survived by his wife and three children.
Cabal’s son, Marjolie, told Human Rights Watch that prior to his father’s killing, the military’s 8th Infantry Battalion in nearby Maramag town had summoned Cabal on suspicion that he was working for the New People’s Army (NPA). “His job with the town mayor required that he would often go to hinterland villages. That might have given them the idea that he was an NPA,” Marjolie said. He said his father had told him he was under surveillance by the military.
The general secretary of the Save Pulangi Movement, a tribal leader named Datu Petronilo Cabungcal, said that the area has been the subject of military operations and that the military suspects his group is supporting the NPA. “We are just fighting for our land, our livelihood, that is threatened by this project. Why would that make us communists?” he said.
Cabal’s widow, Rosalie, told Human Rights Watch that the police never approached the family about any investigation and that, aside from a police report on the killing, there has not been any effort to investigate her husband’s death. “They never bothered to talk to us,” she said, adding that she did not know what would happen to the case.
Village Chief Shot Dead in Front of Family
Jimmy Liguyon was the village chief of Dao in San Fernando town and vice chairman of Kasilo, a tribal group opposed to mining and plantations in Bukidnon province. Witnesses told Human Rights Watch that on March 5, 2012, at around 6:40 p.m., they saw Alde “Butsoy” Salusad, a known leader of a local paramilitary group, fire an M16 assault rifle at Liguyon point blank. Salusad had arrived at Liguyon’s home accompanied by about a dozen men.
Liguyon’s widow, Sharon, told Human Rights Watch that the morning before the killing, Liguyon had reiterated his refusal in a village meeting to sign an agreement with a tribal group called San Fernando Matigsalog Tribal Datu Association. Liguyon feared the agreement would facilitate the entry of big mining companies into the tribal areas, where small-scale mining is a major source of livelihood.
In her sworn statement to prosecutors, Sharon said her husband had told her in October 2011 of a phone call he received from Benjamin Salusad, Alde Salusad’s father, in which the elder Salusad threatened to have Liguyon killed for not signing a document that would allow mining companies to operate in their village.
Days after the killing, Salusad’s group, the New Indigenous People’s Army for Reforms, issued a statement claiming responsibility, alleging that Liguyon was a communist. Credible media reports also said that Salusad, in a radio interview in Malaybalay City, had admitted to killing Liguyon.
Leah Tumbalang, a colleague of Liguyon in Kasilo, told Human Rights Watch: “Since we started protesting proposed mining projects, we have been getting threats and have been followed around by men.” Tumbalang said she received a text message on October 3, 2011, warning her and Liguyon to make sure to bring their coffins when they went home that day.
Leaders of local groups said Salusad and his father, Benjamin, are the leaders of a tribal group that serves as a paramilitary force for the army in that part of Bukidnon. Both father and son are known former members of the New People’s Army; they surrendered to the military last year and, according to Liguyon’s colleagues, became members of the CAFGU, the official militia under the command and supervision of the Philippine Army.
The police have investigated the killing and a murder case has been filed, naming Salusad and 14 unknown “John Does” as the suspects. A warrant of arrest was issued against him on April 30, 2012, but has not been served. The Bukidnon police chief, Supt. Rustom Duran told journalists that his men tried to arrest Salusad a month after the killing but failed. The governmental Commission on Human Rights of the Philippines has likewise promised to investigate the case but no official report on the investigation has been released.
According to residents interviewed by Human Rights Watch, Salusad continues to reside in Dao village, often accompanying individuals known to be close to the military.
Since Liguyon’s death, Salusad’s forces have allegedly threatened Liguyon’s relatives. Tumbalang, Liguyon’s colleague in Kasilo, claimed that she heard Salusad say in a radio interview that she “would be next” after Liguyon. The threats would come through text messages and, in some cases, Salusad’s men allegedly directly confronted Liguyon’s family members, threatening them with violence.
Italian Priest Known for Tribal Advocacy Killed
In the early morning of October 17, 2011, Father Fausto Tentorio, an Italian priest, was about to get into his vehicle inside the Catholic parish compound in Arakan town, North Cotabato province, in Mindanao, when a gunman shot him to death. Tentorio, 59, was a well-known advocate of tribal rights in Arakan and opposed mining in the area. He is the second Italian priest from the Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions (PIME) to be murdered in the Philippines. As in the case of Father Tullio Favali in April 1985, who was killed by the Civilian Home Defense Forces militia, the suspects in Tentorio’s killing are allegedly members of a paramilitary force.”
The Tentorio case remains under investigation. The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) has asked government prosecutors to file cases against four individuals – Jimmy Ato, his brother Robert Ato, Jose Sampulna and his brother Dimas Sampulna – but so far prosecutors have not sought arrest warrants.One of the suspects, Jimmy Ato, is currently in NBI custody after he was arrested for an unrelated case.
The two Atos are known in Arakan as members of a group called Bagani (“tribal warriors”). Bagani is a paramilitary force controlled and supervised by the 57th Infantry Battalion and has been based in the same military camp, according to government documents seen by Human Rights Watch. A former Bagani member told Human Rights Watch that Bagani operates in cooperation with local businessmen and tribal leaders who support new mining and other business projects. Witnesses have made sworn statements to the authorities stating that members of Bagani were responsible for Tentorio’s killing. However, other members of Bagani have not been included in the government’s investigation, despite witness accounts of their involvement in the killing.
According to government documents seen by Human Rights Watch, the military considered Tentorio an enemy for allegedly aiding the NPA, such as by helping wounded insurgents get medical assistance. One NBI “intelligence report” said Tentorio was an “oppositionist” to energy and mining projects that affected the tribes: “He was a respected leader by the Lumads [tribes], a very influential person who enjoyed the sympathy of the [communists] in the area. In short, he was a man of God that is hated most by those with evil motives.”
Father Peter Geremia, an Italian priest also with the PIME, said that various members of Bagani and businessmen who supported the group were not included in the NBI’s original charge sheet despite eyewitness evidence linking them to the killing. For instance, one witness told prosecutors that businessmen and the military provided a local tribal leader with a 50,000-peso “budget” for carrying out the killing. In his sworn statement filed with prosecutors, the witness said the leader of the Bagani, Jan Corbala, met with his men days before to plot the killing. Another witness said in his sworn statement that he saw Corbala and the Ato brothers fleeing the crime scene moments after Tentorio was shot. He said Jimmy Ato told him that “killing that priest was rather easy.”
Fr. Tentorio had previously faced intimidation from the military, including a June 2009 raid in which army soldiers barged into the church compound without a warrant and with no clear purpose.
For years, the military and Bagani vilified Tentorio and Geremia as NPA supporters. For instance, during a briefing for journalists in May 2006, military intelligence officers from the 40th Infantry Battalion in North Cotabato accused both priests of being communists who taught “revolutionary courses” to the tribal population. The Diocese of Kidapawan complained several times to the authorities, including then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, about the military’s harassment and alleged attempts on Tentorio’s life by Bagani. “We cannot overemphasize the need to stop this baseless accusation of our priests and lay workers,” Kidapawan Bishop Romulo Valles wrote to Col. Isagani Cachuela, then commander of the army’s 602nd Brigade, on March 24, 2004. “And this must be done soonest, before name-tagging could claim another life.”
Officials from the Philippine military and the NBI, in separate interviews with Human Rights Watch, denied allegations of military involvement in the killing and a cover-up. Col. Cesar Sedillo, commander of the army’s 602nd Brigade that covers North Cotabato, said no military personnel was involved in Tentorio’s murder and denied the existence of Bagani.”
Angelito Magno, the NBI’s regional director in North Cotabato who is leading the investigation, said, “We are continuously investigating who are the masterminds” of the killing. He also denied that the bureau is protecting the military, saying it is guided by the evidence.
The witnesses in the case feel threatened by Fr. Tentorio’s killers. Those who entered the government’s Witness Protection Program have been compelled to leave Arakan with their families and go into hiding. Fr. Geremia said that he has repeatedly written to the Justice Department urging action, to expedite the case by forming a special investigation, to protect the witnesses. “The witnesses are about to give up hope and feel that your WPP [Witness Protection Program] is causing them to be like prisoners while the accused roam around freely threatening their families,” Geremia said in a May 29 letter to Justice Secretary Leila de Lima.
By Human Rights Watch: http://www.hrw.org/news/2012/07/18/philippines-killings-environment-advocates-unpunished
