Group documents cases of abuse of women by cops

NCRPO Chief Guillermo Eleazar berates PO1 Edgardo Valencia for his rape case of a minor. (Photo: The Philippine Star/Edd Gumban)

Following reports about a police officer who raped the 15-year-old daughter of detained drug pushers in exchange for their freedom, the Center for Women’s Resources (CWR) said it had documented 13 cases of abuse committed by policemen from January 2017 to July 2018.

These comprise eight cases of rape, three cases of acts of lasciviousness, one case of harassment, and one case of physical assault, the group said.

“We think [the] war on drugs becomes an excuse for sexual abuse. We documented that [out of the 13] there were seven cases wherein they arrested suspected drug addicts or during a drug operations wherein a sexual abuse took place,” said Jojo Guan, CRW executive director.

Guan added that the abuses were either committed on innocent individuals during a drug operation or the victim was tagged as a drug suspect.

Police Officer 1 Edgardo Valencia had earlier told National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) Chief Guillermo Eleazar that raping children of suspected drug pushers was not new to the Philippine National Police (PNP).

“Hindi na bago sa ating operatiba yung ganun (this is not new among our operatives),” Valencia told Eleazar after he was taken to the Manila Police District (MPD) Station 4 in Sampaloc, Manila.

Reports said that the suspect allegedly brought the girl to a motel in Sta. Mesa and raped her in exchange for the freedom of her parents who were previously arrested on drug charges.

Kabataan Rep. Sarah Elago said in a statement that such treatment of the poor, women, and children was “downright deplorable” but “not surprising” and cited the recent controversy at the PNP Academy where three cadets allegedly ordered lower classmen to perform oral sex as punishment for violations they had committed.

“It is even more appalling that instead of reproach, these acts elicit praise from our dear President Duterte,” she said.

Gabriela echoed this statement and said that Duterte’s “misogyny and perverted exhortations have nurtured the culture of rape and impunity that now gnaws on what is left of the PNP’s credibility.”

“The youth and the people demand for accountability from the government, or else, it is they who will hold Duterte and his men accountable and render justice on them,” Elago said.

“We will push for an independent investigation into these cases of abuse committed by PNP officers, as we cannot rely on the rotten institution to clean its ranks,” Gabriela added.

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Duterte’s trust rating recovers

After previous surveys showed declines, the third quarter (June to September) trust rating of President Duterte rebounded by five points, the latest survey conducted by Social Weather Stations (SWS) said.

The survey, conducted from Sept. 15 to 23 with the results released yesterday, revealed that 74 percent of adult Filipinos have much trust in the President.

Twelve percent said they had little trust in Duterte, while the remaining 14 percent were undecided.

This gave the President a net trust rating of “very good” +62, five points higher than the “very good” +57 (70 percent much trust, 13 percent little trust) that he obtained in June.

It was also the first time that Duterte’s trust rating improved this year, following a 10-point decline to “very good” +65 (76 percent much trust, 10 percent little trust, rounded off) in March and another eight-point drop to +57 in June.

Throughout his presidency, SWS said Duterte has an average net trust rating of +68 (78 percent much trust, 12 percent little trust).

The net trust rating is the rounded off difference between those who said they have much trust and have little trust with the President.

SWS classifies net trust ratings of at least +70 as “excellent”; +50 to +69 as “very “good”; +30 to +49 as “good”; +10 to +29 as “moderate”; +9 to -9 as “neutral”; -10 to -29 as “poor”; -30 to -49 as “bad”; -50 to -69 as “very bad”; and -70 and below as “execrable.”

According to SWS, the five-point increase in Duterte’s overall net trust rating was due to increases in Metro Manila and the rest of Luzon, combined with steady scores in the Visayas and Mindanao.

Net trust in Duterte rose by nine points and one grade in Metro Manila, from “good” +42 in June to “very good” +51 in September.

It also increased 10 points in the rest of Luzon, from “very good” +50 to “very good” +60.

It stayed at “good” +49 in the Visayas, while slightly dropped from “excellent” +88 to “excellent” +86 in Mindanao.

SWS said Duterte has “very” good net trust ratings across all educational levels.

The survey had 1,500 respondents and an error margin of +/- three percent for national percentages.

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Overstayer jailed for $211k theft

Sentencing was at Eastern court

By Vir B. Lumicao

A former maid has been jailed 9 months and 3 weeks after admitting in Eastern Court that she stole $211,000 worth of diamond jewelry and a tablet computer from her employer, then stayed illegally in Hong Kong for more than three years.

Fedelita R. Sante, 48, cried as Magistrate Peter Law sentenced her on Nov 5 to eight months in jail for theft and one month and three weeks for overstaying, to be served consecutively.

Law said he had discounted the sentences by one-third for the Filipina’s guilty pleas.

“Thank you,” Sante said in between sobs after the sentencing.

The prosecution said that Sante stole a diamond necklace with a diamond pendant, a diamond ring and an iPad Air tablet computer between Jan 6 and Feb 4, 2015 from her employer, Melanie Helene Silvie Viquel.

Investigators valued the necklace with pendant at $200,000, the ring at $5,000 and the tablet at $6,000.

At the time of the offense, Sante was employed as Viquel’s helper in her flat at Sum Way Mansion in Sai Ying Pun. The 37-year-old French employer hired Sante in November 2013.

Sante arrived in Hong Kong on Dec 11, 2013 with a domestic worker visa that was valid until Dec 11, 2014, but she failed to apply for an extension, the prosecutor said.

On Feb 4, 2015, the helper left without notice and became unreachable. When Viquel checked her belongings, she discovered her jewelry and tablet were gone.

After the theft was reported to police, investigators checked with pawnshops and one operator tipped them off that the defendant, who presented her Hong Kong ID card, hocked the necklace and iPad Air in January 2015.

The prosecution said Viquel paid the pawnshop $1,700 to recover the pawned items. Police returned the necklace to the victim and kept the tablet for examination. The only unrecovered item was the $5,000 diamond ring.

  

Sante went underground while she was hunted down by the police. She was arrested on Oct 5 for overstaying when she surrendered at 3:27pm to Immigration officers at Skyline Tower in Kowloon Bay.

Officers who ran a record check then discovered she was wanted for theft. 

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Health Wise free check-ups attract large crowd on launch day

Labor Attache Dela Torre watches as his staff and volunteers administer the free health checks

By Vir B. Lumicao

Close to 200 overseas Filipino workers availed of free health checks at the launch of Project Health Wise on Sunday, Nov. 4 at the Philippine Overseas Labor Office in Wanchai.

The warm response prompted Labor Attaché Jalilo dela Torre to open a Saturday edition of his brainchild project to cater for workers who take their holiday on that day.

Project Health Wise is conducted by POLO-Overseas Workers Welfare Administration Hong Kong in collaboration with Filipino Nurses Association, BSK and Integrated Midwives Association of the Philippines.

It is held at the community hall of POLO’s 18^th floor offices and is open to all OFWs.

Labatt Dela Torre told The SUN that POLO staff will work overtime on Saturdays to provide the health check. The official said he is looking for about five volunteers who can help staff attend to workers who want to avail of the health check on this day.

Those who want a check-up on a weekday may see either Assistant Labor Attaché Angelica Suñga or OWWA staff Joszoa Villa, both registered nurses, Dela Torre said.

The check-ups offered consist of vital signs, blood glucose, urine, uric acid, HIV, syphilis, and hepatitis checks. Volunteer nurses also provide breast self-examination tips.

As of 4pm, Suñga and her team had reportedly administered blood glucose checks to 155 workers. There were others who skipped this test and went for just the free blood pressure check-up.

A group of physical therapists led by Bona Cresencia provided free massage service.

The health service started at 8:30am and closed at 5pm.

“The aim is to enable our OFWs to recognize vital signs that could potentially lead to serious health issues in the future,” he said in a post on Facebook.

He encouraged more workers to avail of the free health service.

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Duterte govt blamed for deaths of Filipino tribes people

By Vir B. Lumicao

The Duterte administration has caused the violent deaths of 48 indigenous people and 169 political killings, a tribal leader has claimed.

Piya Macliing Malayao, secretary general of the Katribu Kalipunan ng Katutubong Mamamayan ng Pilipinas, also accused three government agencies of colluding to abet open pit mining, despite an ban imposed on former Department of Environment and Natural Resources secretary Gina Lopez.

Piya Macliing Malayao

Malayao said the DENR, along with the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples and the armed forces, are allowing giant mining firms to continue their open pit operations despite the ban.

She spoke live via Skype from the Philippines as guest speaker of the Tribal Filipino Sunday second anniversary celebration on Oct 21 in Annie Li Hall of the St John’s Cathedral on Garden Road, Central.

Malayao alleged that 16 aerial bombings that targeted Lumad areas in Mindanao and Cordillera communities had affected 7,000 people.

Worse, she said, the military planes were using phosphorous bombs, which have been banned internationally because they cause greater damage than conventional bombs.

Tribal Filipino Sunday with various Cordillera group leaders . 

The threat is made worse by President Rodrigo Duterte’s threat in July last year to blast Lumad
schools because they allegedly operate without government permits and teach the students to rebel against the government.

“Get out of there, I’m telling the Lumads now. I’ll have those bombed, including your structures,” Duterte was reported as saying in a press conference, as he vowed to retaliate against communist rebels who had been allegedly attacking bridges and government schools.

“I will use the armed forces, the Philippine air force. I’ll really have those bombed … because you are operating illegally and you are teaching the children to rebel against government,” he reportedly said.

Malayao said at least one classroom has been torched in more than 140 various forms of attacks on schools that have forced the closure of about 70 Lumad schools.

She said the schools had been put up by church groups in cooperation with indigenous and other organizations because there are no government schools in Lumad areas. As a result, more than 2,600 young Lumads have been deprived of education.

Evacuations caused by military operations in indigenous communities in two years have allegedly reached 53 incidences that have affected more than 27,000 people.

Malayao, a granddaughter of Cordillera woman activist Mother Petra Macliing who played a crucial role in resisting the Chico River Dam project during Martial Law, scored Duterte’s Build, Build, Build program, saying it would displace indigenous communities and ruin their cultural heritage.

She said the proposed 9,000-hectare New Clark City that will straddle Pampanga, Tarlac and Zambales will dislodge Aetas from their ancestral homeland.

The China-funded Chico River Pump Irrigation Project in Kalinga, Balog-balog Dam in Tarlac and New Centennial Resource-Kaliwa Dam at Panay River Basin Integrated Development Project in Panay will be set up in indigenous areas, Malayao said.

At present, giant mining companies continue to operate in more than 520,000 hectares of indigenous ancestral land while agro-industrial plantations owned by foreign companies are expanding in Mindanao and Palawan under deals signed with Duterte, she said.

These include 120,000 hectares earmarked for palm oil plantations in Mindanao and Palawan, in addition to 500,000 hectares already occupied by plantations on Lumad territory in Mindanao, Malayao said.

She said all indigenous communities should unite and oppose government development projects that will deprive them of their ancestral lands with the use the military in order to hand them over to foreign companies.

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Free Mario!

By Daisy Catherine L. Mandap

This issue we again print a contribution from Mario delos Reyes, one of our most prolific and best-informed contributors, who just happens to be in Stanley Prison, serving a life sentence for murder.

Mario has been in jail for nearly 25 years. He had hoped that given his exemplary record in prison he could be freed shortly after spending 20 years in the maximum-security prison, but this did not happen.

Under Hong Kong’s laws, life-termers like Mario could apply with the Long-Term Prison Sentence Review Board to give them a fixed sentence so they could eventually be set free. And normally, such applications are made when a long-term prisoner has passed the 20-year mark.

A case in point was local man Ho Tung-sing, who was arrested last May for his involvement in a brazen robbery in Tsim Sha Tsui. It was later revealed that 60-year-old Ho had been involved in a series of violent robberies three decades ago for which he got 17 life sentences. But following a review, his indeterminate sentence was fixed at a minimum of 20 years, and as a result, he was released in 2014.

Mario has been trying for the past five years to get the Review Board to also hear his plea for a fixed term, to no avail. In the last hearing of his application in July last year, the Board said it was convinced that the period he had served was “insufficient in all the circumstances to warrant consideration for early release.”

This was despite the many testimonials submitted by various people urging for Mario’s early release, including Catholic Chaplain Patrick Colgan and several other leaders from the church, civil society and other sectors, including this writer.

Fr. Colgan said the Board’s decision that Mario had not served enough jail time was “astonishing,” given his spotless record in detention and his positive behavior and demeanor.

“Until when will the period served be deemed to be ‘sufficient’? What internationally recognized criteria are used for this? It is quite bewildering to both inmate and those, like chaplains, to assist you and the CSD in his rehabilitation, to be offered such a statement, with no reasons given?” said Colgan in an impassioned letter he sent to the Board.

His frustration was understandable, for there could be no better model prisoner than Mario. Not only has he managed to stick to prison rules during his long confinement, he has also put his time inside to good use, reading all materials he could lay his hands on, and taking up all the free courses offered to inmates.

“Kung may law course lang na offered, siguro abugado na ako ngayon,” (If a law course was offered, I would have been a lawyer by now), he said wryly in one of the many letters he has sent us through the years, all done in his neat, cursive handwriting.

Mario’s compassionate nature is also shown by his effort to cheer up female prisoners, mostly those jailed for acting as drug couriers. Through his encouragement, a number of them have also submitted articles to us to speak about their ordeal, and to warn others about the dangers of getting involved in the drug trade.

But beyond Mario’s good nature and achievements inside jail, one is pricked more by the thought that he could have been unfairly sent away for a murder he did not commit.

High Court Judge J. Stuart Mooore, who presided over Mario’s trial in 1993, said in a letter dated Sept 1, 1995 that “a verdict of manslaughter might have been recorded by a more merciful jury against these defendants (Mario and another) on the basis of a joint enterprise falling short of the intention necessary for murder.”

Clearly, the trial judge himself was not convinced that Mario and his co-accused had committed murder; that the jury, had it been more merciful, should have given a verdict of manslaughter, for which a 7-year jail term would already be on the high side.

A veteran court interpreter who was at the trial had confided many years ago that she was not convinced of Mario’s guilt. But she was reasonable enough to admit it was the jury which had to decide on the case, and not anyone else.

To this day, Mario who is now 61, is adamant he was not the one who stabbed to death the Filipino victim in that gang brawl in Saikung. So resolute was he in denying any culpability that he rejected his lawyer’s suggestion that he plead guilty to manslaughter so he could get off with a much lighter sentence.

But his once fierce proclamation of his innocence is rarely heard nowadays. Having done jail time for a quarter of a century, all he wants now is to be free again, and do things many people have come to take for granted, like using a mobile phone and a computer, or even just to feel the breeze from outside prison blowing in his face again.

Mario has suffered long enough. He should be freed.