IBON filed a complaint with the Office of the\nOmbudsman to hold government officials accountable for their malicious and\nbaseless red-tagging of so many activists, individuals and groups especially\nsince the creation of the so-called National Task Force to End Local Communism\nand Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) in 2018.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We focused on red-tagging because this is what\nthe Duterte administration has been doing to IBON. Our\ncomplaint is just a small one of many efforts to make sure that government\nofficials do not get away with their bad behavior. Bad behavior should be\npunished \u2013 and Major General Antonio Parlade, Jr, Presidential\nCommunications and Operations Office (PCOO) Undersecretary Lorraine Badoy, and\nNational Security Adviser Hermogenes Esperon have been behaving very badly. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Gen. Parlade, Usec. Badoy and Gen. Esperon\ncannot just accuse activists of terrorism with only the spectral evidence in\ntheir minds. They cannot be allowed to use government resources for their\nmalicious ends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Yet, we are also conscious that there is more\nto red-tagging than mere vilification \u2013 it is the administration\u2019s\ngateway drug to more vicious persecution and even violent attacks on\nactivists. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Red-tagging is a prelude to illegal arrests of activists and raids\non their offices, as with the five activists in Tacloban, Leyte a few days ago\nor the dozens more in Bacolod and Manila in October and November 2019. There\nhave already been some 3,300 illegal arrests under the Duterte administration.\nRed-tagging has already been the death knell for far too many, with 293\nactivists already extrajudicially killed by suspected State forces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It is easy to see red-tagging as merely the paranoid defense of an\nadoring government propagandist. Or the result of small-minded militarist\nthinking where every Leftist is an enemy to be neutralized. The comical claims\nand farcical arguments do not make sense otherwise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Unfortunately, the red-tagging of the Duterte administration is\nmuch more and, clearly, just the first step of a much larger and more sinister\nagenda. The NTF-ELCAC claims counterinsurgency and even peace objectives but is\nreally the hub of a great wheel of authoritarianism and repression. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The administration is out to stifle dissent and to put down all\nprotest, focusing on the most determined, most vocal, and most organized\nindividuals and groups in the country. Red-tagging paints activists as\nterrorists to portray them as threats, and disparages activism to keep people\ndocile. It is creating a climate of fear and repression to intimidate all who\ndare challenge its rule. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
In doing so, it is also closing what little democratic space there\nis in the country and defending the unjust social and economic status quo. The\nreason there are so many activists in the country among non-government\norganizations, students and youth, teachers, workers, farmers, fisherfolk,\nindigenous peoples, migrants, women, artists, journalists, lawyers,\nprofessionals, and elsewhere is because of widespread disillusionment with the\nsystem. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Duterte administration is defending wealth and power under the\nguise of national security and anti-terrorism. Repression will of course not\ncure social and economic distress. It will just further damage the prospects\nfor development and improving the lives of tens of millions of Filipinos\nseeking real change for the better. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Gen. Parlade and Usec. Badoy are fond of challenging activists to\ndenounce so-called \u2018communist-terrorists\u2019 as if they have found an unassailable\nargument for their accusations. We are sane enough to not get caught up in\ntheir deluded fantasies. We do challenge them to prove that we are guilty of\nanything. They will not be able to, because we do not do anything illegal and\nhave nothing to recant. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
We however will continue to conspire to study the economy and,\nwith the organized groups they so fear, continue to advocate for the radical\nreforms the Filipino people need and deserve. For a start, we defy and will\novercome the red-tagging. ###<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
IBON filed a complaint with the Office of the Ombudsman to hold government officials accountable for their malicious and baseless red-tagging of so many activists, individuals and groups especially since the creation of the so-called National Task Force to End Local Communism and Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) in 2018. We focused on red-tagging because this is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":8735,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2048,14,961],"tags":[2157,2161,347,2107,2162,2158,2160,2155,2154,2143],"class_list":["post-9013","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-banner","category-news","category-statement","tag-antonio-parlade","tag-bishop-sol-toquero","tag-duterte-administration","tag-eo70","tag-hermogenes-esperon","tag-lorraine-badoy","tag-ntf-elcac","tag-office-of-the-ombudsman","tag-red-tagging-complaint","tag-vilification","wpautop"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-07-23 18:18:01","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9013","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9013"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9013\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9014,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9013\/revisions\/9014"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8735"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9013"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9013"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9013"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}