RP's Progressive Groups Appeal To Yanks For Help

DAVAO CITY - Progressive group Suara party list on Wednesday called on all US citizens to pressure their government on the tenacious incidents of extrajudicial killings in the Philippines, a country that receives millions of dollars-worth of financial assistance from the American government.

This, as Bayan, the largest among progressive groups in the country, also sounded the call for the US Congress to stop supporting the Philippine government with financial aids as it continues to show its inutility in solving the killings of militant leaders and members, students and journalists now numbering close to a thousand since 2001, the year when Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo became president.

Abubakar Uy, secretary general of Suara-Southern Mindanao, said Americans, who are fighters of freedom and democracy, can actually press their own government to stop supporting the Philippines’ security agents who are blamed for the series of killings.

“Americans must realize that the money they giving their government in the form of tax are now used to finance the slaughter of hundreds of Filipinos. They must realize that they are actually supporting the evil desires of a criminal government which is out to murder all of those whom it consider enemy as it desires to stay in power,” Uy said in a statement sent to the Mindanao Examiner.

“So we appeal to all Americans to ask the US government suspend its financial aids to a country like the Philippines…a country that is hell-bent in murdering hapless civilians. While US aids continue to pour in to the country and finds its way into the military, deaths will never stop,” Uy said.

The United Nations human rights expert Prof. Phillip Alston and the Philippine-government backed Melo Commission which was tasked to investigate the series of killings, both agreed of the military’s culpability in the death.

The government has denied this. The US Congress will discuss next week the cases of killing in the country and Philippine officials have so far showed an image of confidence on the result of the investigation.

Immediately, Justice Secy. Raul Gonzales said the government will clear its name.

For Suara, the culpability of the government is so obvious already that it can never persuade anyone that it is not behind the killings. Although the idea of the US government investigating the cases of extra-judicial killings in the Philippines doesn’t sit well with progressive groups like Suara, the idea of the international community giving attention to human rights abuses happening in a democratic country like the Philippines is a welcome development.

“What is more important is for the people around the world to know that the Philippine government is killing its own people and if their government will pledge support to the Philippine government, it would only mean that they too supports the slaughter of the Filipino people,” Yap said.