PNoy urged to end violence against indigenous peoples

A human rights leader called on the Aquino government to end the violence perpetrated against indigenous peoples.

Judy Pasimio, executive director of Legal Rights and Natural Resources Center urged President Benigno Aquino III to stop the state of impunity under his administration.

Mining companies should be made accountable for human rights violations, Pasimio said in a statement, urging Aquino to review the government’s skewed mining policy that tramples on human rights and brings irreversible destruction of the environment.

Pasimio lamented that mining has slowly become “synonymous to violence,” as many advocates have been murdered because of their strong stance against mining.

On October 14, Datu Roy Gallego, a Manobo chieftain in Surigao del Sur was killed in an ambush. Gallego, who was also a broadcaster, was a known anti-mining tribal leader.

Last October 17, PIME missionary Fr. Fausto Tentorio, a strong defender of the lumads and known for his anti-mining stance was also gunned down by a motorcycle-riding assassin.

Pasimio noted that the murder happened just few days after Aquino approved the mining companies’ proposal to allow the formation and funding of militias for their protection, at a time the nation celebrates National Indigenous Peoples Month.

She rued Aquino’s apparent ignorance of the human rights violations suffered by rural communities in the hands of private armies that protect big business like mining and logging.

Aquino’s decision to allow mining corporations to have their own paramilitary units for their protection can be taken that [he is] for mining and against those who oppose it, Pasimio said.

It is appalling, she added, that the indigenous people like Datu Gallego and those who support their struggles, are militarized and killed for defending their rights to their territories.

“[While] mining companies, which pose grave threats to the environment, the livelihoods of the peoples, the integrity of the communities, and to the lives of those who defend these, are given protection by the Aquino government,” Pasimio said.

“This should not be allowed to happen. Not anymore,” she stressed.

She urged for the enactment of an alternative mining bill, saying it “will seriously address the issues being raised against current mining operations and the government’s mining policy” that favors mining corporations.

“Mr. President, it’s time now to listen not to the people who funded your presidential campaign, but to those who actually voted for you,” Pasimio added.