Palparan sows fascist terror in Eastern Visayas
Maj. Gen. Jovito Palparan, newly appointed chief of the 8th ID, has already begun to unleash fascism in Eastern Visayas.
Barely three weeks into his new role, Palparan launched his opening salvo with the attempted murder on February 18 of Fr. Allan Caparro of the Iglesia Filipina Independiente and vice chairperson of the Promotion of Church People�s Response (PCPR) in the region. Caparro and his wife Aileen were both wounded after three men armed with .45 caliber handguns aboard a motorcycle shot them. Fr. Caparro actively opposed large-scale mining because of the harm it would bring to the people of the region.
On March 6, a company of soldiers from the 63rd IB who even brought along an armored personnel carrier positioned themselves in front of the Bayan Muna-Northern Samar and Katungod-Eastern Visayas offices in Catarman, Northern Samar to intimidate activists opposed to intensifying militarization in Catubig and other towns of Northern Samar. When Bayan Muna Congressman Teodoro Casi�o went to Catarman to press for the withdrawal of the 63rd IB troops, he was tailed by military forces on his way back to Manila.
On March 14, Atty. Felidito Dacut, Bayan Muna coordinator for Eastern Visayas was murdered. He was a human rights lawyer who defended victims of military violence in the region. Dacut had just come from the Bayan Muna office when he was shot by suspected military elements in Tacloban City. He was also the newly elected chairman of the Integrated Bar of the Philippines (IBP) in Samar.
Palparan�s brutal record as an officer detailed to various Philippine Army units in different regions of the Philippines is unmistakable.
As chief of the 24th IB in Central Luzon from the latter part of the 1980s to 1991, Palparan was involved in the capture and torture of peasant organizers and other activists, mass arrests and fake surrenders and in bombing a community.
In 1992, when he was transferred to Mountain Province, he was responsible for six cases of illegal arrest, five cases of harassment and one case of abduction. One person was wounded and there were two cases of forced evacuation during his watch. Sixty-one cases of human rights violations were recorded in 2001 when he headed Task Force Banahaw in Rizal and Laguna. In less than two years as commander of the 204th Brigade in Oriental Mindoro from 2001 to 2003, up to 27 activists were killed, including mass leaders Eden Marcellana and Eddie Gumanoy.
In light of all this, the National Democratic Front (NDF) in Eastern Visayas avers that there can be no one else responsible for the further intensification of fascist violence in the region.
No less than Palparan, the so-called �butcher of Mindoro� confirms this perception. On March 5, in his first media interview as 8th ID chief, Palparan indicated what more he had in store under his term of office.
He boasted of crushing all opponents of the reactionary government�both the �armed enemies of the state� and �agitators��in six months. He also agreed with the AFP proposal to penalize media personnel who interview persons branded as terrorists.
Palparan himself has said it: he would not differentiate between the armed and unarmed, civilians and combatants, those operating aboveground or underground. For the US-Arroyo regime, Palparan is the epitome of the barefaced fascist terrorism and repression that it would like to install.
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