Benguet PNP arrested local tourists, not NPA
Chadli Molintas Command
New People's Army - Ilocos-Cordillera
February 20, 2006
Martin Montana
Chadli Molintas Command Spokesperson
The Chadli Molintas Command (NPA-Cordillera) strongly denounces the 1604th Provincial Mobile Group and 3rd Coy of the Regional Mobile Group of the Philippine National Police for their craven and unwarranted arrest, torture and frame-up of eleven young people visiting the Cordillera. The victims, including a 15-year old girl, were illegally arrested, threatened with guns, hogtied, beaten with wood slats, and even electrocuted by the police. They were tortured into admitting they were part of an NPA unit that successfully raided the 54th IB detachment in barangay Cabiten, Mankayan. The victims, all in the prime of their youth, simply wanted to experience the thrill of trekking through the beautiful countryside of the Cordillera only to end up as victims of police brutality. They are not members of the NPA, and even if they were, their right to due process should have been respected. The inhuman treatment and near death they suffered at the hands of the PNP will traumatize them for life.
The police committed the above atrocities to cover up their cowardly conduct during the raid on the Cabiten detachment. Instead of riding out to reinforce the beleaguered detachment, the 1604th PMG and other PNP units in the area hunkered down and hid in their camps and outposts. They went to the Cabiten detachment, arrogantly strutting their weapons, only when they were sure that the raiding NPA unit had withdrawn.
This is not the first time that the various Benguet PNP units displayed such deplorable conduct and recklessness. They have pointed their guns and used violence on women and children when they harassed the picket lines of striking workers of the Lepanto Consolidated Mining Company. During their investigation of the 2003 gold heist in Lepanto, they murdered Efren Agsayang, a deaf-mute whom they mistook for one of the robbers. They arrested and tortured Joseph Coop, a lame man, on suspicion that he was also one of the robbers. Coop was later proven innocent when the real robbers were captured. Instead of meting out punishment for their gross incompetence, bungling performance and recklessness, PNP Chief Arturo Lomibao instead awarded the perpetrators with commendations and promotions.
The 1604th PMG and other police units are fierce warriors when attacking women, children, and the handicapped, but are like dogs with tails tucked between their legs when confronted with the NPA.
The Benguet PNP is notorious for its reckless disregard and monstrous violations of human rights of civilians and also of NPA Red fighters. On August 17, 2005 PNP personnel under Sr. Insp. Crispin Ongican arrested, tortured, murdered, and brutalized the bodies of NPA cadres Antonio "Ka Leyap" Licawen and Brandon "Ka Tub-on" Ginaman in Buguias, Benguet. Both victims were unarmed and were not resisting arrest and yet they were not accorded their rights under internationally recognized humanitarian rules of war. In 1985, Henry Dayag, currently assigned with the PNP in Buguias, led the unit that killed, beheaded, and brutalized the corpses of three NPA cadres, among them Fr. Nilo Valerio, in Bakun, Benguet. Their bodies have never been found.
All these are an outrageous affront to basic human decency and morality. It brings to mind the statement by an infamous American general who avenged the ambush of his men by razing Balangiga town in Samar to the ground: "Kill and burn, kill and burn. The more you kill and burn the more you will please me."
For the PNP and the military, there is honor in arresting and torturing the innocent. There is valor in meting out violence on those who are unable to defend themselves. There is courage in slinking away from combat. This is how they "protect and serve." Lomibao would know all these. After all, he did his share in conjuring lies and torturing the helpless during the Marcos dictatorship and after.
It is ironic that the people of the Cordillera and the rest of the country are ravaged and murdered by those sworn to protect and serve them. It galls further that drug lords, gambling lords, criminal syndicates and other nefarious entities are able to operate under the auspices and protection of the PNP and military.
Those who daily rail against injustice in this society are subject to summary execution by the PNP and the military. This is the current policy of the abominable Arroyo regime. Activist leaders like Pepe Manegdeg and Albert Terreda�o were murdered for advocating a change of the prevailing corrupt system. Those in power would torture and murder the innocent to preserve their corrupt rule. Leaders of the legal mass movement are treated as targets of police and military harassment and assassination.
Driven by a twisted sense of honor and glory, the PNP and military commit horrendous and barbaric acts of savagery. These so-called guardians of society, these reckless barbarians, these vindictive criminals in uniform, ought to be condemned and swiftly punished with revolutionary justice.
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Attached are grim photographs showing the mutilated bodies of Ka Leyap and Ka Tub-on for reference. Please be forewarned that the photographs are extremely shocking.
Check out the following links for further references on the Benguet PNP's despicable record:
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