The US-Marcos regime and private corporations and businesses are relentlessly driving the urban poor out of their communities this April. They divest the urban poor of their right to housing, livelihood, and life amid the worsening economic crisis driven by the imperialist war of the US and Israel against Iran and the US-Marcos regime’s incompetence.

In Quezon City, the National Housing Authority demolished on April 9 the houses and structures along NIA Road, Barangay Pinyahan that remained after successive fires hit the community. Police arrested seven residents at the height of the demolition. Meanwhile, a demolition in Cambridge in Barangay E. Rodriguez in Cubao evicted more than 30 families.

Nearly 1,000 Monocrete Construction Company personnel and 300 Philippine National Police (PNP) and SWAT personnel dismantled the barricade of residents opposing the demolition in Panday Creekside, Barangay Palingon-Tipas, Taguig City on April 13. Police used tear gas and threw bottles at residents, while police snipers around the area aimed. Seven individuals were arrested in the demolition.

Several houses have already been torn down and an estimated 300 families of sharers, renters, and tenants face eviction from the community. Up to 218 residents, including 35 children, 14 elderly, five persons with disabilities, and four pregnant women are staying in roadside makeshift shelters.

Bambang Land Corporation and police violently demolished more than 70 houses in Purok 6B, Barangay Bambang, Los Baños, Laguna on April 14. They treacherously carried out the demolition when a dialogue was being held between residents and the company on that same day. Residents have lived in Purok 6B for six decades, and in 2004 the government recognized their rights to their occupied land.

At least 40 families were disrupted by the forced fencing of their community on Calachuchi Road, Barangay Andagao, Kalibo, Aklan on April 15. The community was surrounded with metal sheets, caging residents, including the elderly, pregnant women, and children. Landowner Jesus Daroy is driving residents out.

The Iloilo City local government violently drove away street vendors in front of the privatized Iloilo Terminal Market operated by SM Prime on the night of April 10. The Local Economic Enterprise Office, the PNP, and SWAT carried out this operation. They confiscated goods and robbed the vendors of their personal belongings and cash. Harassment and eviction continued in the following days.

A Davao City community local government demolished and evicted an estimated 100 families in Matina Aplaya on April 14. Residents plan to file a case in court against the illegal demolition.

Meanwhile, authorities violently dismantled the protest camp of more than 2,000 urban poor from Quezon City, Caloocan City, and Bulacan at the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) national office in Barangay Batasan Hills, Quezon City that started on April 13. They demanded compensation or indemnification for those affected by disasters since 2025. Police repeatedly threatened and assaulted the urban poor, including the elderly and women.

According to the Katipunan ng mga Samahang Manggagawa (Kasama, or Alliance of Workers’ Associations), a National Democratic Front of the Philippines allied organization, intensifying repression and exploitation are further pushing the urban poor and semi-proletariat to take the path of people’s democratic revolution. The group called to strengthen and consolidate their basic organizations—unions, community associations, livelihood-based organizations, and people’s organizations—as well as revolutionary organizations of workers and semi-proletariat.

“Our movement must vigorously strengthen and expand the struggles for democratic rights through militant mass actions that challenge and further indict the very foundations of the reactionary system,” it said.