NDF-EV condemns attack on Tacloban 5 as crackdown on legal democratic opposition
The National Democratic Front-Eastern Visayas today strongly assailed “the fascist tyranny of the simultaneous illegal raids last February 7 by Duterte government forces on the offices of progressive organizations in Tacloban City, Leyte, and the arrests of a journalist and human rights defenders on false charges and evidence.” As reported in the media, those taken into custody, dubbed Tacloban 5, were: Frenchiemae Cumpio, executive director for local alternative media outfit Eastern Vista; Alexander Philip Abinguna, coordinator of human rights organization Katungod-Sinirangan Bisayas; Rai Legion of Bagong Alyansang Makabayan-Eastern Visayas; Marissa Cabaljao, spokersperson of People Surge, and her one-year-old baby; and Mariell Domanquill, staff member of Rural Missionaries of the Philippines.
“We vigorously condemn the 8th Infantry Division of the Philippine Army and the Philippine National Police for attacking and arresting these activists in the latest incident of the Duterte regime’s rising fascist tyranny,” said NDF-EV spokersperson Fr. Santiago “Ka Sanny” Salas. “The Red-tagging and attack on Tacloban 5 is an attack on the legal democratic opposition against the creeping fascist dictatorship of the Duterte regime. The fascist tyrant Duterte wishes to silence the vocal opposition of activists in exposing his regime’s human rights violations, corruption and puppetry, and he is moving towards ultimately doing away with all political opposition.
“We join the people in demanding the immediate release of the Tacloban 5. We urge the immediate relief and punishment of 8th ID commanding general Pio Diñoso III and regional police director Brig. Gen. Ferdinand Divina in this farce orchestrated by virtue of Duterte’s fascist decrees Memorandum Order 32 and Executive Order 70. We call on the people to persevere in forming the broadest united front against Duterte’s emerging dictatorship and wage all forms of struggle to end his brutal, corrupt and pro-imperialist regime.”#
