By Eufemia Cullamat | Lumad Leader, Former Representative, Bayan Muna
The press conference led by Pilar Libayao does not speak for the Lumad of Talaingod. It speaks for a political dynasty long complicit in logging operations and militarization, and for a small group of Lumad “dealers” of ancestral land who have acted as brokers for corporate interests and have been directly linked to paramilitary formations such as the Alamara, which operated alongside military forces to suppress Indigenous resistance.
Let us be clear: the Libayao political dynasty was complicit in the entry, operation, and protection of logging interests in Talaingod, particularly those of Alsons Consolidated Resources (Alcantara Group). Since Talaingod’s founding as a municipality, Libayao-led local governments did not oppose, halt, or protect communities from logging concessions imposed under Integrated Forest Management Agreements covering vast areas of Ata-Manobo ancestral land. Instead, their rule facilitated and normalized extraction, while Indigenous resistance was treated as disorder and criminality.
As Talaingod Manobo communities resisted logging, militarization followed—and the Libayao-led local government allowed it. Military and paramilitary forces were deployed in ancestral communities defending their land. Schools were attacked, families were displaced, and fear was imposed as a method of control. At no point did the Libayao dynasty use its authority to stop militarization, demand accountability, or defend Lumad civilians. This was not mere inaction; it was political complicity.
The record of abuse against Lumad children under militarization in Talaingod is clear. Obello Bay-ao was killed amid intensified military operations, exposing the deadly consequences of treating Indigenous communities as security zones, while the rape of a Lumad girl by soldiers occurred under the same climate of fear and armed presence, involving forces operating alongside paramilitary groups such as the Alamara. In both cases, the Libayao-led local authorities did not merely remain silent but publicly defended the continued presence of the military and paramilitaries, rejected calls for troop pullout, and failed to demand accountability, thereby actively condoning abuses against Lumad children.
What was staged in that press conference is not the voice of Lumad communities, but the active mouthpiece of corporate and military abuse in Talaingod. The statements advanced by Pilar Libayao and her group actively defend the narratives of logging corporations—most notably Alsons Consolidated Resources—and of the armed forces that enforced militarization in Indigenous territories. These pronouncements justify logging operations, normalize military presence, and discredit community resistance, while diverting attention from their concrete consequences: forced displacement, school closures, and abuses against Lumad civilians under militarized conditions.
To present the Court of Appeals’ affirmation of the conviction of the Talaingod 13 as “justice” is a profound distortion of reality. This case did not arise from genuine concern for children. It arose from a system that protected logging, tolerated militarization, dismantled Lumad schools, and then criminalized those who protected displaced children.
The Talaingod 13 are not perpetrators of child abuse. They are Lumad volunteer teachers and community advocates who shielded Indigenous children from harm during forced evacuations, military operations, and school closures—when the State failed and local authorities, from the very beginning, abandoned and neglected Lumad communities instead of protecting them. To label acts of care and protection as “child abuse” is a grave distortion of the law, weaponized to criminalize solidarity and complete the attack on Lumad education.
The Libayao dynasty has no moral ascendancy to speak on child protection or Indigenous rights. A political dynasty that stood with logging corporations and armed force against its own Indigenous people cannot now posture as a defender of justice.
Let me be clear:
This is not about child protection.
It is about criminalizing care and protecting logging and plunder.
I call on the media and the public to look beyond staged press conferences and confront the real questions:
Who enabled logging in Talaingod? Who allowed militarization to crush Indigenous resistance? And why are those who stood with the people now being punished under the false banner of “child abuse”?
Justice for the Talaingod 13 is justice for the Lumad.
Anything less is impunity dressed up as law.
