The grim record of the Philippines on environmental protection has worsened in the past two years, not only because government has failed to stop the San Miguel Corp. (SMC) from preventing its subsidiaries from leaking oil in Manila Bay and in Mindoro, with millions of liters of industrial fuel polluting the seas, but also because the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) has not punished the masterminds of ugly dolomite beach project in Manila Bay.
This is the same department that wants the ecological stewardship of the Masungi Georeserve in Baras, Rizal to end and says nothing about the plan of the Bureau of Corrections to transfer its facilities to the area, never mind if it means destroying what should be a protected area. Then there is the matter of Yulo King Ranch in Busuanga and Coron towns in Palawan, a 40,000-hectare property owned by the family of the DENR secretary herself. The question of coastal environment protection also led to the abduction of young activists Jed Tamano and Jonila Castro, who exposed their abduction by the military, forced confession, and bogus surrender last year. It was a slap in the face of the NTF-ELCAC, which promptly filed a dismissible perjury complaint against Tamano and Castro.
Luckily for the young Bulacan activists, they did not share the fate of 17 land and environmental defenders murdered in 2023, the worst in all of Asia for that year, Global Witness reported. Ten of them were summarily killed and seven disappeared without a trace. Worldwide, 193 died while resisting environmentally destructive projects worldwide, from logging in the Amazons in Brazil and Peru to the destruction of Indonesian and Malaysian forests to pave the way for palm oil plantations and the nickel, cobalt, and lithium mines in many countries. Yet, the records of Brazil, Malaysia and Indonesia as well as Peru are much better than those of the Philippines. Global Witness reported that more environmental defenders were murdered in the Philippines in the past 11 years than in any other Asian country.
It added that many of the victims resisted the operations of mining and quarrying firms. Worldwide, more than 2,000 activists were killed in just a decade, or 200 a year, which is a terrible record that proves countries have been unable to defend what they need to defend. In Peru, Indigenous communities fought a group of loggers clearing their traditional homeland, killing two of them. Global Witness said 10 of the Filipino victims were killed and seven others were kidnapped. “We have so many cases of killings and arbitrary arrests and detention. Many of these are what I call invisible cases because little is known about them publicly,” Joan Carling, executive director of the Indigenous Peoples Rights International (IPRI) told HRW Philippines.
HRW Philippines said many of those fatalities were from the Philippines, “which is notorious for frequently carrying out enforced disappearances targeting activists and Indigenous leaders defending their land from environmentally harmful projects.” By extension, activists claimed that those responsible for ecological despoliation have taken refuge in the country. They have killed people with impunity and continue to go scot-free, enjoying their liberty to kill without being arrested, charged, and made to pay for their crimes. This came as the government created an inter-agency committee on human rights to speed up inquiries on human rights abuses, one that is comprised of the very same units accused of rights violations.
It is a bad sign particularly for the administration of President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. since he has made it a priority to attract foreign investors to participate in the extractive industries, quarrying, and dam projects. The much-ballyhooed Maharlika Investment Corp. (MIC) even talks of large agricultural estates where foreigners can plunk in their money even as landless farmers complain about the glacial pace of the agrarian reform program. Global Witness reported that many of the victims resisted the operations of mining and quarrying firms. Worldwide, more than 2,000 activists were killed in just one decade, or 200 a year, which is a bloody record. Reacting to the report, Human Rights Watch (HRW) Philippines noted that many of the fatalities were from the Philippines, “which is notorious for frequently carrying out enforced disappearances targeting activists and Indigenous leaders defending their land from environmentally harmful projects.”
Aside from abductions, arbitrary detention, unjust prosecutions, and murder, Filipino environmental defenders and Indigenous leaders are routinely subjected to harassment and intimidation through “red-tagging,” which is the principal job of the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) organized by Rodrigo Duterte in December 2018 and the Anti-Terrorist Council (ATC.) Global Witness noted that the victims were mostly slain in ancestral domains of Indigenous people (IP.) The victims were dismissed as sympathizers or supporters of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), the New People’s Army (NPA), and the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDF) as if they did not have human rights and were not entitled to due process. Once tagged, anyone can be neutralized.
The Global Witness report should prompt the Marcos Jr. administration to protect land and environmental defenders and investigate the attacks on them through the Commission on Human Rights (CHR), an independent body regarded internationally as the human rights institution (NHRI) in the Philippines. “The international community, including multinational companies and investors, should be more concerned about the violence, speak out against it, and ensure that their business practices in the Philippines are consistent with international human rights principles and standards,” HRW Philippines said. The policies of the current administration will also permit the reduction of areas for rice production, poultry and livestock raising and aquaculture. It is just killing Filipinos softly, unlike the swift, brutal, and bloody killings of the 17 land and environmental defenders in 2023.
