Farmers’ leader killed in Davao
Dennis Jay Santos, Jeffrey M. Tupas
Inquirer
DAVAO CITY – A farmers’ leader was shot and killed by three unidentified men who disrupted a meeting of cooperative members in a remote village here on Saturday night, according to his colleague.
Vicente Paglinawan, vice president of the Pambansang Kilusan ng Samahang Magsasaka (Pakisama) in Mindanao, was talking about development programs during the meeting in Paquibato District when the assailants suddenly barged in and shot him three times in the head, Louise Lampon, a Pakisama coordinator, told the Inquirer (parent company of INQUIRER.net).
The killers fled on a motorcycle, he said.
“We ruled out personal motive because he has no known enemies,” Lampon said. “It’s political.”
The government has been criticized heavily by human rights watchdogs here and abroad for its failure to end unsolved political killings.
Senior Supt. Ramon Apolinario, city police chief, said by phone that he had yet to gather information on the latest killing.
In May, Celso Pojas, a member of the militant Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas was shot dead by unidentified assailants here.
Meanwhile, the vice chair of the Union of Peoples’ Lawyers in Mindanao (UPLM), a group of human rights lawyers, has reportedly received death threats while attending an administrative hearing on the case against the police chief of Pagadian City at Camp Crame in Quezon City last week.
Lawyer Emiliano Deleverio said he received a text message on his mobile phone on Tuesday, warning him to take things easy. “Atorni au au ha ang imo batasan kay ampay ra ba na sa tagabukid. (Attorney, watch your manners, the people up the hills will surely like you),” the message read.
Deleverio was one of the lawyers behind the first issuance of a writ of amparo on the abduction of Ruel Muñasque in October 2007.
The Counsels for the Defense of Liberties said 22 lawyers and 15 judges had been killed, while 41 human rights lawyers had been attacked from January 2001 to October this year.
“(The) UPLM believes that this renewed threat on Deleverio came from the same elements who consider public interest lawyering anathema to their antidemocratic activities,” said Carlos Isagani Zarate, the group’s secretary general.
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