Bayan Muna leaders say attacks won’t defeat group in polls

04 January 2007

LEGAZPI CITY—THE LEFT-WING party-list group Bayan Muna said it would emerge as the top winner in the May elections for party-list representatives despite attacks on its leaders.

Robert de Castro, national deputy secretary general of Bayan Muna, said that while the group expected more attacks on its leaders and members, it was not backing down from a campaign to emerge as the top party-list group in the elections.

The latest Bayan Muna leader to have been murdered was Rodolfo Alvarado, the group’s Albay coordinator.

Alvarado, 53, the 42nd political activist to be murdered in Bicol last year, was shot dead Sunday while aboard his car on his way home to Barangay San Lorenzo in Ligao City at around 5 p.m.

“If we no longer fight in the elections, it is the time the government should start to fear because we can never stop our members, agitated by the killings, from fighting back against the government in other ways,” he said.

Suspect

Senior Supt. Roque Ramirez, provincial police director, said Tuesday that a witness in the murder of Alvarado was now in police custody and that a police task force had been created to thoroughly probe the killing.

He said the witness saw the suspect who shot Alvarado in Ligao late Sunday afternoon.

However, De Castro said they had always doubted the government’s sincerity in its efforts to solve the killings and serve justice to the families of the victims.

“All of these are but pretensions,” he charged.

He added that in other cases of killings, witnesses emerged “but where would their testimonies go and would the government be able to provide security for them since they had also become targets of slays?”

“The government will again end up diverting the issue by saying the victims were slain by fellow activists or by members of the New People’s Army because of internal conflicts,” he said.

What’s going on?

“What’s going on?” Gov. Fernando Gonzalez said as he condemned the killing of Alvarado, which he said was a manifestation of the violent acts against leaders of legitimate party-list groups.

The provincial government was “very much concerned” about the killing, said Gonzalez.

He asked the PNP and the Melo Commission, which was formed by President Macapagal-Arroyo to look into leftist killings, to solve Alvarado’s case immediately.

But De Castro said the Melo Commission was powerless.

“We fear Ompong’s (Alvarado) case would a be part of the police data and end up unresolved,” he added.

Not more than 100 people attended the indignation rally held by Bayan Muna here, but De Castro said a major protest march was planned on Alvarado’s burial. Ephraim Aguilar, Inquirer Southern Luzon