March 28, 2005
The War Against the People: Scholars Denounce Killings in the Philippines and Calls for a World-Wide Action

Statement of the Critical Filipina and Filipino Studies Collective
Contact: cffsc@REMOVETHISfocusnow.org

Northampton, MA – The Critical Filipina and Filipino Studies Collective (CFFSC) condemns the growing spate of killings and human rights violations of political activists, peasant rights advocates and sympathizers, lawyers and priests in the Philippines. The Philippine military is targeting and murdering leftist activists and civilians under the pretense of Gloria Macapagal Arroyo regime’s “War on Terror.” The U.S.-backed Arroyo regime’s campaign of surveillance, abduction, torture, and execution is a campaign of terror against the Filipino people.

International and Filipino human rights groups have documented that since 2001, forty-nine activists have been killed or otherwise brutalized by the Philippine military or paramilitary. On March 7, 2005, unidentified gunmen attempted to assassinate Romeo T. Capulong, UN Ad Litem Judge and a human rights lawyer who served as counsel to striking farm workers at Hacienda Luisita, a large sugar estate owned by the family of former President Corazon Aquino in the province of Tarlac. The attempt on Judge Capulong’s life follows the infamous massacre at Hacienda Luisita. Last November 16, 2004, the Philippine military and police attacked striking peasant workers, killing seven and wounding many. Since then, death squads have killed supporters of the peasant farmers: Abelardo Ladera, a city councilor; William Tadena, a priest; and Marcelino Beltran, a peasant leader and key witness to the November massacre. Five more have been abducted and believed dead.

In deep sympathy and solidarity with the progressive individuals and organizations, such as BAYAN-MUNA, BAYAN, ANAKPAWIS, and GABRIELA, who continue to be targeted by such militarist brutality, the CFFSC strongly deplore the unbridled state tyranny exercised by the Philippine government to silence any and all manner of dissent and resistance against its political and economic policies, which have reduced Filipinos to unprecedented levels of poverty and suffering. We denounce the support of the Arroyo regime by the imperialist George Bush administration, which continues to deploy U.S. troops in the Philippines to train Philippine paramilitary forces to infiltrate and destroy progressive Filipino organizations and ordinary civilian activism. We censure the Bush/GMA administration’s false accusations against anti-imperialist activism as “terrorism” and progressive insurgent activists as “terrorists.” This strategy masks a deceptive and wholly undemocratic campaign to coerce the Philippine people and the peoples of the world into justifying and condoning the brutal military suppression of the legal and collective right to organize against injustice and exploitation.

We also decry global-U.S. “War on Terrorism” which provides both legitimation and financial and military support for the Arroyo regime’s domestic war against its own citizens. The global “War on Terrorism” is itself globalization by other means, a globalization of crony capitalism and the military-industrial complex. It is a global project seeking to destroy entire communities for the purposes of creating new sites of investment and profit and new opportunities for the aggrandizement of unlimited power and wealth for the few.

It is vitally important for the progressive international community, which finds cause to protest the U.S.-led war against and occupation of Iraq as the hallmark of a new imperialism, to also show solidarity with Filipino human rights activists and mass leaders, whose terrible fates under the Philippine Republic show the disastrous consequences of a “democracy” under the sponsorship of a globalizing U.S. military-corporate state acting at the behalf of transnational capital and national elite interests.

We must view the flagrant atrocities committed by the Philippine state against its citizens; the civil tyranny and repression insidiously exercised against vocal critics of Empire in U.S. universities (such as Ward Churchill at the University of Colorado and many Middle Eastern studies professors at Columbia University such as Hamid Dabashi, Joseph Massad, Lila Abu-Lughod and others); and the undeclared suspension of the writ of habeas corpus and the flouting of the Geneva Conventions in the case of suspected enemies of the U.S. State detained in Guantánamo Bay and other sites of “extraordinary rendition”(subcontracted torture in foreign territories), as all instances of a world-wide escalation in the use of coercion and unmitigated violence, including political assassinations and torture. If we do not connect these disparate instances of repression and violence as parts of a trend in global tyranny, our hopes for a better and more just world will remain divided and unrealizable. And the alliances forged between state, military and corporate powers under the auspices of the imperial project of global security will continue to go unchallenged.

We therefore appeal to concerned Filipinos everywhere and progressive citizens of the world community to:

· demand that local and national authorities put an end to these killings and to hold the Philippine state accountable for the relentless persecution and murder of Filipino activists, critics and journalists
· call for an invigorated global anti-imperialist movement that recognizes the everyday conditions of violence, dispossession and repression produced by crony capitalism and military-industrial complex
· organize local fora, start solidarity organizations to raise consciousness and build support for the Philippine progressive movement
· Envision and make real global justice, self-determination (rather than the dictates of the elite or global multinational corporations), and human dignity for all.

Signed,
THE CRITICAL FILIPINA AND FILIPINO STUDIES COLLECTIVE

1. Nerissa S. Balce
Assistant Professor
Department of Languages, Literatures and Cultures
University of Massachusetts, Amherst

2. Lucy Mae San Pablo Burns
UC President’s Postdoctoral Fellow
Department of History of Consciousness
University of California, Santa Cruz

3. Richard T. Chu
Assistant Professor
Department of History
University of Massachusetts, Amherst

4. Peter Chua
Assistant Professor
Department of Sociology
San Jose State University, CA

5. Vernadette V. Gonzalez
Assistant Professor
Department of Global Studies
Saint Lawrence University, NY

6. Gladys Nubla
Doctoral student
Department of English
University of California, Berkeley

7. Robyn M. Rodriguez
Assistant Professor
Department of Sociology
Rutgers University, NJ

8. Joanne Rondilla
Doctoral student
Department of Comparative Ethnic Studies
University of California, Berkeley

9. Jeff Santa Ana
Assistant Professor
English Department
Dartmouth College, NH (Commencing fall semester 2005)

10. Rowena Tomaneng
Associate Professor
English Department
De Anza Community College, CA

11. Luis Francia
Journalist, Village Voice and Philippine Inquirer
Author and Lecturer, Asian Pacific American Studies
Program
New York University, NY

12. Dylan Rodriguez
Assistant Professor
Department of Ethnic Studies
University of California, Riverside

13. Ronald R. Sundstrom
Assistant Professor of Philosophy
University of San Francisco, CA

14. Neferti X. Tadiar
Associate Professor
History of Consciousness Department
University of California, Santa Cruz

15. Benito Vergara Jr.
Assistant Professor
Asian American Studies Department
San Francisco State University, CA

For additional information on human rights abuses by the Philippine state:

http://www.geocities.com/arkibo21/mass/lentenmass4jph.htm

http://portal.unesco.org/en/ev.phpURL_ID=26425&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html

Amnesty International: http://asiapacific.amnesty.org/apro/aproweb.nsf/pages/index

http://asiapacific.amnesty.org/apro/aproweb.nsf/pages/appeals_philippines_ASA350012005

Asian Pacific Mission for Migrants: www.apimigrants.org

To find more on information on collaborating with or joining local and national efforts to support progressive and anti-imperialist movements in the Philippines and the U.S:

In the Philippines: BAYAN MUNA: http://www.bayanmuna.net/
GABRIELA: http://www.gabrielaphilippines.net/index1.htm

In the U.S.: BAYAN-USA: statement: http://www.indybay.org/news/2005/03/1728977.php
Critical Filipino and Filipina Studies Collective: http://www.cffsc.focusnow.org

To send letters of protest and contact Philippine government officials:
Ms. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo
President
Republic of the Philippines
Malacañang Palace
J.P. Laurel St., San Miguel
Manila, NCR 1005
PHILIPPINES
Fax: +63 2929 3968

Ms. Purificacion Quisumbing
Commissioner
Commission on Human Rights
SAAC Bldg., Commonwealth Avenue
U.P. Complex, Diliman, Quezon City
PHILIPPINES
Tel. No. +63 2 928-5655/926-6188
Fax: +63 2 929-0102
Email: drpvq@chr.gov.ph

Sec. Teresita Quintos-Deles
OPAPP (office of the Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process)
Government Peace Negotiating Panel for Talks with the CPP-NPA-NDF
4th Flr. Agustin 1 Bldg. Emerald Ave. Ortigas Center
Pasig City, Philippines
Telefax: +63 2 6377259
Email: gpnp_cnn@opapp.gov.ph

Mr. Avelino J. Cruz Jr.
Secretary, Department of National Defense
Room 301 DND Bldg.,
Camp Emilio Aguinaldo
E. de los Santos Avenue, Quezon City
PHILIPPINES
Fax: +63 2911 6213
Email: osnd@philonline.com
P/DEP. DIR Gen. Arturo Lumibao
Chief, Philippine National Police (PNP)
Camp Crame, Quezon City
PHILIPPINES
Tel: +63 2 726-4361/4366/8763
Fax: +63 2 724-8763

Atty. Jasmin N. Regino
Regional Director
Commission on Human Rights (CHR III)
3/F, Kehyeng Bldg.,
Mc Arthur Highway, Dolores
San Fernando, Pampanga
Philippines
Tel: +63 45 961 4830/ 963 5311
Telefax: +63 45 961 4475

Popularity: 1% [?]

I’m hemming and hawing about posting an anti-NAATA broadside which may get me into so much trouble, but this is more important. Check out this article from The Washington Post, via Philippine News. (Thanks to Nerissa for the original post.)

The Philippines is apparently — I shudder at the turn of phrase — one of five “emerging target countries,” along with Somalia, Yemen, Indonesia, and Georgia, where a spy organization will be operating as part of “developing a more efficient antiterrorist initiative.”

This is, of course, nothing new.* But it helps to be reminded of the ramifications of such clandestine operations:

This official, declining to speak on the record about espionage in friendly nations, said that the Defense Department sometimes has to work undetected inside “a country that we’re not at war with, if you will, a country that maybe has ungoverned spaces, or a country that is tacitly allowing some kind of threatening activity to go on.”

Laos and Cambodia were, of course, countries that the U.S. was not at war with…

But here’s the best part:

This program includes “human intelligence operations,” as opposed to such high-technology gathering as using “satellite photography,” and range from “peacetime recruitment of foreign spies” to “interrogation of prisoners [my italics] and scouting of targets in wartime.”

Finally! The Philippines gets to be the happy beneficiary of more U.S. outsourcing, from call centers to torture — oh, wait, it isn’t torture if it ain’t on U.S. territory. My bad.

*One of these days I’m hoping to post this scary recruitment letter sent to me from Langley last year. This was because I was sitting calmly having breakfast at a conference in San Diego when this PsyOps woman asked to share my table. So we chatted, me busily gulping down my coffee once I discovered who and what she was, and we ended up exchanging business cards anyway and several months later, to my horror, I received a letter from the chief of the “PACOM Strategic Studies Detachment 4th Psychological Operations Group” looking for “a well-qualified individual who is fluent in Tagalog, loves the challenge of rigorous academic research and enjoys the possibility of foreign travel.” I must note, however, that an “intelligence specialist” position at Fort Bragg has a way larger starting salary than I’m currently making.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Having been approved 261-161 in the House, H.R. 418 is about to wend its way through the Senate, and it’s one nasty bill, designed in part “to unify terrorism-related grounds for inadmissibility and removal.” Because Sec. 103 is so (intentionally) vague, it becomes almost infinitely applicable and malleable.

Check out, for instance, their criteria for inadmissible aliens:

‘(IV) [Any alien who] is a representative (as defined in clause (v)) of–

`(aa) a terrorist organization; or

`(bb) a political, social, or other group that endorses or espouses terrorist activity;

“Endorses or espouses” could already refer to (for instance) Ward Churchill. It’s the politico-legal embodiment of David Horowitz’s bleating about how the academic left supports terrorism.

`(VII) [Any alien who] endorses or espouses terrorist activity or persuades
others to endorse or espouse terrorist activity or support a terrorist organization;

That is, you don’t even have to be a “representative” — just someone who “persuades” others to support those so-called terrorist organizations.

`(IX) [Any alien who] is the spouse or child of an alien who is inadmissible under this subparagraph, if the activity causing the alien to be found inadmissible occurred within the last 5 years…

It’s retroactive, and applies to your nearest and dearest as well.

Moral of the story: the next time there’s, say, a Palestinian solidarity rally (or, for you Pinoy readers, any leftist organization that in any way remotely resembles the Communist Party of the Philippines — since we know those people overseas can’t tell those orgs apart) in your town, remember that “solidarity” may be a semantic hop and a skip away from “endorse or espouse.” Don’t forget: that strict upholder of the Constitution, Alberto Gonzales, is watching!

The bill gets worse, particularly with Rep. Pete Sessions’ last-minute amendment, described here:

Representative Pete Sessions (R-TX) offered an amendment that passed the House by a voice vote. The amendment would provide unprecedented authority to bounty hunters to “pursue, apprehend, detain and surrender” immigrants in removal proceedings. It also would set the minimum bond amount at $10,000 and prohibit the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) from releasing on recognizance anyone placed in proceedings.

You’ve been warned.

And don’t even get me started on denying drivers’ licenses to undocumented immigrants…

Popularity: 1% [?]

So David Horowitz — I used to think of him as “David Horriblewitz,” but that would be as ad hominem as the stuff he was calling students — was invited by the local handful of College Republicans to give a talk here on my campus last week. He spent the first 10 minutes or so complaining about how Michael Moore and Jesse Jackson get invited and paid for out of student money, but folks like him don’t.

(It’s perhaps a valid complaint, just as — at least in theory — there is little to disagree with regarding the Students for Academic Freedom’s “Academic Bill of Rights”. Again, at least in principle; I’m not sure I agree with the point on “organizational neutrality.” But when you start your talk already on the defensive, it seems to undermine the rest of what you have to say.)

Then he spent the next half-hour rambling and railing against… the Soviet Union. I mean, Jesus, the Soviet Union doesn’t even exist anymore. You’d be hard-pressed to find members from what passes for the American left calling herself or himself as Marxist! (One person pointed out that that Marx’s economic principles barely resembled what was implemented in the USSR, but that was essentially ignored.) Then he spent the next 15 minutes or so with some rather long-winded answers to two questions — which some members of the audience interpreted as stalling for time — about Marx and Trotsky.

Probably because people were thinking that Horowitz was on campus simply to deliberately bait the audience, a lot of people stayed away. (A few articles on SFSU have been featured on The Front Page before, especially after a couple of Horowitz’s ads in SFSU’S [X]press were rejected for publication.) The folks from Students Against War gave a relatively silent protest at the back of the auditorium — they were more centrally positioned earlier, but were asked to move because they were “blocking people’s view” — holding up banners (“Horowitz Is A Racist Ideologue” and “U.S. Out Of Iraq Now!”). Even the organization of Palestinian students didn’t seem to bother to get a group together. (It was the Spartacus Youth Club folks that ended up getting ejected for no good reason; this was after Horowitz kept hollering for security and threatening to sue the administration if the hecklers weren’t thrown out.)

So, not much to write about. Horowitz mentioned Ward Churchill once in the context of “the Left supporting terrorism” (you can read more about this on his website), and later said something to the effect that “Zionism is the only true national liberation movement for one people in the history of the world,” and that was about it. Almost every time someone would heckle him, he would either call them “idiots,” “brain-dead,” or look at the audience and start talking about the McCarthy era or say, “This was exactly what it was like in Weimar Germany!” Talk about Godwin’s law…

In an odd way his talk effectively neutralized him at least in my eyes; for all the speaking engagements he seems to have, the man was a terrible speaker, jumping from topic to topic with little coherence.

Popularity: 1% [?]

SCHOLARS RELEASE REPORT ON U.S. FILIPINO DEPORTATION

San Jose, CA – The Critical Filipino and Filipina Studies Collective (CFFSC) releases Resisting Homeland Security: Organizing Against Unjust Removals of U.S. Filipinos, a report on the state of U.S. Filipino deportation.

Resisting Homeland Security makes visible what remains invisible to many: the detention and removal of U.S. Filipinos. The existing information on U.S. Filipino deportations following September 11, 2001 collapses U.S. Filipino deportations uniformly and arbitrarily across any and all racial-ethnic groups. Contrary to this popular misunderstanding, the report alternatively offers exacting research and analysis underscoring a more complex picture – that after September 11, there is a “systematic targeting of Filipinos for deportation” that is related to the legacies of U.S.-colonial rule, the current U.S.-led war on global terrorism avidly supported by the Philippine government, and the emergence of homeland security racism.

Included in Resisting Homeland Security is a section on “Community Organizing.” This section provides insights on how grassroots organizations fight against unjust removals and detentions. In particular, the section chronicles the Support Campaign to Prevent the Deportation of the Cuevas Family of Fremont, CA, assesses its efforts and strategies, and offers recommendations to build effective anti-removal campaigns.

Jay Mendoza, Executive Director of the National Alliance for Filipino Concerns (NAFCON), notes: “Resisting Homeland Security is a significant document that all Filipinos and all peoples concerned with social justice should read and deeply understand. It is a reminder for all cultural diverse and multiracial peoples to work in alliance and coalition with each other, despite ethnicity, nationality, or race-towards the single objective of justice for our communities.”

For the CFFSC, Resisting Homeland Security is “a document of hope-to inspire all to participate in a global movement for justice and equality.” The report may be accessed at the Filipino Living Archive.

Founded 2002, CFFSC is a U.S.-based national network of community-engaged scholars, professors, and educators.

Popularity: 2% [?]