Jonila Castro’s testimony at the International People’s Tribunal speaks of one of the most alarming trends under the regime of Ferdinand Marcos Jr.–that of the fast-growing number of enforced disappearances.
From 20 victims of forced disappearances throughout Duterte’s six-year term, there are now 11 victims still missing less than two years into Marcos Jr.’s presidency.
Some victims of abduction, like Jonila and her fellow activist Jhed Tamano, have been fortunate enough to survive their ordeal and tell about it. Jonila and Jhed were abducted in Bataan in September 2023, held captive, threatened and tortured for 17 days and were to be presented by the NTF-ELCAC as “surrenderees” during a press conference. But they defied their abductors and declared to the public that they were abducted.
Their case is eerily similar to that of activists Eco Dangla and Jak Tiong. Eco and Jak were seized by suspected state agents in Pangasinan in March 2024, interrogated, threatened and beaten up by their captors for three days to pressure them to become informers. They later surfaced at a church facility. Eco has spoken about his harrowing experience, with listeners seeing grim parallels to Jhed and Jonila’s story.
The NTF-ELCAC, invoking the so-called whole of nation approach, harnesses enormous state resources to surveil, profile, harass, threaten, red- and terror-tag activists and coerce them to surrender, disaffiliate from and vilify their organizations and misrepresent their advocacies. These “surrenderees” become state witnesses providing perjured testimonies in order to persecute other activists through trumped-up cases alleging violation of anti-terrorist and terrorist financing laws.
Deliberately blurring distinctions between legal and above-ground activism and armed resistance, the NTF-ELCAC targets unarmed civilians and civil society organizations, further shrinking an already constricted civic space and blatantly violating international humanitarian law provisions that protect civilians.
Other victims of abduction have not been surfaced. William Lariosa, red-tagged as a trade union organizer in Davao City, sought sanctuary in another province but was kidnapped by military men last April, according to witnesses’ accounts. A habeas corpus petition filed by his wife has been denied by the court. He remains missing to date.
These stories show the NTF-ELCAC in action as a brutal, lying and deceiving entity that sets up its red-tagged victims for graver human rights violations and violations of international humanitarian law. No wonder Ferdinand Marcos Jr. is loathe to get rid of it.
The IPT is a people’s initiated-tribunal, presided over by a panel of international jurors and legal experts, that will convene in Brussels, Belgium on 17-18 May 2024 to hear war crime charges against the U.S.-backed Marcos Jr. and Duterte regimes. The tribunal will focus on violations of international humanitarian law (IHL) in the conduct of the Philippine government’s so-called ‘counterinsurgency’ operations designed, directed and financed by the U.S. government. Victims of these IHL violations, which includes Jonila Castro, will participate to serve as witnesses to the proceedings. #