Search for missing activists reaches cyberspace
The families of two abducted activists in Iloilo have brought their campaign to cyberspace 60 days after their abduction.
Relatives and colleagues of Leonilo "Nilo" Arado and Ma. Luisa Posa-Dominado will mark the second month of their abduction today by formally launching a website and online petition site in the hope of pressuring those who have taken their kin to release them unharmed and for authorities to solve their abduction.
The website (www.saveluisaandnilo.cjb.net) aims to gain international attention to the abduction of the two and other desaparecidos or victims of involuntary disappearance in the country.
May Wan Dominado, elder daughter of Ma. Luisa, said they hope various human rights advocates, church groups, humanitarian institutions and personalities in other countries would help exert pressure on the government to find the victims and put to justice the perpetuators.
"It has been two months already but we have heard nothing significant from investigators," said May Wan.
Arado and Dominado were forcibly taken by unidentified armed men who waylaid their vehicle last April 12 in Barangay Cabanbanan in Oton town, Iloilo.
The armed men shot and seriously wounded the victims' companion Jose Ely Garachico who was driving the pickup truck they were riding. Garachico was left behind while the two were forced into at least two vehicles used by the armed men.
The badly burned vehicle of the victims was found hours later at a sugarcane field in Janiuay town, around 30 km from the place of the abduction.
The two victims are the 184th and 185th victims of voluntary disappearance since President Macapagal-Arroyo came to power in a people's uprising in 2001.
Their families and colleagues have blamed military agents for the abduction pointing to the manner on how they were abducted and the pattern of similar incidents nationwide.
Arado was regional chair of the militant group Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan) and regional secretary-general of the farmers' organization Pamanggas. He was also a nominee of the party-list group Anakpawis.
Dominado, one of the prominent political detainees during the Marcos dictatorship, was spokesperson in Panay of the Samahan ng mga Ex-Detainees Laban sa Detensyon at Para sa Amnestiya (Selda), a group of former political detainees.
The website has attracted 1,012 visitors since it was set up on April 24.
It includes links to accounts of the abduction, the life stories of the victims, and statements and letters of condemnation of the abduction by local government units, human rights organizations and friends and colleagues of the victims.
An update and chronology of the pending petition for habeas corpus filed against military and intelligence officers in Panay and a photo gallery are also posted.
The website is linked to an online petition that they intend to present to United States Senator Robert Menendez, foreign relations committee member.
The petition has 960 signatories as of June 11 coming from visitors from the Philippines, US, Germany, Canada, Australia, United Kingdom, China, Belgium, United Arab Emirates and France among others.
The victims' families and colleagues are targeting 10,000 signatories.
The petitioners are calling for an the immediate formation of an independent fact-finding and investigation team composed of representatives from human rights groups, the church, local government, and the Commission on Human Rights that will look into the frustrated killing of Garachico and the abduction of Dominado and Arado.
They are also calling for the arrest and prosecution of the perpetrators of the attack and the "immediate and proper indemnification of the victims."
"The Philippine Government to be reminded that it is a signatory to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and that it is also a party to all the major Human Rights instruments, thus it is bound to observe all of these instruments' provisions," read the petition.