Leaders from various progressive organizations based in Bacolod City highlighted disturbing patterns of harassment, threats, and surveillance by state agents, underscoring their urgent call for the abolition of the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC), during a press conference yesterday.
The group’s demand comes in response to NTF-ELCAC’s proposed budget, which has alarmingly tripled to P7.8 billion for 2025, with concerns that the increased funds will intensify attacks on legal activists, said a press release from the organizers.
The press conference followed recent incidents where key leaders, including Urban Poor KADAMAY Negros secretary general Berlita Ante and board member Nori Saldavie, were subjected to surveillance and red-tagging. Those leaders were maliciously linked to the Communist Party of the Philippines and its armed wing by alleged state agents.
The harassment includes efforts to discredit them and disrupt their advocacy work, which involves defending communities from displacement and opposing harmful land use policies in Bacolod City.
Labor organizer Noli Rosales of Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU) Negros also faced similar state-led intimidation, particularly in relation to his work supporting jeepney drivers and opposing the transport modernization program. State agents reportedly searched for him and asked about his whereabouts in strike centers. Prior to this, he also reported to have been visited by intelligence officers in his home, who tried to convince him to lie low from his work as a labor organizer.
Human Rights Advocates Negros (HRAN) claim that these successive attacks are part of the “desperate attempt” by the military to claim Western Visayas as Stable and Internal Peace Status (SIPS) by September, as disclosed by 3rd Infantry Division’s Maj. Gen. Marion Sison.
In Bacolod City, the increased deployment of police and intelligence forces in the barangay level is due to the Mayor Albee Benitez’s opening of the city to foreign and local investors to paint the illusion of peace and order in his aim towards a “Smart City.”
The groups are calling for the immediate dissolution of NTF-ELCAC, citing that the increased budget will likely be used to further target and suppress progressive voices. The harassment of these leaders is seen as a direct attack on their right to advocate for their communities and causes.
“All forms of red-tagging are human rights violations,” HRAN said, citing the recent Supreme Court Ruling against the malicious linking of legal activists to the revolutionary movement. “If there is no resistance, it will be easier for them to displace communities.”
The groups affirmed that despite the threats and harassment they face, they will continue to champion for the rights of marginalized sectors.*
