Indigenous and human rights groups condemned the terrorist designation of four Igorot activists in the Cordillera by the Anti-Terrorism Council (ATC) just over a month after beating a rebellion case filed against them.

In a July 10 press release, the ATC announced the designation of Cordillera Peoples Alliance (CPA) pioneer Abellon-Alikes, chairperson Windel Bolinget, regional council member Stephen Tauli, and researcher Jennifer Awingan-Taggaoa as terrorists.

The government accused them of being members of the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army (CPP-NPA) Ilocos Cordillera Regional White Area Committee and the Cordillera White Area Committee

CPA condemned the designation of four of its leaders, calling it a “relentless attack against indigenous peoples’ activists.”

“While we at CPA continue to seek legal remedies to ensure our safety, security, and human rights in this shrinking democratic space, the state also weaponizes everything at its disposal to silence us,” the statement said.

The International Indigenous Peoples Movement for Self Determination and Liberation (IPMSDL) also slammed their inclusion in the terrorist list. The group also urged the government to remove their names.

Bolinget is a member of the international coordinating committee of the network.

“Indigenous peoples’ pro-active defense of their ancestral lands, life, rights, and territories are never acts of terrorism but a vibrant exercise of their right to self-determination,” the group said.

“Their vocal expression of dissent and democratic freedoms to criticize any powers that be must be ensured and protected, not silenced, criminalized, vilified and further marginalized,” IPMSDL added.

Justification

ATC said their designation under ATC Resolution No. 41, approved on June 7, were “based on verified and validated information, sworn statements, and other pieces of evidence gathered by Philippine law enforcement agencies.”

Abellon-Alikes and Bolinget allegedly violated Sections 10 and 12 of the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA), which refers to recruitment to and membership in a terrorist organization and providing material support to terrorist organizations, respectively. Meanwhile, Awingan-Taggaoa and Tauli supposedly breached Section 10.

Since 2017, cases filed against them in local courts, implicating them in several attacks committed by the communist rebels, were dismissed or quashed.

Abellon-Alikes, Awingan-Taggaoa, Bolinget, and Tauli were among the seven activists from the Ilocos and Cordillera charged with rebellion in January. They were implicated in an NPA ambush in Malibcong, Abra in October 2022. Last May, the regional trial court in Bangued quashed the warrant and excluded them from the case for lack of probable cause.

The CPA chair was also included in a murder charge in Davao del Norte. A court in Tagum City dismissed the case in July 2021 for lack of probable cause.

Meanwhile, for Abellon-Alikes, the quashing of the warrant last May was her fifth legal victory since 2017.

Bolinget said the recent ATC resolution, designating them as terrorists, proves that the ATA intended to target activists and government critics.

He added: “It is a government tool, a last resort when their systematic legal harassments fail to silence activists and the democratic mass movement.”

‘Hit list’

Human rights group Karapatan said the designation sets up the four individuals to graver attacks and human rights violations.

“With the State’s trumped-up accusations against these activists failing to prosper in courts, the ATC is now resorting to designation not only as a way of curtailing their movements and derailing their pro-people and human rights advocacies but to set the victims up for arrest on other trumped-up charges or worse, for involuntary disappearance or extrajudicial killing,” said Karapatan secretary general Cristina Palabay.

She called the designation list “a virtual hit list.”

“We condemn the ATC for unjustly, arbitrarily, and maliciously designating political activists as terrorist individuals and endangering their lives, safety, and security in the process…We will hold the ATC and its co-conspirators in the intelligence agencies and the NTF-ELCAC accountable for any harm that may befall these designated individuals,” Palabay said.

“We deplore the increasing use of terror laws against activists and peasants to suppress political dissent and violate basic rights and civil liberties, as what numerous human rights advocates and groups have warned when the Anti-Terrorism Act was signed into law,” she added.