Senator Risa Hontiveros on Thursday, April 22, filed a resolution condemning the harassment and red-tagging by national government officials and law enforcement authorities against private citizens who organized and conducted community pantries.
(Senate of the Philippines / FILE PHOTO)
Hontiveros said state agents’ “heavy-handed” tactics against community pantries are not just undemocratic but “they also punish Filipinos who are already suffering because of the pandemic and who desperately need the lifeline extended by these community pantries.”
“Bakit isusuplong ang tumutulong? Huwag naman nating patayin ang natitirang pag-asa ng ating mga kababayan. Pagtutulungan at pagdadamayan ang kailangan hindi karahasan o pananakot (Why report on those who are helping out? Let’s not kill whatever hope is left of our fellowmen. Teamwork and reciprocity is what we need not violence or intimidation),” Hontiveros said.
In filing Senate Resolution No. 705, the opposition senator urged the Executive branch to ensure the safety and protection of community pantry organizers inasmuch as they provide invaluable service to communities during the pandemic.
“Instead of harassment and threats against community pantry organizers, they should be lauded for embodying all that is good and noble in the Filipino community especially during times of hardship and hunger,” she said.
“Community pantry is a response to the urgent needs of Filipinos for food. It creates a platform for civic-minded citizens to express solidarity with those in need,” she pointed out.
Earlier, eight senators issued a joint statement telling authorities to stop the profiling of community pantry organizers after the Quezon City police and the government’s National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) caused some community pantries to temporarily cease their projects for the safety of their volunteers.
The senators — Hontiveros, Franklin Drilon, Nancy Binay, Sherwin Gatchalian, Francis Pangilinan, Grace Poe, Ralph Recto, Leila de Lima — condemned the social media posts of the NTF-ELCAC and police who tried to solicit personal information from the organizers.
“The profiling of organizers must stop…It puts people’s lives in danger, knowing how notorious some police, military officers and personnel are in red-tagging progressives and now civic-minded citizens who only want to do good to their fellow men and women,” the senators said.
The senators have also called for the defunding and realignment of the NTF-ELCAC’s budget to the government’s COVID-19 response measures.