ILOILO CITY – A party-list group has welcomed the Supreme Court (SC) decision that granted a Writ of Amparo or court protection for former Bayan Muna Rep. Siegfred Deduro from Iloilo who had been red-tagged by the military.

DEDURO (Sine Panayanon)
“It can be noted that international organizations have long warned the dangers of red-tagging and United Nations special rapporteurs, specifically on the freedom of opinion and expression and on climate change, have called on to stop the practice of red-tagging,” Bayan Muna said in a statement.
The SC on Wednesday, May 8, declared that red-tagging, vilification, labelling, and guilt by association threaten a person’s right to life, liberty or security and may justify the issuance of the court’s protective order.
Deduro filed a petition for review on November 2020 after Judge Nestle Go of the Iloilo City Regional Trial Court Branch 24 denied his petition for a Writ of Amparo due to lack of evidence.
Deduro sought court protection after he was allegedly named as one of the top officials of the Communist Party of the Philippines and its armed wing, the New People’s Army, in 2020.
The Writ of Amparo was issued against Major Gen. Eric Vinoya, then the commander of the 3rd Infantry Division in 2020.
Deduro said that he sought the Writ of Amparo when he felt that the threat on his life was very real.
In 2020, two activists in Western Visayas were killed – Jory Porquia of Bayan Muna in Iloilo City and Zara Alvarez of Negros Karapatan in Bacolod City.