Leftwing leader claims escaping slay try in Iloilo City

By Nestor P. Burgos Jr.

Visayas Bureau

First Posted 20:37:00 03/19/2008



ILOILO CITY, Philippines -- A top official of the leftwing Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (New Patriotic Alliance, Bayan) in Panay narrowly escaped an alleged attempt to abduct or assassinate him, militant groups here claimed Wednesday.

Aurelio Bosque, spokesperson of Bayan-Panay, said two unidentified men who were separately riding motorcycles followed him from their office in Jaro District, Iloilo City on Monday and pursued him until he and two companions sought refuge at a Kababayan Center.

"Their intentions were more than just surveillance because they kept on following us even if they were aware that we already spotted them," Bosque said in a press conference on Tuesday.

He said he noticed the two men, each riding a motorcycle, following him after he left their office in the village of Fajardo at around 4 p.m. and as he was riding a passenger jeepney going to the city proper.

Bosque said two of his companions joined him in the jeepney later after it bumped another vehicle at the Jaro public plaza.

He said he had wanted to go to a hospital because he was not feeling well after the accident.

Bosque claimed the two men still followed them when they went first to a Kababayan Center in the village of Montinola to ask for help from the policeman assigned there.

Since there was no policeman at the center, they took a taxi to the Jaro police station with the motorcycle-riding men still following them.

Bosque said the men tried to overtake the taxi they were riding and were looking intently at the passengers so they decided to return to the Kababayan Center, sought the help of village chief Buenvenido Lago and called the police.

He said the Jaro policemen confronted the two men who denied they were following Bosque and told the police they were waiting for their companions. The police also released the two after they showed papers for the motorcycles.

Militant groups accused military agents of being involved in the incident.

"It fits the pattern of the rising number of abduction and killings," said Hope Hervilla, regional coordinator of Bayan Muna.

But the Army's 3rd Infantry Division denied any involvement in the incident.

"It has been their practice to blame us and the AFP (Armed Forces of the Philippines) for incidents like this. But, as we have repeatedly said, activists who shout and march in the streets are not our targets," said Lieutenant Colonel Erwin de Asis, 3ID spokesperson, in a telephone interview. He said they went only after armed elements of the leftist movement.

Jose Ely Garachico, public information officer of the human rights group Karapatan, said "the incident shows that the abductions and killings continue despite widespread international condemnation of killings of activists in the Philippines."

Garachico was shot and seriously wounded last year when armed men abducted his companions, Nilo Arado and Ma. Luisa Posa-Dominado in Oton town. The two activists remain missing.

Lawyer Janne Baterna, an official of the Iloilo chapter of the National Union of People's Lawyers, said they would file a petition for a writ of amparo against the AFP as a safeguard against possible attacks on Bosque.