Bagong Alyansang Makabayan condemns the arrest of 11 environmental defenders in Barangay Pacquet, Kasibu, Nueva Vizcaya, and calls for their immediate release.
Bayan also denounces the repressive actions of the police and some local officials who had been harassing and attacking residents for fiercely opposing the mining exploration of the North Luzon Mineral Resources Corporation.
The arbitrary arrest was the latest in an alarming wave of police violence directed against the people’s barricade, which was set up in May to prevent the destructive mining activity of NLMRC. Police deployment in the area was clearly intended to facilitate the operations of NLMRC instead of ensuring the welfare of the people.
Over the past year, we saw how the people of Dupax and Kasibu defended their communities by protesting the entry of extractive companies. Those who profit from mining plunder retaliated by filing SLAPPP suits and weaponizing state machineries to undermine local resistance. Aside from the frequent arrests conducted by the police, more than 30 cases were filed against Indigenous Peoples, activists, and their lawyers for opposing mining activities.
The situation in Nueva Vizcaya reflects the mining surge under the administration of Ferdinand Marcos Jr., which has recently laid a new policy framework for the intensified exploitation and foreign plunder of the country’s critical minerals. The brutal actions of the Nueva Vizcaya police highlight the fascist violence unleashed by the state against the defiant local population.
Bayan reiterates its call for the immediate release of the 11 individuals in Kasibu, the dropping of all harassment suits against land rights defenders, the pull-out of all police troops in anti-mining barricades, and the revocation of permits granted to NLMRC and other operators of large-scale mining. Bayan enjoins its chapters to organize solidarity actions in support of Indigenous Peoples and the demand of the people of Nueva Vizcaya for the protection of their lands.
Bayan calls for protests against the Marcos administration for selling out our patrimony to local and foreign plunderers. Marcos should also be held accountable for enabling extractive operations that cause massive flooding and landslides in the country. We call on the people to resist plunder, defy tyranny, and assert the people’s demand for social justice and genuine development.
No to imperialist plunder!
Defend environmental defenders!
Ikulong ang mga kurakot, hindi ang mamamayang lumalaban!
Marcos Jr., tuta ng imperyalistang ganid!