Home > Philippines Left-Wing Union, Party Leaders Assassinated
Philippines Left-Wing Union, Party Leaders Assassinated
by Open-Publishing - Thursday 27 October 2005By Oliver Teves
Separate assassination attacks in the northern Philippines killed a union chief at a sugar plantation owned by former President Corazon Aquino’s family and a provincial official from a leading left-wing party, police and party leaders said Wednesday.
Ricardo Ramos, president of the workers’ union at the Hacienda Luisita plantation in Tarlac province, was shot by an unknown assailant with an M-14 rifle late Tuesday as he talked with other unionists near his home.
Separately, Bayan Muna party coordinator Francisco Rivera and two friends were all killed when men in two vans sprayed them with gunfire as the victims rested near their homes early Wednesday in Angeles City in Pampanga Province, near Tarlac, police said.
Police said they have no suspects in either attack, and it was not immediately clear whether the assaults were related.
Bayan Muna’s president, Rep Satur Ocampo, said he suspected the military. Regional military spokesman Lt Col Preme Monta immediately denied responsibility.
"We are saddened by the report, but what we can say is we have nothing to do with it," said Monta.
Ocampo said the murders "cannot be separated from a series of killings" that have left at least 18 party members, activists and sympathizers dead since September.
Military authorities often refer to left-wing groups as fronts for communist rebels.
"The brazenness of these attacks, in addition to the black propaganda linking me to the purchase of bombing materials, are circumstantial evidence against [the military]" Ocampo said, referring to the military’s claim that seized communist rebel documents indicated Ocampo funded the purchase of explosives.
He said the left-wing opposition has become "fair game for armed assaults" by military and paramilitary units.
"That is unfair," military spokesman Monta said in response. "That speculation is subject to confirmation. They should show evidence to be fair to our soldiers."
Ocampo and his party have been at the forefront of a broad opposition move to oust President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo for allegedly rigging the May 2004 election.
Ocampo said Ramos’ union backed Bayan Muna in last year’s election, and the party supported the continuing strike at Aquino’s plantation.
The strike erupted into a clash with police last November, leaving seven farmers dead and injuring more than 100 police and workers. The management and union were close to a settlement after the plantation recently paid the workers’ back wages.