Alamon: Free Joel Yagao, Now!

I HAVE not met the man but I met his wife. I was in a public event and she approached me and introduced herself. Of course, I have heard about Joel Yagao, political prisoner. Joel was a lay co-worker of the Rural Missionaries of the Philippines doing work among farming communities in Misamis Oriental. By organizing farmers, lay missionaries like Joel from RMP are able to increase farm gate prices of their products, increase wages of seasonal workers, and help them deal with the prevalence of usurious practices in the rural areas that mire them in debilitating debt. To say that they are doing heroic spiritual work by directly addressing the structural causes why many rural Filipinos remain poor and oppressed is an understatement. Especially since they are also easily made scapegoats of state forces eager to score points in their counterinsurgency bid. This was what happened to Joel and his farmer companions when they were arrested and charged with murder in connection with the ambush of Gingoog City Mayor Ruthie Guingona almost three years ago. The NPA owned up to the mistake and promptly apologized for the serious error. But the military, instead of arresting the real perpetrators in their lairs, instead accosted Joel a few months after the incident on the basis of trumped-up charges. I am still at a loss why the state refuses to distinguish between activists and development workers who are obviously above ground and working within the premise that the very little democratic space at present can effect meaningful change; and those, who may espouse the same causes, but have given up on the capacity of the system to transform itself. Joel did not carry a gun, but bravely put himself in harm’s way to stand up for the lowly farmer with just the courage of his convictions. The same tactic is now being leveled against lumad communities and their indigenous leaders. Four indigenous chieftains from Cabanglasan, Bukidnon are now facing the same charges as Joel for a separate incident involving the death of a member of the notorious de la Mance paramilitary group. The design is similar in both cases – close down the opportunities for these individuals to continue their democratic activities as citizens of this nation and legally debilitate their rights as free citizens. It is a counterproductive move actually since what it actually relays is the message that there is no democratic space to speak of in the first place. Every time someone is imprisoned on the basis of made-up legal cases, whatever little glint and illusion of democracy is shattered. It is a case of the military shooting themselves in the foot. They say that they want to bring people back into the fold of the law. And yet they use the law to push these people away from the mainstream and further into the margins. It is an unprincipled move. But what do we expect from state institutions who only have contempt for the weak and the little and the highest degree of subservience and fidelity to those who wield power and wealth? Trampling on the rights of people is ingrained in the operations of this State, shaped in no small measure by our long colonial history and its contemporary manifestation via our feudal democracy. In the meantime, it is the likes of Joel, his wife and their two little boys who suffer. I learned from our brief conversation that the couple has two young boys who sorely miss their father. The children and the wife are studying and working in Cagayan de Oro and the weekend visits to Gingoog City jail has been economically and emotionally taxing especially for the kids. I feel for the wife and the children especially since she also graduated from the same high school I studied in here in Cagayan de Oro. But alas! There are cases when the state’s diligence in pursuing these trumped-up cases falter and the accused are set free. On Friday, I received the good news that after almost three years of languishing in jail, Joel and his co-accused have been acquitted by a local court. Such development is not proof of a working system but instead is evidence that defenders of so-called democracy cannot even win in their own legalistic game, under their own rules. But three years of lost time between Joel and his family have been wasted. Additional injustice must be prevented and he must be brought back to the loving arms of his family, not a day later. Free Joel Yagao immediately! Published in the Sun.Star Cagayan de Oro newspaper on January 23, 2016.