MANILA (UCAN): Zara Alvarez, a volunteer for the Church-Workers Solidarity group in the Diocese of San Carlos, in the Western Visayas of the Philippines was gunned down in Bacolod City, just days after the murder of labour and agrarian reform activist, Randall Echanis who was shot dead in his Manila home on August 10. She had reportedly been receiving death threats for more than a year.
Alvarez was affiliated with leftist groups Anakpawis—of which Echanis was chairperson—and rights group Karapatan, which he co-founded. She once served as Karapatan’s education director and a paralegal staff member.
In August 2019, Alvarez told said that Church work brought her to the peripheries where “farmers who fight a daily struggle live in a place that can only be described as hell on earth.”
She also said more than 87 farmers and activists in her province whom she knew had been murdered. “Every time my phone rang, I knew someone had died,” she had said.
Alvarez also said that despite the threats, she had to respond to her call “because the pursuit of justice has to continue.”
“Receiving death threats has already become one small part of our work,” she said.
Karapatan said Alvarez’s death was part of a “pattern of killings” that included the murder of Echanis.
“Like Ka Randy (Echanis), she was among those tagged as ‘terrorists’ in a proscription case of the Department of Justice filed in 2018. Her name and those of many others were stricken off the list, but the threats against her by alleged state forces continued,” Karapatan said on social media.
“We extend our condolences to Zara’s family and friends, as we and many other colleagues mourn the killing of a beloved human rights and health worker. We will never relent in pursuing justice for Zara, Ka Randy and all victims of extrajudicial killings.”
As we celebrate the 500 years of Christianity in the Philippines. The Chaplaincy to Filipino Migrants organises an on-line talk every Tuesday at 9.00pm. You can join us at:
https://www.Facebook.com/CFM-Gifted-to-give-101039001847033
Bishop Gerardo Alminaza of San Carlos, called the killings “a clear mark of the shameless immorality of the Philippines.”
He urged people to campaign for an end to extrajudicial killings where the perpetrators go unpunished.
The 72-year-old Echanis was allegedly tortured, stabbed and shot by at least five unidentified men in Manila on August 10. Eyewitnesses said unidentified men accosted him outside his apartment in Quezon City, and bundled him into a vehicle before he was found dead, but other reports said he was murdered in his home.
Echanis had reportedly received anonymous death threats, forcing him to adopt an alias that initially raised questions over the dead man’s identity.
He was also a peace consultant of the National Democratic Front and sought reforms and rural development during government peace talks with communist rebels.
Echanis also drafted the Genuine Agrarian Reform Bill that sought the emancipation of tenants and an end to the monopoly on land ownership by the country’s elite and foreign control of land.
Reacting to the murder, Bishop Alminaza said “I add my pastoral voice to the common cry: Justice for Ka Randy. Let us put an end to all these extrajudicial killings where perpetrators go unpunished. The government advocates for the death penalty, yet many crimes like this are still unresolved.”
The bishop said, “We should never be afraid to confront injustice and continue our cry in the name of the landless farmers. We will never stop confronting this violent regime.”
