UP Student Regent (SR) Terry Ridon declared the Diliman campus as a “sanctuary” for any anti-Arroyo group who will be pursued by law enforcement agents due to last Thursday’s military stand-off.

Ridon directly addressed his pronouncement to Senator Antonio Trillanes and the 30 Magdalo soldiers who walked out from their court martial hearing over the failed coup attempt in 2003 to stage a demonstration on November 29. The said group, which took over the Manila Peninsula Hotel, called for the resignation of Gloria Arroyo whose regime they consider as “corrupt” and “illegitimate.”

Currently detained at Camp Crame in Quezon City, Trillanes, Brigadier General Danilo Lim and the other Magdalo soldiers, now facing charges of rebellion, were forced to surrender to prevent further bloodshed among journalists and supporters from leftist and religious groups who were inside the hotel.

After the arrest of Trillanes and the other renegade soldiers, the government retaliated through imposing unlawful orders that violated press freedom. Justice Secretary Raul Gonzales said they could be charged with rebellion, but claimed that state prosecutors are also looking into possible violations of the Human Security Act.

UP students held a simultaneous protest action to sympathize with the Magdalo soldiers facing rebellion charges whom Ridon considered as bearing the same grievances against the Arroyo administration.

Ridon vowed that UP students will protect any group or individual opposing Arroyo and seeking protection in the university premises.

Educated stance
University Student Council Chair Shahana Abdulwahid said that the students support the legitimate demands of the Trillanes-led Magdalo group.

She maintained, however, that the simultaneous protest action in UP served to “consolidate an educated stance” regarding the issues Trillanes forwarded.

Abdulwahid mentioned that most students were already willing to mobilize in Makati but opted to assess the situation and issue first.

Militant youth organization Anakbayan Chair Eleanor De Guzman, meanwhile, stressed that the Makati stand-off serves as an “opportune time to sort lingering issues hounding the Arroyo administration.” She added that the stand-off should also pose as a sign to intensify calls for Arroyo’s ouster.

Other universities such as the Polytechnic University of the Philippines, University of the East, and the University of Sto. Thomas also held simultaneous protect actions.

No trespassing
Ridon referred to the militant tradition of UP to bolster his pronouncement of ensuring safe passage for Arroyo opponents in the university premises.

The university throughout the years has proven to be a haven for opponents of changing regimes. Before Martial Law, UP students once cordoned the university avenues to protest an oil price hike ensuing in what is known as the Diliman Commune.

Upon the declaration of a state of national emergency last year through Presidential Proclamation 1017, UP students and administrators declared the university as a “state of emergency-free zone.”

‘Martial Law’ fears
Following the end of the six-hour military stand-off, around 30 journalists were taken into custody for questioning at the National Capital Region Police Office in Bicutan at aound 9 p.m. Some of them were handcuffed at the time they were let out of the hotel’s lobby.

Also around this time, Malacanang ordered a five-hour curfew which militant groups branded as a sign of a “creeping Martial Law regime.”

However, some journalists, including Leonard Postrado of the Manila Bulletin, Malaya columnist Ellen Tordesillas and GMA 7 reporter Sandra Aguinaldo, refused to be handcuffed because the police did not say the reason behind their arrests.

Postrado revealed that arrested foreign and local journalists were “invited” for “processing” either as “witnesses or suspects.” “Sabi nila (police), suspect kami… dahil kasabwat kami ni Trillanes,” he said.

The National Union of Journalists in the Philippines (NUJP) demanded the police to stop treating journalists who covered the botched uprising as “enemies of the state.”

In a Collegian interview, Neri Colmenares, secretary general of the National Union of People’s Lawyers, said the confiscation of TV footage is an act of censorship. “This reflected the paranoia and overreaction of the Arroyo government to the situation,” he said.

As the “invited” journalists were being shoved onto the bus, their colleagues outside the hotel repeatedly shouted, “Freedom of the press!”

In reports, Police Deputy Director General Jesus Verzosa said that the journalists had been released late midnight, but 17 remained in custody. The invitation, according to Verzosa, is a matter of “standard operating procedure” when a crime has been committed.

Tordesillas said that even if journalists were freed later, the police and military wanted to create a chilling effect on the members of the press who were just fulfilling “their jobs as journalists.”

In what she said as “reminiscent of Martial Law,” Tordesillas, who was charged with libel by First Gentleman Miguel Arroyo earlier this year, decried a creeping dictatorial rule, especially as a curfew was ordered.

‘Unlawful’ curfew
Arroyo also placed Metro Manila, Central Luzon and CALABARZON (Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal and Quezon) under a five-hour curfew from 12 m.n. to 5 a.m. as the military and police conducted follow-up operations after the siege.

Under the guidelines issued by the police, checkpoints shall be established and permit to carry arms outside one’s residence shall be suspended during the curfew. Violators shall be released only after 5 a.m.

The curfew, the first since Martial Law, drew flak from various groups, saying that it was a manifestation of Arroyo’s atrocities to suppress similar public condemnation calling for her ouster.

Executed without a law, Arroyo’s declaration is unconstitutional and any arrests would be illegal, said Colmenares. The provision was placed in the Constitution to prevent the president to single handedly impose repressive orders, he added.

Section 6, Article III of the Philippine Constitution states, “The right to travel [shall not] be impaired except in the interest of national security, public safety, or public health, as may be provided by law.”

Colmenares said Arroyo has taken the law in her hand so that she could quell the people’s outrage over her illegitimate administration hounded by dismalhuman rights records and corruption controversies.

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