The Center for Trade Union and Human Rights (CTUHR) welcomes the court decision junking the illegal possession of firearms and explosives charges against Bicol transport leader Ramon Rescovilla and his release from prison.

The November 27 decision of Presiding Judge Alym Almayda of Legazpi City’s 5th Judicial Region, Branch 7 affirms our contention that the charges filed against Rescovilla are trumped-up and the evidence used against him were all planted by the police officers who arrested him.

Rescovilla, chairperson of CONDOR, the Bicol chapter of transport group Pagkakaisa ng mga Samahan ng Tsuper at Operatiors Nationwide (PISTON), was arrested on September 7, 2020 in Barangay Kilicao, Daraga town, Albay. He suffered mauling ang torture in the Daraga Police Station before he was brought to Camarines Norte Provincial Jail.

While we welcome the junking of charges against Rescovilla and his release from prison, we are calling for justice for him. So many deplorable human rights violations and injustices were committed against him. Furthermore, we are calling for the release of the 26 political prisoners from the labor movement and all the more than 750 political prisoners in the country.

Trumped-up charges of murder were filed against him, for which he paid a bail on February 9, 2023. When he was being arrested, police officers planted a firearm and hand grenade in his possession. After he was arrested, he was beaten up and tortured by police officers. He spent four years in prison without committing any crime.

The police’s actions against Rescovilla form a pattern of injustice from which many labor activists and many social activists continue to suffer. We demand the immediate release of the 26 political prisoners from the labor movement and all political prisoners in the country, and that no less than President Ferdinand Marcos Jr take action on this issue.

The pattern of injustice that leads to the arrest and imprisonment of labor and social activists continue under Marcos Jr. On October 27, Gavino Panganiban, director for campaigns of the Pagkakaisa ng mga Manggagawa sa Timog Katagalugan (PAMANTIK), regional chapter of national labor center Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU, May First Movement), and Maritess David, labor organizer of the Organized Labor Association in Line Industry and Agriculture (OLALIA), a national federation also belonging to the KMU, were arrested in Pililia St., Brgy. Valenzuela, Makati City. The arrest of Panganiban and David was based on both trumped-up charges and planted evidence.

Last October 7, Jose Dahildahil Puansing, leader of a farm worker’s association, in Escalante City, Negros Occidental, was arrested using similar trumped-up charges and an arrest warrant issued by well-known warrant factory judge Cecilyn Burgos-Villavert of the Quezon City Regional Trial Court Branch 89.