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Police intel on hunt for members of Alliance of Concerned Teachers

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Inday Espina-Varona

<p>Philippine National Police (PNP) intelligence operatives have been visiting schools nationwide, asking for “an inventory” of members or allies of the Alliance of Concerned Teachers (ACT),” officials of the 180,000-member association told ABS-CBN News.</p><p>In an interview, ACT secretary-general Raymond Basilio said reports have poured in from Tarlac, Bulacan, Cebu, Sorsogon, Camarines Sur, Zambales, Manila, Navotas, Malabon and Agusan del Sur since the start of 2019.</p><p>“Some areas, like Manila and Zambales, even have memo from the division offices of the Department of Education,” Basilio said.</p><p>“In other cities, there is no memo, but requests come in via SMS or messages to mobile phones of via Facebook messenger and some orders are verbal.”</p><p>At least three schools in Manila’s third district received visits from police intelligence officers, Manila Public School Teachers Association president Solita Diaz also confirmed in an interview.</p><p>Police officers visited Cecilio Apostol Elementary School in Santa Cruz, Lakandula Elementary School in Tondo and Avancena High School on Friday, January 4.</p><p>Diaz said all three schools are under district three, in Manila’s old downtown area.</p><p>ACT national chairperson Joselyn Martinez told ABS-CBN News that police intelligence officers also visited Maysilo Elementary School in Malabon on Thursday, January 3, and Villamor High School in Tondo.</p><p>Police also talked to the teacher federation heads of Las Piñas and Antipolo, she added.</p><p>Lito Resaba, Antipolo teachers&#x27; federation president, told ABS-CBN News two police officers, a man and a woman, visited him at the Juan Sumulong Elementary School on Thursday, January 3, at about 2 p.m.</p><p>&quot;They were polite, said they were only following instructions,&quot; Resaba said. &quot;But they only flashed some memo on a mobile phone, that I could not read.&quot;</p><p>He initially told them to come back on Tuesday, January 8, but later told them of ACT&#x27;s decision to reject the request.</p><p>&quot;They took it calmly,&quot; Resaba said.</p><div class="media-content"><div class="slider-for"><div><img src="https://sa.kapamilya.com/absnews/abscbnnews/media/2019/tvpatrol/01/05/20190105-teacher1.jpg "/></div><div><img src="https://sa.kapamilya.com/absnews/abscbnnews/media/2019/tvpatrol/01/05/20190105-teacher2.jpg "/></div><div><img src="https://sa.kapamilya.com/absnews/abscbnnews/media/2019/tvpatrol/01/05/20190105-teacher3.jpg "/></div><div><img src="https://sa.kapamilya.com/absnews/abscbnnews/media/2019/tvpatrol/01/05/20190105-teacher4.jpg "/></div></div><div class="media-content slider-desc"><div class="item-desc"><p>ACT and the MPSTA supplied to ABS-CBN News copies of orders from Chief Inspector Rexson C. Layug, head of the Manila Police District Intelligence Branch, and Zambales province police intelligence head Chief Inspector Pancho Dasca Doble.</p></div><div class="item-desc"><p>ACT and the MPSTA supplied to ABS-CBN News copies of orders from Chief Inspector Rexson C. Layug, head of the Manila Police District Intelligence Branch, and Zambales province police intelligence head Chief Inspector Pancho Dasca Doble.</p></div><div class="item-desc"><p>ACT and the MPSTA supplied to ABS-CBN News copies of orders from Chief Inspector Rexson C. Layug, head of the Manila Police District Intelligence Branch, and Zambales province police intelligence head Chief Inspector Pancho Dasca Doble.</p></div><div class="item-desc"><p>ACT and the MPSTA supplied to ABS-CBN News copies of orders from Chief Inspector Rexson C. Layug, head of the Manila Police District Intelligence Branch, and Zambales province police intelligence head Chief Inspector Pancho Dasca Doble.</p></div></div></div><div><br/><strong>Orders</strong></div><p><br/>ACT and the MPSTA furnished ABS-CBN News copies of orders from Chief Inspector Rexson C. Layug, head of the Manila Police District Intelligence Branch and Zambales province police intelligence head, Chief Inspector Pancho Dasca Doble.</p><p>Their orders are similar, citing memos from the regional intelligence division office, with a reference to “2019 mid-term elections.”</p><p>Doble’s December 27 order additionally cited a December 10, 2018, order from the national directorate for intelligence.</p><p>The MPSTA, in addition, had a copy of a January 4 order from Manila Assistant Schools Division superintendent Sheryll T. Gayola.</p><p>Gayola, officer in charge while superintendent Jenilyn Rose B. Corpuz is on leave, furnished principals of Manila schools with Layug’s December 26 memorandum and ordered “appropriate action.”</p><div><br/><strong>Denials, confirmation</strong></div><p><br/>National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) head Chief Superintendent Guillermo Eleazar, in a phone interview with ABS-CBN News, denied ordering the school visits.</p><p>“Walang order, hindi ko alam iyan,” Eleazar said. (I have not issued any order. I do not know anything about that.)</p><p>Manila police district head, Supt. Vicenta Dupa Danao, Jr., also said he had never issued an order, nor had seen the Layug document.</p><p>When shown the document, Danao said it was his first sight of it. He did not, however, question the authenticity of the document.</p><p>ABS-CBN News also called the NCRPO’s Intelligence Office for a response from its top officers, division head Senior Supr Glicerio Cansilao, and his deputy, Sr. Supt Bernard Yang.</p><p>A PO3 Leope Santos called back to ask for the document. ABS-CBN News read the contents to him. He has yet to return subsequent calls and text messages.</p><p>But Doble, the intelligence chief of the Zambales provincial police, confirmed the document passed on by ACT was genuine.</p><p>“We’re just following orders,” Doble said in a phone interview.</p><p>Asked what was the reason for the “inventory”, Doble replied: “You don’t ask why. It’s up to the region. We only pass the order to the stations.”</p><p>When asked about the reference to the mid-term elections cited in his memo, Doble refused to give details.</p><p>Basilio said a police officer in General Santos also confirmed receiving the order but refused to divulge details.<br/> </p><div><strong>Attacks on militants</strong></div><p><br/>President Rodrigo Duterte, military officials and national police officials have been attacking legal militant organizations as “fronts” of the Communist Party of the Philippines.</p><p>The President in December vowed to decimate Asia’s longest-running insurgency, including militant legal organizations, referencing the bloodbath that happened in Indonesia during the time of President Soeharto in the mid-1960s.</p><p>Communications Secretary Martin Andanar has also confirmed and justified Duterte’s order, claiming groups out to oust the President are enemies of the people.</p><p>The order to destroy front organizations includes militant party-list groups which have consistently won seats in the House of Representatives since the 1990s.</p><div><br/><strong>Tokhang redux</strong></div><p><br/>The ACT is the accredited and sole regional union of teachers in the National Capital Region, as well as Regions 5, 6, 7 and 11.</p><p>“We are also the only registered union in other regions, where we are working to be accredited,” Basilio said.</p><p>The ACT is separate from but allied with the ACT Teachers party, which currently has two lawmakers, Representatives France Castro and Antonio Tinio.</p><p>Castro warned that education officials who forward to intelligence units the private information of teachers could face administration or criminal raps.</p><p>She urged officials and school administrations to “fight for the rights of teachers.”</p><p>Castro also said the collection of lists is in line with the strategy of Tokhang, the fulcrum of Duterte’s drug war that has killed thousands of mostly poor Filipinos.</p><p>The MPSTA, a recognized division chapter of ACT, sent the DepEd’s Manila School Division Office a strongly worded letter on Friday, January 4.</p><p>It demanded the revocation of Gayola’s memo and denouncing its “complicity” in “state-perpetrated harassment, intimidation and repression” of ACT members.</p><p>“Teachers have the right to self-determination,” stressed the letter signed by Diaz. “Schools are supposed to be havens of learning and zones of peace.”</p><div><strong>Protests loom</strong></div><p>Martinez told ABS-CBN News the teacher’s organization that two police intelligence officers in civilian clothes visited Maysilo Elementary School and asked the principal for the names and residential addresses of ACT members.</p><p>The principal referred them back to the division office, Martinez said.</p><p>“They said they had a letter but that it was confidential and did not let the principal read it,” she added.</p>

<p>PNP intelligence operatives have been visiting schools nationwide, asking for “an inventory” of members or allies of the ACT, officials of the alliance said.</p>

PNP intelligence operatives have been visiting schools nationwide, asking for “an inventory” of members or allies of the ACT, officials of the alliance said.