MANILA, Philippines — Malacañang will let the legal process run its course following the filing of administrative complaint against three government officials for red-tagging activist groups.
IBON Foundation Inc. asked the Office of the Ombudsman to hold National Security Adviser Hermogenes Esperon, Presidential Communications and Operations Office Undersecretary Lorraine Badoy and Southern Luzon Command chief Major Gen. Antonio Parlade Jr. answerable for their “malicious abuse of authority and negligent performance of duties.”
The research group also said the three government officials should be punished for their “unprofessional, unjust and insincere, politically biased” conduct.
Presidential spokesperson Salvador Panelo said Malacañang “will let the law take its course.”
“The Ombudsman is an independent body, a constitutional body at that. It will perform its tasks,” Panelo said.
IBON said the complaint was filed after “a year of constant vilification,” including Badoy’s remarks calling the research group a communist front during a television interview in January. This, after IBON sought to debunk the data that PCOO presented for their “Duterte Legacy” campaign.
In February 2019, Badoy along with Parlade, former Armed Forces of the Philippines deputy chief-of-staff for civil military operations, accused IBON of “fabricated reports” for the United Nations and European Union.
A month later, Esperon named IBON as among the non-government organizations supported by the Belgian government the legal fronts of communist rebels.
IBON stressed it is a foundation that publishes socio-political-economic analysis.
“We know that there’s more to red-tagging than mere vilification—it’s the administration’s gateway drug to more vicious persecution and even violent attacks on activists,” Sonny Africa, IBON executive director, said. — Gaea Katreena Cabico