Stop
playing dirty!
Environmental activists want clean elections,
literally and figuratively
12 March 2007
We are alarmed over the Comelec midnight fire which destroyed vital
election records and deplore the weekend raid on lead Bayan Muna
nominee and second-term solon Satur Ocampo. These are tactics of
the dirtiest kind. We believe that these are ominous developments
in a series of unfortunate events that are setting the stage for
the dirtiest and filthiest elections that the Philippines has had
in years, possibly worse than the 2004 elections.
We want a clean election, literally and figuratively.
We
from Kalikasan
Peoples Network for the Environment (Kalikasan-PNE) want an
election that will be free from excessive material and financial
waste, and more importantly from the dirt and filth of cheating,
fraud, and political harassment. We do not want to see our trees
wounded and smothered by posters of anti-environment candidates,
our streets littered with trash from the overwhelming amount of
paper waste that massive electoral spending generates. But more
importantly, we do not want or country to be smeared with the dirt
and blood of electoral fraud and political repression. We want a
clean election, not a whitewash of muck.
We
have seen enough filth during the 2004 electoral period, where the
stench of the fertilizer scam and the Garci tapes leaked out. When
unsavory characters decided to conserve paper on fake ballots but
tampered with the election returns instead. When blood was spilled
as hundreds of supporters and campaigners of Bayan Muna, Anakpawis,
and Gabriela were killed by suspected military assassins.
This
month, we will not merely listen to the jingles and ads of Senatorial
and Congressional wannabes. We will also be campaigning against
candidates who carry anti-environment and anti-people platforms:
who are in favor of mining liberalization for foreign companies,
bilateral and toxic free trade agreements such as the JPEPA, who
have not lifted a finger against the destruction of our lands, air,
and seas, and who have been silent about the political killings
and massive electoral fraud in 2004.
Already
now, we are seeing tarpaulin posters of candidates?especially administration
candidates?being nailed on to trees in our neighborhood here in
Quezon City. But this waste and excess is nothing when compared
to the dirty tactics that are mounting by the day: the demonizing
and instant criminal cases or administrative charges being drummed
up against opposition figures, the gearing up of an entire fraud
machinery and infrastructure for cheating that will usher in an
even dirtier political era until 2010.
We
from Kalikasan-PNE join other peoples organizations, non-governmental
organizations, and progressive party lists in denouncing and resisting
against this onslaught of filth. We call on all the perpetrators
of these acts: STOP PLAYING DIRTY, FACE THE ELECTIONS FAIR
AND SQUARE. LET THE PEOPLE DECIDE ON THE OUTCOME OF THE 2007 ELECTIONS.
-- Kalikasan-People's
Network for the Environment (Kalikasan-PNE)
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