Going Home (to the heart) for Melissa Roxas

Aug 26th, 2009

From Friends of Lolas
Originally posted on July 23, 2009, 5:45 PM

By M. Evelina Galang

Something happens to you when you are born outside of your parents’ mother country. You are born with a longing to go home to a place you’ve never been. You go about your business, being all American and knowing nothing else, ignoring all that talk about how it was when they grew up “back home” how things were, who your ancestors were, but inside you, they’ve planted that seed, and it’s growing. You pretend you don’t want to know like a good teenager, but you want to know. You want to be a part of it. And if you somehow find your way to writing stories and poems and making films and art, that hunger grows. And you want to go back home. You want to see it for yourself. And it is not enough to visit. You start to write about it. Draw it. Make music about it. And then that is not enough to just visit your family, your lolo, lola, titas and titos all your pinsan, you want to know more. You go historical. You find the stories of the earth. You sit with all the kapitbahay. You speak your bad Tagalog. And stories come out of you, poetry, things you never imagined you housed inside of you and there you are — an American, digging up a past only your soul comprehends. Not your MTV self. Not your Boomerang kid self. Certainly not your wild American Self. If you’re lucky that spark hits you and somehow the art you make does something more than sit pretty on the page. It moves you to act.

I sit in solidarity with you Melissa Roxas. Speak up, speak your truth without fear. For you represent us all. All of us who long to go home, to find our true Selves and in doing so discover that in fact, despite the fact we were not born on that island or if we were, we have not lived on that island for a lifetime, we have a devotion to it, a commitment to it. Make it clear, we have a right to come home, to serve our people with our words and to do it without savage acts of torture, or corruption or imprisonment.

With much love, sincere respect and absolute solidarity,

Evelina

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Posted in Words for Melissa

Kundiman for Melissa

Aug 23rd, 2009

From Kundiman

On May 19, 2009, Melissa Roxas, 31, an activist and Kundiman fellow from Los Angeles who had been doing volunteer health work in Tarlac Province in the Philippines, was kidnapped along with two other health volunteers for a nongovernmental nationalist group called Bayan.

Let us participate in a community of cymbals through poems– bringing noise and sound and outrage and unremitting memory to what has happened to Melissa and what continues to happen to activists and artists around the world who dare to take a stand against injustice. Let us encircle them, encourage them and fight for them. There is power when people agree to stand and speak together.

For original posting of “Kundiman for Melissa” poems, click here.

 

 

NEIL AITKEN

Kundiman That Will Not Be Silenced

for Melissa Roxas

If I speak for Melissa, I speak as well for the disappeared,
for the ones taken under the heat of the high sun

or by the binding blindfold of night, for the sons and daughters,
husbands and wives, beaten down with rods and fists,

for the ones who cannot sleep tonight, whose unclosed wounds,
silent and heavy, span the black oceans between here and home.

I must carve my fear like hers into a shining blade of hope,
my heart into an iron fortress of will. I must enter the bruised homes

of the missing and kneel by the side of women in empty rooms,
their voices and hands scarred from searching in the dark. I must take

what has been written on the flesh with hard fists and hate
and write it plain, must make the stain of blood indelible, return

the tally of blows a hundred-fold with words. I must say her name,
Melissa. Say: Yes, I live. Say: My name is Melissa Roxas. Say:

I will not be silenced. I have rights. There are laws. Say: I am Melissa.
Say: My name is like honey in the skull of the lion. Say: I am a writer.

Though you gag and choke me, beat my head against the wall, yet I will live.
Say: My God is not a god of torture. The birds know and are rising from the trees.

Not all hearts can be destroyed. Say: Melissa. Melissa. Melissa.
Though I am not her, let me be a fire, a torch lit in a deep cave,

breaking the swell of darkness, rising back into the light. Let me be like her,
brave as the first bee setting out in spring, armed and hopeful. Yes, you live…

 

 

KIMBERLY ALIDIO

Kundiman

After “Author’s Prayer” by Ilya Kaminsky

If I speak for Melissa, I must speak
from America as an American

to Americans and from the Philippines
as a Filipina to Filipinos

and to those with masks on
with my hood on and tape

across my mouth. I must speak
for the right to return to the place

of my birth on programs of exposure
and immersion, upon being endorsed

from the USA to the National to Central Luzon
to Tarlac, with a camera, external hard disk, a laptop,

an ipod, a journal, a sphygmomanometer,
a stethoscope, thermometers, medicines, my watch,

and a wallet. I must speak
of the right to witness without violation,

whether or not I am mistaken for another
North American Filipina activist,

by torturers and senators of the home country
of my parents. Let me be unhooded, uncuffed,

unsuffocated, undoubled over, unshot, unraped,
unsaved, and undisappeared. I must speak

upon resurfacing and speak for those unsurfaced
sitting at the other end of the earth.

When asked: “Handa ka na bang mamatay?,”
I give my name: Melissa.

When asked whether I would return
to the fold, I repeat my name, Melissa.

Melissa, not Maita. Melissa, not NPA.
Melissa, not CP. Melissa, not America.

Melissa, not (even) the Philippines.
Our country is wider than fear.

Yes, I live. We live among the relics:
a copy of Love in the Time of Cholera,

a Bible, a pair of slippers, a t-shirt, biscuits,
handcuffs, and a password. Yes, you live.

 

 

CHING-IN CHEN

Elegy for a Blindfold
a Kundiman for Melissa Roxas

On May 19, 2009, Melissa Roxas, an activist and poet from Los Angeles who had been doing volunteer health work in Tarlac Province in the Philippines, was kidnapped along with two other health volunteers for a nongovernmental nationalist group called Bayan.

If I speak for Melissa Roxas,
I must leave my blindfold by the door.

There were hundreds watching
while we wrote her name over and over,

for the white page leaves her song unsung,
To the fifteen ski masks asking for the opened door,

I say yes, I live. My mouth is a million

Melissas shouting my name against
the tape compressed to my mouth:

each who’s lost home country still chanting

Melissa Roxas,
Melissa Roxas,
Melissa Roxas,

my mouth full of my own eyes.
Let me be honest.

I have never seen the corner
where they took you with
high-power rifles and pushed
you to the ground. You shouted your name
for memory.

I was not there with the bruise
dragging your arms and legs into that
blue van, where five punks pushed

you through the side door under the limits of
artificial sky.

For days, every creature a vanishing back, punched repeatedly in the ribcage,
head grazed to the letters of friends recycling bamboo slats -
your words:

“No goodbyes, it’s always see you later, or sooner… I was confronted by two burly men
I will not be surprised if they shone their flashlights when in a little town in the Philippines
I slept light that first night in a couple years amidst earth and grass in my hands, no breakfast or lunch was given me the sun hiding again for the last time I did not listen and did not answer that day I hear your voice, turn around and told them I knew my rights and yes, before long we meet again…” passing through a sometimes grassy and graveled pathway where I saw through my blindfold

This inarched that has grown a film over my eyes I took a bath with one hand free from its cuff but a hanging cuff on the other and my eyes free from the blindfold

I’ve hacked through. Then a fist struck me at my upper sternum and it hurt and then a thumb was pressed strongly to my throat (I heard somebody saying “huh! … huh … huh.”) choking me, making me suffocate for quite a time and when he released the pressure I gagged and I coughed and then he struck me with his fist on my left jaw ringing my ears …

I waited to hear word of you rising from the page with your name intact.
I prepared for the worst.

And you did, saying “Tonight I will learn
To Die
A Thousand Times
And Be Resurrected.”

Yes, you live
to tell your own story.

Notes:

Italicized words are taken from Melissa Roxas’ affidavit signed May 29, 2009, Quezon City, Philippines.

Words in quotes are taken from letters Melissa Roxas wrote to the Kundiman community.

“each who’s lost home country still chanting” is a line from Vanessa Huang’s “Kundiman for Melissa Roxas”

 

 

OLIVER DE LA PAZ

Kundiman

“I then started to shout my name, repeating it
again and again . . . “
–Melissa Roxas from the affidavit on her abduction by
military agents in the Philippines.

If I speak for Melissa, let my words
sound above the night crickets and the water

tonguing the edges of the fortress. Let the bats
arc above me in the night time, while a fingernail

is heard, scratching a poem on the underside of a chair.
Yes, I live. Yes, I live, and the far off sounds of boats

confirm me. Let my body rise above the waters
and the music. Let the helicopters whirl

their adagios while searchlight beams write my name.
Let television and the air waves say Melissa Roxas,

Melissa Roxas in the unquiet hours, beyond
the static of station sign-off.

Melissa Roxas, Melissa Roxas, the sound of the ocean
against the balustrades, the waters surging and receding-

Melissa Roxas, into the jeepneys with their jangled
American voodoo, Roxas, Roxas,

deep and thrumming with the baseline. Let me be
the silver jeep to carry you from here. Let the music

from the radio be heard from the street corner,
past the markets selling leather. Let me be the breath

in your ear as you turn your head to go to sleep.
Let the heat from what I say press down on your chest

in the nighttime. Yes, you live. Yes,
you live as the steam from what I say fogs your window.

As the vendors in the early morning, rise to carry
their wares in the pre-dawn. Yes, you live beyond

this solitude — beyond this immeasurable ocean to hear,
feel your name, my name, our song. Let me be unseen

yet ever present. Let my whisper be your whisper. My scream
be your scream, the pulse of my wrist, your cadence

keeping pace beyond the disquiet. Let our nerve endings
touch, setting fires with a spark on the horizon. Let us

be the kerosene soaked arrow fired above the fortress walls.
Let it burn, let it breathe, let it ignite the dry wild grasses

in the courtyard to spell my name, your name,
our song.

 

 

NIKI ESCOBAR

“Over and Over Again”
Kundiman for Melissa

If I speak for Melissa, I must paint
my tongue the color of the century,

I must release the prisoners
hidden between my bitter teeth.

If I must speak for Melissa, I must be more
than a standing number before the disappeared,

more than quiet mourning
sitting at the other end of the earth.

Yes, I have planted
my feet in the soil of what sustains us

across an ocean, through our parents’
amnesiac flight.

Yes, I live. I can chant “Melissa” in two tones:
unyielding stone and a lip-biting kiss

with the impossible. Let me be the smile of words
that rose in throats upon Melissa’s return.

I will meet a mouthful of crucified silence
with a lifetime of a poet’s howl.

I will repeat my name: Melissa.
Melissa, not NPA. Melissa, not America.

Melissa, not the Philippines.
Let me starve colossal lies,

and feed a bellowing era with forgiving
syllables for our beloved

masters. My sisters, my brothers live
in the incantation of Melissa’s name.

Yes, you live in the telling of this story.

 

 

SARAH GAMBITO

Kundiman

If I speak for Melissa, I force myself
upon the soldier. I keep him in my schoolhouse

feed him fish and aqua lovely numbers so he forgets
where he is from. He can be
as I am from.

As the woman ahead of you with a lovely Om
and it is like an Apostle.
A beatrice original family feeling.

I put my hand on your chest and say Feel.

I’ll love the boy, the man, the old man.
Clenching, body aroma family.

Healing it as I hate.
(So you can stop. So you can rest. So you can drink something cool.)

Yes, I live. I move my books to stand beside your books.
Bright blade angel squalling like a whale.
Yes, you live.

Let’s drape it around someone’s shoulders.

 

 

VANESSA HUANG

Kundiman
for Melissa Roxas

If I speak for Melissa, I must speak
for L, N, and youth we do not name
Assata, Mumia, each name ears have fought to know
Andrea’s Osage, names stolen inside the chanting
each stolen who’s let me hear their heartdrum
each patience, in prayer, for one kiss with truthsong
all spirits and lovers who carry song without sound
and still dance.

Yes, I live now, the quiet fightdrum
You shouted your name for memory
Melissa Melissa Melissa still chanting
I hear you far and close still chanting
L N and youth still chanting
each purple flower, each return still chanting
Melissa Melissa Melissa still chanting
blank license plate of your capture still chanting
Assata Mumia and MOVE still chanting
all hiding in Quezon City still chanting
Melissa Melissa Melissa still chanting
each who’s lost home country still chanting
Andrea’s Osage neighbors still chanting
each ghost still not safe to name is chanting

Let us be this fightdrum still chanting
each Kuya, help me still chanting
each decline to comment still chanting
Melissa your camera memory still chanting
ghost of dead lovers still chanting
showing signs of torture still chanting
medicine for this break still chanting
language evaporate at gunpoint still chanting
stretch and pull each mask still chanting
each door forced open, each left ajar still chanting
each stomach caressing ground still chanting
each muscle fight back still chanting
Melissa your Flame to the Body still chanting
each Foot that Bleeds Black still chanting
each Incipient Wing that can’t fly still chanting
military gone to hide still chanting
each inch tape, each knotted blindfold still chanting
sinking each handcuff’s clasp still chanting
temperature their rifles still chanting
each bomb, each fire, each time still chanting
each death and resurrection still chanting
Melissa your compas inside still chanting
each rib, each palm stronger than cages still chanting
each breath you stole for rest, each whisper a campaign still chanting
each poem that speaks later, each truthsong before Night Comes still chanting
each window of sky, each freedom found in village arms still chanting
each knowing eye, each kind gesture still chanting
each movement til empire fall, each rest in love still chanting
gathering this rebel heartdrum still chanting
all this music poetry still chanting

Yes, you live, Melissa,
song of truth rising,
your music is chanting.

Notes:

This poem after Illya Kaminsky’s “Author’s Prayer”.

“You shouted your name for memory” is from Ching-In Chen’s “Elegy for a Blindfold”, also a Kundiman for Melissa Roxas.

“Kuya, help me” is from Melissa Roxas’ affidavit signed May 29, 2009, Quezon City, Philippines.

The rest of the italicized text is from a poem Melissa Roxas conceived and memorized during her abduction on May 19, 2009.

“each death and resurrection” refers to “I will learn to Die / a Thousand Times / and Be Resurrected” in Melissa Roxas’ May 19, 2009 poem.

 

 

AIMEE NEZHUKUMATATHIL

Kundiman for Melissa Roxas

“An American woman was freed five days after armed and hooded men believed to be military agents abducted her and
two companions in a Philippine province north of Manila.” — NY Times

If I speak for Melissa, let my ribcage & lung break

into beautiful pieces, let loose several freckles of spit.

Let the owl I keep in my nurseclothes lend you

a feather. Let her wide eyes be the lantern

& thirsty wick you carry into the dark rooms.

Let each wiggle & audacious pulse of a snake’s heart

be the hiss & whisper that says, Yes, I live.

Melissa. Melissa. Melissa. Melissa. Melissa. Me-lis-sa.

Your name is a breeze from a sambong shrub.

New moon. Sea foam and broken dish. I salve the leaves

into your cuts and welts. We surround you in flame

& fountain. I cup my hand with mobolo juice & lime.

Bring it to your lips. Let our voices be the only match

& start you need when you return to face your captors.

We surround you in flame & fountain. Yes, you live.

 

 

YAEL VILLAFRANCA

Surfacing
after Illya Kaminsky and Diskarte Namin

If I speak for Melissa, I have locked
my fingers with hers. I’ve planted
my feet in the soil of what sustains us

across an ocean, through our parents’
amnesiac flight. I’ve awakened to the cry
the unhooded roar
UNTIL WE WIN THIS REVOLUTION
stretching endless ribbon woven
in our voices our fists. The promise of
our country is wider than fear.

We swear upon our waiting generations, yes. We live
and speak for Melissa. We reach back
to our belonging. Our always. We rise

as Melissa, anak na babae, kapatid na babae,
taga Maynila, taga Los Angeles, taga Habi,
taga Kundiman. We name ourselves
the river carving unyielding stone and speak

for each other, together at once.

Para sa bayan.

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Posted in Words for Melissa

Poem by Melissa Roxas

Aug 21st, 2009

Humus
by Melissa Roxas

I.

The composition of earth changes every time something is mixed into it. The rains come and it becomes mud when mixed with water. Seeds, when planted, flower into something that feeds you. The same is true of smell and sounds. Isn’t it often said that when you talk to plants they grow to know your voice? Move with your breath?

But what of sweat that pours into the ground? The markings made from combat boots that trampled the earth? The wrappers of Payless on the ground? The many cigarette butts that came from the Devil’s mouth? What of the blood? From the back of Julito*? From the chest of Ronel**? What happens to the animal sound from the bodies? The slow movements of men with their hands tied to the back, the missing tongues, the knife, the men in uniform whose laugh made the earth remember? There was the odor of musk and wind and rotten calabasa. What will grow from that much soil? The earth grew familiar with Julito’s hands when he planted maiz and vegetables in the farm, Ronel’s feet from hours of planting squash. The earth has known their names forever, Oh, but never like this.

II.

By earth
bound
by earth
bit by bit
by give
by mouth
by trail
by foot
by print
by squash
by earth
unearth
by leaf
by worm
lift by hair
by arm
by might
see the sack
grey and ash
by and by
hack by hack
by bit
by bone
by red by rib
by earth
by lie
they lie
my
o my
by and by
by earth they lie

III.

You try to rearrange the bones
but the foot doesn’t fit the leg
the hip too big for the torso
the neck too dark for the head
one eye is gone
the other is the wrong color
no arm
only two left fists.
Mark the parts
that still don’t have
its pieces,
try to fit the ones
that are there
feel the finger,
let it point,
lift them all from the fires.

IV.

I looked for you
in hospitals, infirmaries,
morgues of every city,
everywhere –
even in the fresh patches of unmarked earth
that promised your body.

But it was not you I found
but many more unnamed children.
There was a woman
whose body was half burned,
her face drawn in soft charcoal,
an unmaking of art
an erasure of beauty, of death
in its most primitive form.
There was a man who went
insane from torture, found
on the steps of a small hospital
in Pasig. They were all broken parts
that could’ve been yours.
Other deaths
and their living mothers,
children, and lovers
walking the streets
searching the wind
hoping it will carry them messages.

V.

When you tell the mountains to be moved, it is not at your call that they obey. But journey and take even a spoonful of earth from its mountaintop and place it on flat ground and you would have changed the world a little bit already.

 


* Julito Quirante and Ronel Raguing were members of NAMASCA (Nagkahiusang Mag-uuma sa Sta. Catalina), a legal peasant’s organization affiliated with Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) movement, that advocates for the rights of landless peasants, small farmers and farm workers for genuine land reform in Negros Oriental, Philippines. After missing for more than a month, the search for them led by Karapatan Central Visayas ended with the exhumation of their bodies on March 9, 2009. Their bodies were in an advanced stage of decomposition. Juanito’s body had broken ribs and 10 stab wounds in the back. Ronel’s body had broken ribs, 4 stab wounds in the stomach and 2 in the upper chest. Suspected elements of the Philippine military responsible for their abduction and killing still remain at large.

** See above note.

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Posted in Melissa's Words

For Doing Its Job, CHR Is Now Under Attack

Aug 21st, 2009

From Bulatlat.com
Published on August 21, 2009, 8:24 PM

The Philippine military, through its attack dogs Pastor Alcover and Jovito Palparan, are trying to discredit the Commission on Human Rights and its chairperson, Leila de Lima. Human-rights groups are understandably concerned. “Now that the CHR chairperson insists on the mandate of the commission, they consider her as an enemy,” Marie Hilao-Enriquez of Karapatan said. “That is the most dangerous mindset.”

By Ronalyn V. Olea
Bulatlat

MANILA — For years since it was established, the Commission on Human Rights (CHR), a supposedly independent constitutional body whose head is appointed by the President, has struggled to gain some respect. Many had doubted its capacity to fulfill its mandate, even to be impartial.

As its leaders would readily admit, the CHR had been a toothless tiger–a perception made worse by the commission’s failure in the past to confront the government, particularly the Philippine military, for violations of human rights.

It came as a surprise to many, therefore, when the CHR began taking a more active role in recent years in investigating human-rights cases, particularly in the wake of the series of extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances and torture.

CHR chairperson Leila de Lima during a hearing of the Melissa Roxas case in Congress. (Photo by Fred Dabu / bulatlat.com)

CHR chairperson Leila de Lima during a hearing of the Melissa Roxas case in Congress. (Photo by Fred Dabu / bulatlat.com)

The case of Melissa Roxas–the Filipino-American activist who claimed to have been abducted and tortured by soldiers and who, after going home to the United States, had gone back to the Philippines to pursue her case against the military–illustrates best this change at the CHR. Roxas did all that under the protective custody of the CHR.

To many human-rights advocates, it did not come as a surprise as well that the CHR itself had become the subject of attack for doing its mandate. Nothing illustrated this best than the CHR hearing on Roxas’s case on July 29, when Rep. Pastor Alcover Jr. of the anti-communist group Alliance for Nationalism and Democracy (Anad) asked CHR chairperson Leila de Lima if she was related to Juliet de Lima, the wife of Jose Maria Sison, the founding chairman of the Communist Party of the Philippines.

Alcover apparently sought to discredit de Lima and the CHR investigation itself by trying to link de Lima to the communists. Earlier, Alcover alleged that Roxas was a communist guerrilla.

“I take offense in that kind of stance. What are you trying to insinuate?” de Lima told Alcover during the hearing. “Is this part of your psy-war? Are you questioning the credibility of the CHR chair?”

“Yes,” Alcover replied without hesitation.

Threatened

De Lima told Alcover and former Maj. Gen. Jovito Palparan Jr. of the Bantay party list, who also attended the hearing, not to muddle the issue. Alcover and Palparan were summoned by the commission to testify and present the alleged video and photographs showing Roxas as a member of the New People’s Army (NPA). The NPA, led by the CPP, has been waging a people’s war for four decades.

Palparan also questioned de Lima’s statement saying that Roxas’s affiliation is irrelevant to the ongoing investigation of the CHR. He said further that Roxas’s testimony is a mere propaganda against the military and the government. Palparan has been called “The Butcher” by human-rights advocates for the trail of blood he left behind in places where he had been assigned. Alcover is a self-proclaimed anti-communist crusader.

In a statement to the media the next day, de Lima confirmed that Juliet de Lima is a distant relative. “I neither denied nor concealed that. Why are the two gentlemen making a fuss about that?” she said.

“Why are they so threatened by Roxas’s case that they are on full offensive?” de Lima said. “It seems that their personal crusade is to block an inquiry whose goal is to search for truth. Why are they so frightened of such scrutiny? No one is respondent yet because no one has been identified so far. Does anyone feel alluded to for past acts?”

When asked to comment, CHR commissioner Jose Manuel Mamauag told Bulatlat that it’s a peripheral issue. “Their [Alcover and Palparan] mere presence is already an answer to their question on the credibility of the CHR.”

“Regardless of political color, we stick to the main issue of allegation of abduction and torture [of Roxas],” Mamauag said.

“This is the first time they [Palparan and Alcover] encountered a CHR chair who insists on the independence of the commission, who takes her job seriously and who can be depended on by human rights victims. They are threatened by this fact,” Karapatan secretary general Marie Hilao-Enriquez said in an interview with Bulatlat.

Enriquez said Palparan and Alcover aim to destroy the credibility of the CHR as an institution. “For them, there is no place for dissenting opinion,” she said.

“The fact that Palparan and Alcover are now speaking against Roxas’s testimony bolsters our belief that the military is behind her abduction and torture,” Enriquez said.

Visit to Fort Magsaysay

A second visit to Fort Magsaysay, the camp of the Philippine Army’s 7th Infantry Division, to ascertain the allegations of Roxas earned for de Lima and the CHR yet another barrage of attacks.

Some members of the Commission on Human Rights during a hearing of Melissa Roxas case. (Photo by Ronalyn V. Olea / bulatlat.com)

Some members of the Commission on Human Rights during a hearing of Melissa Roxas case. (Photo by Ronalyn V. Olea / bulatlat.com)

In the early morning of July 30, the CHR team, led by de Lima, visited Fort Magsaysay, this time with Roxas. In her affidavit, Roxas’s description of the place of her detention bears similarities with Fort Magsaysay,

Enriquez, who went with the team, said there were obvious renovations on the compound they inspected. “There is a new wall, a new gazebo. The pathway has been changed. The jail cell identified by Melissa is now a storage room.”

But the compound was indeed near a firing range and an airstrip, said Enriquez, referring to Roxas’s assertion. When they went inside one of the comfort rooms, Enriquez said, Roxas was trembling and told her: “This is where they gave me a bath.”

A day after the said visit, Maj. Gen. Ralph Villanueva, commander of the 7th Infantry Division, described the CHR visit as “cunning and deceiving.”

In a report he submitted to Armed Forces Chief of Staff Gen. Victor Ibrado, Villanueva said the CHR used the visit to Fort Magsaysay to look into cases of missing activists apart from Roxas’s case. He said the visit could just be a “fishing expedition” to implicate members of the military in the cases of missing activists.

In his report to Ibrado, Villanueva accused de Lima of “showing obvious bias by not being frank and forthright in her dealings” with the 7th Infantry Division. He even said he was not initially aware that Raymond Manalo, a torture survivor, was with de Lima during the visit.

In a letter to Ibrado dated August 1, de Lima said Villanueva’s statements are “unacceptable and uncalled for.” “The assertions made by Maj. Gen. Villanueva are untrue and deplorable. We cannot allow the commission’s credibility and independence to be undermined capriciously and without basis,” de Lima said in her four-page letter to Ibrado.

“As a human-rights institution, we respect Maj. Gen. Villanueva’s right to freedom of expression and opinion. However, we draw the line at false accusations and baseless innuendos,” de Lima added.

As to Villanueva’s misgivings about the inclusion of Manalo in the visiting team, de Lima asserted that the CHR has the prerogative to determine who shall allow to take part in its inspections.

Article XIII, Section 18 of the 1987 Philippine Constitution lays down the CHR’s powers and functions including, among others, to investigate, on its own or on complaint by any party, all forms of human rights violations involving civil and political rights; to exercise visitorial powers over jails, prisons, or detention facilities; and to monitor the Philippine Government’s compliance with international treaty on human rights.

De Lima (second from left) with Melissa Roxas (right), Marie Hilao Enriquez of Karapatan and Bayan Muna Rep. Satur Ocampo. (Photo by Vince Borneo / bulatlat.com)

De Lima (second from left) with Melissa Roxas (right), Marie Hilao Enriquez of Karapatan and Bayan Muna Rep. Satur Ocampo. (Photo by Vince Borneo / bulatlat.com)

“The Constitution grants the commission broad powers of investigation and visitation. And it has been our firm and consistent position that CHR does not need prior clearance from any authority to fulfill its investigative and visitorial mandate,” de Lima said.

Karapatan’s Enriquez believes that what the CHR is doing is a boost to human rights in the Philippines. She, however, bewailed the attempts by the military to discredit the commission. “Now that the CHR chairperson insists on the mandate of the commission, they consider her as an enemy,” Enriquez said. “That is the most dangerous mindset. Their bigotry kills.” (Bulatlat.com)

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Poem by Melissa Roxas

Aug 7th, 2009

Disinter
by Melissa Roxas

Her red shorts were left
in an abandoned shack
a rag on the rotting wood floor
the heavy screen door, shut
the echo of her voice
a scrap between the cracks…

found

a fingernail.

It was said
two women and a man were spotted
somewhere along that road
in a solitary town two years ago
spotted? like cattle?
or deer in the wild?
ready for slaughter?

There is a hush
from the night child
that saw

his father knows

they come for him next

but who then

who

cries out

to stop the coming of the hour?

I,

I could have been that woman

I was

that woman

but surfaced on the banks
of a dark river,
the moon, I didn’t see
but the light behind the folds
the shadow of a hand
before the blow to the head

Yes,

it’s true about the light
the bright light you see
but no moan from the open mouth
only a song
the music of people
in my head

the child’s eyes
looking at me by the river
the broken back of her father
ploughing the miles of grainy fields
not his own,

I remembered the fly
on the lips of baby James
sucking his mother’s dry breast
his tiny hand searching the many folds.

A silent song
from the people
kept playing at my heart.

There is nothing else.

Asked if I was ready to die.
I said Yes.
For the people
I said Yes.

To Sherlyn Cadapan, Karen Empeno, Jonas Burgos, and many more still missing. I get the strength to tell my story because it is also yours. We refused to be silenced.
For the people.
Surface all victims of enforced disappearances!
Justice for all victims of human rights violations!
End the madness.

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Posted in Melissa's Words

Poem by Melissa Roxas

Aug 2nd, 2009

[This poem was conceived and memorized by Melissa during her abduction.]

Come before the Night Hour
Come and Sing
before Night
Comes. I am Flame
to the Body.
The Incipient Wing
that can’t Fly.
The Open
Skin on a Foot
that Bleeds
Black. Tonight
I will learn to Die
a Thousand Times
and Be Resurrected.

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Posted in Melissa's Words

Melissa Roxas: As Palparan Fails to Break Roxas in Manila, US Legal Team Files Complaint with United Nations, US State Department

Jul 29th, 2009

PRESS RELEASE
Contact: Kuusela Hilo
Justice for Melissa Roxas Campaign
Email: info@justiceformelissa.org
Website: www.justiceformelissa.org

While former Philippine military leader-turned-lawmaker Jovito Palparan fails to break the credibility of American citizen Melissa Roxas’ testimony that it was the Philippine military that tortured and abducted her last May during a hearing before the Philippine House Committee on Human Rights in Manila, official complaints of torture have already been filed by Roxas’ US legal team with the United Nations in Geneva and United States State Department.

In a statement issued earlier this week by Roxas’ US-based legal counsel, Attorney Arnedo Valera of the Migrant Heritage Commission, a torture claim was filed in Roxas’ behalf “by way of ‘An Urgent Appeal and Allegation vs. the Philippine Government’ before the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture, Professor Manfred Nowak, under the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in Geneva, Switzerland.” A confirmation of receipt was also sent from Geneva.

Serving as co-counsel for Roxas alongside Valera is renowned international human rights lawyer Leonard Weinglass, whose clients have included the Cuban Five, Mumia Abu-Jamal, and Angela Davis.

Valera also explained that the Urgent Appeal is requesting the UN office to review the significant human rights violations committed on Roxas and that an immediate impartial investigation be conducted, specifically citing established procedures under the U.N Commission on Human Rights, and the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.

Meanwhile, Roxas’ legal team also filed a complaint and request for investigation with the US State Department in Roxas’ behalf just in time for the upcoming face-to-face meeting between President Barack Obama and Philippine President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo this Thursday. Community groups in support of Roxas, including the Justice For Melissa Roxas Campaign, are sending letters to Obama requesting that he raise the issue of Roxas and other cases of human rights atrocities with Arroyo during their meeting, as well as comply with the pending US State Department investigation. Supporters of Melissa can write and send a letter to Obama by clicking onto: http://docs.google.com/View?id=dd9d2nfn_96hk8bhhg9

Roxas is the first US citizen under the Obama administration to be subjected to torture in the Philippines. In a statement last June 26th, in commemoration of the UN International Day in Support of Torture Victims, Obama stated– “Torture is contrary to the founding documents of our country, and the fundamental values of our people….My administration is committed to taking concrete actions against torture and to address the needs of its victims.”

Roxas is scheduled to testify at the Philippine Supreme Court’s hearing for her Writ of Amparo petition the same day as the Obama-Arroyo meeting in Washington DC.

But before that Roxas must conclude her testimony in front of the Philippine House Committee on Human Rights, which is chaired by House Representative Lorenzo “Erin” Tanada III. The said committee also includes Rep. Satur Ocampo, Rep. Liza Maza, Rep. Edcel Lagman, Rep. Roman Romulo, and Rep. Risa Hontiveros.

Also questioned by the House Committee were Palparan and Rep. Jun Alcover, who have been seeking to dismiss Roxas’ belief that she was abducted and tortured by the Philippine military by hurling accusations against Roxas herself. Palaparan is the former head of the 7th Infantry Division of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), stationed in Fort Magsaysay, the same unit Roxas suspects abducted and tortured her last May. Their attempts to break Roxas’ course of action in going after the AFP or steer the hearing in another direction have failed.

“I can no longer count how many times I have narrated the incident and my ordeal,” Roxas stated before the House Committee. “But I will not tire to tell the truth about what happened for I seek justice, not only for myself, but for others who have gone through the same. I seek justice, not only for what they did to me, but for other victims of human rights violations.”

Actions in front of the White House during the Obama-Arroyo meeting, including a prayer vigil, are set for Thursday, July 30th.

For more information, contact the Justice for Melissa Roxas Campaign at info@justiceformelissa.org and visit the Justice for Melissa Roxas Campaign Website at www.justiceformelissa.org. ###

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Melissa Roxas Testifies in Congress: "I Will Not Tire to Tell the Truth"

Jul 29th, 2009

From Bulatlat.com
Published on July 29, 2009, 1:18 PM

Below is the opening statement made by Filipino-American activist Melissa Roxas during a hearing by the House committee on human rights on her allegations of abduction and torture in the hands of the Philippine military.

Good morning, honorable members of the House of Representatives, friends and human rights advocates.

I am Melissa Roxas. Thank you for allowing me to come here today to tell you of my ordeal, which is also a story of many other Filipinos who were abducted and tortured by the military.

I am a member of Habi Arts, a Filipino cultural organization based in Los Angeles. I am also a member of the Bagong Alyansang Makabayan–USA.

I came to the Philippines to learn more about my roots and heritage, to know more about the plight of the impoverished Filipino people and to conduct research for my writing projects. I volunteered with Bayan in the Philippines because I feel that I can achieve my objectives more meaningfully through Bayan’s work with the communities both in the urban and rural areas. To this end, I thought I can put to better use my background on community health.

Melissa Roxas testifies in Congress. (Photo by Vince Borneo)

Melissa Roxas testifies in Congress (Photo by Vince Borneo)

I am a writer and a poet. I am also an activist.

I have reason to believe that the Philippine military were the ones who took me and my companions, Juanito Carabeo and John Edward Jandoc, against our will on May 19. I have reason to believe that the military were the ones who handcuffed, blindfolded, beat me up, suffocated me and denied me of my rights. I have reason to believe that I was brought to a military camp for interrogation.

For six days in captivity, my captors tried to force me to admit that I’m a member of the New People’s Army, accused me of being a member of the NPA and told me that it was “people like me” who are the ones who are making it difficult for the government.

Although I repeatedly invoked my right to see a lawyer, my abductors told me that I will not be able to see a lawyer and instead threatened that they can do all they wanted to do with me because they “got me clean.” They threatened me with death and accused me of so many things, especially that of being a member of the NPA. Because of the fear of more pain and I thought that dying came so slow, I told myself to just play along with whatever they tell me I am guilty of and to be back to the fold of the law, as what Dex told me their mission was.

Surprisingly, on May 25, I was released by my captors near my family’s house and instructed me to keep in touch with them; that they hope I do not harbor any ill-feelings against them because the ones who tortured me are from the “special operations group” and not from their group. I was so terrified and traumatized by this harrowing experience that as soon as I can get a flight to the US, I had to leave to reunite with my family. Although still very much afraid for my life and safety, I had to come back to testify before the Court of Appeals and other investigative bodies to obtain justice and tell the public what happened to me so that people would know and they will not allow this to happen to anyone again.

Now, other people are accusing me of being an NPA, forcing me to admit that I’m an NPA and insisting that I was abducted and tortured by the NPA.

I reiterate, I am an activist. I am not a member of the NPA.

And I have reason to believe that the Philippine military were the ones who abducted and tortured me, and held me captive for 6 days. I do not like to dignify the allegations being hurled at me now as they only echo what my abductors have been forcing me to admit during my interrogation and illegal, incommunicado detention. I have filed a petition for the writ of habeas data. I am asking the Supreme Court that all records pertaining to me including videos and photos, false and true, should be expunged and destroyed as they violate my right to privacy. I insist on that.

I can no longer count how many times I have narrated the incident and my ordeal. But I will not tire to tell the truth about what happened for I seek justice, not only for myself, but for others who have gone through the same. I seek justice, not only for what they did to me, but for other victims of human rights violations.

There are still families looking for their loved ones, and many more still missing. I hope that this august body will also look into the cases of those others still missing and those who have been killed. Thank you very much. (Bulatlat.com)

Melissa Roxas takes her oath right before making her opening statement. (Photo by Fred E. Dabu)

Melissa Roxas takes her oath right before making her opening statement. (Photo by Fred E. Dabu)

CHR chair Leila de Lima (right) was also summoned by the House committee on human rights. (Photo by Fred E. Dabu)

CHR chair Leila de Lima (right) was also summoned by the House committee on human rights. (Photo by Fred E. Dabu)

Bayan Muna Rep. Satur Ocampo (left) and Rep. Edcel Lagman. (Photo by Fred E. Dabu)

Bayan Muna Rep. Satur Ocampo (left) and Rep. Edcel Lagman. (Photo by Fred E. Dabu)

Rep. Erin Tanada, chairman of the human-rights committee, shows the pictures of Roxas's injuries. (Photo by Fred E. Dabu)

Rep. Erin Tanada, chairman of the human-rights committee, shows the pictures of Roxas's injuries. (Photo by Fred E. Dabu)

Melissa Roxas takes a glass of water during her emotional testimony. (Photo by Fred E. Dabu)

Melissa Roxas takes a glass of water during her emotional testimony. (Photo by Fred E. Dabu)

Melissa Roxas asserts that the military abducted and tortured her. (Photo by Fred E. Dabu)

Melissa Roxas asserts that the military abducted and tortured her. (Photo by Fred E. Dabu)

Melissa Roxas and her lawyer Rex Fernandez. (Photo by Fred E. Dabu)

Melissa Roxas and her lawyer Rex Fernandez. (Photo by Fred E. Dabu)

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Posted in Articles

Melissa Roxas Submits Torture Case Before UN in Geneva

Jul 28th, 2009

PRESS RELEASE
Migrant Heritage Commission

Melissa Roxas, the first known American Citizen under President Obama’s administration to have become a victim of abduction and torture by military agents in the Philippines, filed through her counsel, Arnedo S. Valera, of the Migrant Heritage Commission’s Legal Resources program, her torture claim by way of “An Urgent Appeal and Allegation vs. the Philippine Government,” before the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture , Professor Manfred Nowak, under the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in Geneva, Switzerland . The case was received at the Geneva Office at 4:15 p.m today (U.S. time).

In addition to providing legal services for Roxas in the US, the Migrant Heritage Commission is a carrier of the Justice for Melissa Roxas (J4MR) Campaign, along with several organizations across the nation.

Among the specific answers in response to the questionnaire on the torture of Melissa C. Roxas, 31 years old, were the dates of May 19 through May 25, 2009 as the period during which the incident of torture occurred; and Kapanikian, La Paz, Tarlac, the Philippines identified as the place of abduction. The victim believes the torture was carried out in a military camp in Nueva Ecija, known as Fort Magsaysay. Fort Magsaysay, about 150 kilometers north of Manila, is the largest military camp of the Armed Forces of the Philippines. It is home to the Army’s 7th Infantry Division. It also named the Special Operations Group (SOG) and those wearing military uniforms as interrogators and torturers.

The Philippines’ Commission on Human Rights’ ocular inspection of Fort Magsaysay in Nueva Ecija on June 10, 2009 tended to validate Melissa’s physical description of the place where she was tortured.

Submitted also in the Urgent Appeal and Allegation is the description of the form of torture used and injury suffered by Melissa, i.e., torture via asphyxiation using a doubled-up plastic bag, repeated beatings on the face and body, and having her head banged repeatedly against the wall by her interrogators. Melissa suffered multiple abrasions as well as a psychological disorder called Acute Stress Disorder with supporting medical certificates.

The Urgent Appeal is requesting the UN office to review the significant human rights violations committed on Roxas and that an immediate impartial and vigorous investigation be conducted. Consistent with the established procedures under the U.N Commission on Human Rights, in resolution 1985/33, the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, the Urgent appeal and Allegation was filed both online and in a written form. Attached to the document are the affidavit, medical certificate, various appeal letters from faith-based, labor, non-government and human rights organizations, and others.

The Special Rapporteur upon receipt of the information may submit an earnest request to the Government concerned to ensure that the human rights of individuals are respected and to take steps aimed at protecting the right to physical and mental integrity of the person concerned, in accordance with the international human rights standards. The Special Rapporteur urges governments to take steps to investigate the allegations; to prosecute and impose appropriate sanctions on any persons guilty of torture regardless of any rank, office or position they may hold; to take effective measures to prevent the recurrence of such acts; and to compensate the victims or their relatives in accordance with the relevant international standards. The mandate comprises three main activities: transmitting urgent appeals to States with regard to individuals reported to be at risk of torture, as well as communications on past alleged cases of torture; undertaking fact-finding country visits; and submitting annual reports on activities, the mandate and methods of work to the Human Rights Council and the General Assembly.

Unlike the complaint mechanisms of the human rights treaty monitoring bodies, the Special Rapporteur does not require the exhaustion of domestic remedies to act. When the facts in question come within the scope of more than one mandate established by the Commission, the Special Rapporteur may decide to approach other thematic mechanisms and country rapporteurs with a view to sending joint communications or seeking joint missions.
Article 5 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights clearly states that “No one shall be subjected to torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment”. The right against Torture is a non-derogable right and in the same way, Article 2 states that “Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms, without distinction of any kind, such as race, color, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status”.
“The Philippines always boasts of being a signatory to all major human rights declarations and treaties, it is now time to stop lip service and comply with these international UN instruments”, said Melissa Roxas’ Counsel Arnedo S. Valera, Esquire, Co-Executive Director of the Migrant Heritage Commission based in Fairfax, VA.
Records of the human rights watchdog Karapatan reveal there have been more than 1,016 victims of politically-motivated torture under the Arroyo government since 2001. More than a thousand other activists were victims of extra-judicial killings and hundreds others victims of enforced disappearances. ###

Download PDF

Reference: Susan Pineda, 202-247-0117
Migrant Heritage Commission (MHC), Inc.
Virginia Main Address : 3930 Walnut Street, Suite 200, Fairfax, VA 22030
Tel. Nos.: 202-247-0117, 202-631-8856, 703-675-6334, 703 273-1196
Fax No.: 703-273-4838
DC Address : 7108 Chestnut St., NW, Washington D.C.20012

www.migrantheritage.org
migrantheritage@gmail.com

(A 501(c)3 tax exempt , non-profit, national service-oriented non-governmental organization)
Honoring & Serving the Migrants

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Melissa Roxas: Torture, Not Political Affiliation, Is the Issue

Jul 26th, 2009

PRESS RELEASE
Contact: Kuusela Hilo
Justice for Melissa Roxas Campaign
Email: info@justiceformelissa.org
Website: www.justiceformelissa.org

The latest accusations of Philippine Congressman Jovito Palparan should bear no weight in determining the outcome of the ongoing investigation on the case of American torture victim Melissa Roxas. This must only be determined by the facts, including the evidence currently being gathered by the Commission on Human Rights (CHR) in the Philippines.

It is clear in hurling accusations about Roxas’ political affiliation, Palparan is seeking to steer the public conversation about Roxas’ case to another direction, in hopes of protecting not only the perpetrators of the crime, but maintain the status quo of rampant, state-sponsored human rights violations in the Philippines, of which Palparan is a leading fixture.

By blatantly dismissing the circumstances surrounding Roxas’ case and the rule of International Humanitarian Law (IHL) and its provisions on torture, Palparan seeks to shift the paradigm of seeking justice from a question of the facts and accountability to a question of ideology and political beliefs.

Abduction, Torture, and International Humanitarian Law

It is important to remember that the issue at hand is the abduction and torture of Melissa Roxas, an American citizen and community health volunteer worker who, along with her two companions, was abducted at gunpoint by 15 masked men, in La Paz, Tarlac. Roxas later surfaced on May 25th in Quezon City.

Medical reports from examiners both in Philippines and United States conclude that Roxas showed symptoms typical of a torture victim, symptoms impossible to fabricate or impersonate.

What Palparan and the Arroyo government continually fail to recognize and remember is that international humanitarian law (IHL) prohibits torture and other forms of ill treatment at all times and demands that detainees be treated according to international standards, REGARDLESS OF POLITICAL AFFILIATION AND BELIEFS. The Philippine government, as a state signatory since 1977, is party to all major international humanitarian and human rights law treaties. This includes provisions on torture.

A Hired Gun in the Philippine Congress

In applying the standards set by IHL on the Philippines, one would realize that it is Palparan himself, a former high-ranking official with the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), that has accumulated a vast amount of violations, including the assassination campaigns of dissenters in Mindoro, Eastern Visayas, and Central Luzon, under his stints as the commander of the Philippine Army’s 204th Infantry Brigade, 8th Infantry Division, and finally the 7th Infantry Division– the SAME group under investigation of the CHR for the abduction and torture of Melissa Roxas.

Palparan’s integrity as a public servant and lawmaker in the Philippine Congress must also be put into question. Who stands to gain most from Palparan’s accusations against Roxas and divert the public conversation from the documented facts of her abduction and torture? None other than Commander-in-Chief Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo herself.

Arroyo gladly promoted Palparan twice in a row, despite growing condemnations from international human rights groups. It must be noted that the never-arrested, never-jailed Palparan currently has pending cases against him for numerous human rights violations, including the abduction of university students Karen Empeno and Sherlyn Cadapan in 2006. But despite this, Arroyo’s clique further rewarded Palparan with a seat in the Philippine House of Representatives shortly after his retirement. As an official Philippine lawmaker, Palparan’s main responsibility is to protect the Philippine Constitution and serve the public interest, not policing the New People’s Army or speaking publicly for the Philippine military.

Palparan’s accusations against Roxas and ardent defense of the AFP further prove that torture is in fact a policy of the Philippine government and military.

A Brave Woman

That Roxas found the courage to return to the Philippines to pursue justice “not only for [herself], but for thousands of other victims of human rights violations” is a commendable and extremely brave act. We can only hope that the CHR, which is mandated only to determine cases of human rights violations and make recommendations, continues with its investigation with a truly objective framework, and not under the influence of the likes of Palparan. ###

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