‘Atin Ito’ sails to Pag-asa in latest mission
EL NIDO, PALAWAN—Over 150 volunteers, fisherfolk, artists, Church leaders, youth advocates and civic leaders sailed to Pag-asa (Thitu) Island before dawn on Tuesday as part of Atin Ito Coalition’s third civilian mission to the West Philippine Sea (WPS).
“Our message is clear: A message of peace and unity, a message of solidarity—we want peace in our region,” Akbayan president and Atin Ito Coalition coconvener Rafaela David said in a press briefing here on Monday before a “peace and solidarity concert” organized by the civilian mission was held at sunset aboard the MV Kapitan Felix Oca, the civilian ship that will bring the WPS activists.
Two Philippine Coast Guard vessels—BRP Melchora Aquino, one of its largest and most modern vessels, and BRP Malapascua—escorted the Kapitan Felix Oca.
Among the concert performers were musicians Noel Cabangon, Ebe Dancel and Fumiya Sankai.
Pag-asa, a 38-hectare island, lies in the outskirts of the West Philippine Sea, the body of water in the South China Sea that is part of the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone.
The island’s residents are in the thick of a continuing maritime dispute between the Philippines and China despite a 2016 decision favoring Manila’s 2013 arbitral case against Beijing.
Chinese Embassy invited
Atin Ito will hold another concert this time off Pag-asa’s coast on May 28. The coalition will also provide supplies to Filipino fishermen, who were on their fishing boats as they witnessed Monday’s concert at Kapitan Felix Oca.
Before Tuesday’s visit to Pag-asa, Atin Ito sailed to Ayungin (Second Thomas) Shoal in 2023 and Panatag (Scarborough) Shoal in 2024. On both occasions they were harassed by Chinese vessels.
“We expect radio challenges. We expect shadowing,” David said of their latest mission, which comes days after a China Coast Guard vessel on May 21 fired water cannons and sideswiped a Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources ship near Sandy Cay in the West Philippine Sea.
David said the group sent an invitation two months ago to the Chinese Embassy in Manila to join the mission but did not receive any response.
“We are showing the world that our commitment to the West Philippine Sea is not rooted in militarism or warmongering, but in compassion, community and culture. Atin Ito’s historic sea concert is a love song to our seas and to the people who protect them,” David said.
Other volunteers
Kiko Aquino Dee, grandson of the late former President Corazon Aquino, also joined the civilian mission. It was on the watch of his uncle, the late former President Benigno Aquino III, that the Philippines filed its arbitral case.
“The arbitral ruling is really a major legacy of the [second] Aquino administration… It is our mandate to defend and preserve that legacy,” Dee told the Inquirer.
“We pursued the legal means and we won the arbitral case, but the dispute with China continues so we are looking for different means to assert our rights through peaceful means,” he added.
Among the volunteers who joined the mission were 18-year-old Christian Alday of Quezon City and 21-year-old Kaith Distor of Caloocan City. It was their first time to go out this far at sea.
“I needed to see it with my own eyes,” Alday, the youngest volunteer in the mission, told the Inquirer, referring to the West Philippine Sea. “We should normalize these kinds of activities in our waters and in the West Philippine Sea.”
Distor, who is a Sangguniang Kabataan official in Caloocan City, said: “Our coming here is not only to travel far but also to experience and be with those who are truly bullied and deprived of their rights, like our fishermen.”
Atin Ito is expected to return to Manila on Friday. —WITH A REPORT FROM MELVIN GASCON
