New ‘charges’ seek to hush journo, says Karapatan
A human rights group on Sunday decried the additional “trumped-up” charges filed against detained community journalist Frenchie Mae Cumpio over the deaths of two soldiers in a 2019 ambush.
Karapatan called the additional charges against Cumpio and human rights worker Alexander Philip Abinguna “forms of judicial harassment against human rights defenders [that] are meant to silence them into inaction.”
“These charges were based on fabricated testimonies of paramilitary personnel and soldiers, using their highly questionable means of presenting a gallery of pictures of activists who have been subject of threats and surveillance by the military and the NTF-ELCAC (National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict),” it said in a statement.
Cumpio has been detained since Feb. 7, 2020, for alleged illegal possession of firearms and explosives. She was arrested with Abinguna and three activists during police raids on suspected communist safe houses in Tacloban City.
On top of these, they also faced new charges.
In a statement last Friday, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said that a few weeks before arresting Cumpio the police “quietly” submitted a report linking her to the killings of two soldiers on Oct. 18, 2019.
Cumpio, then executive director of community-based news outlet Eastern Vista, was charged with “double murder” and “multiple attempted murder” along with several others, according to RSF, which conducted a fact-finding mission on her case.
The two soldiers were killed in an ambush near Barangay Sumoroy, Palapag town, in Northern Samar province, which RSF said was a “remote locality more than seven hours by road from Tacloban,” where Cumpio was residing at the time.
‘Unsubstantiated’
Cumpio’s presence at the ambush site was “unlikely” given that she was already under surveillance by the military as part of a “preliminary investigation into the very case that led to the search of her home and her arrest a few months later,” it said.
“At the time of this writing, it is not clear who brought the case against her. What is apparent, however, is how unsubstantiated these claims seem—just like the charges she’s currently facing in court,” RSF said.
“With all charges brought together, the 26-year-old journalist faces up to 40 years of imprisonment,” it added.
RSF is a Paris-based nonproftit advocating press freedom and the safety of journalists worldwide.
Karapatan said Abinguna was attending a school forum as a guest speaker on the date and time of the alleged ambush.
The human rights group noted that both Abinguna and Cumpio have been in the “crosshairs of the military” because of their work exposing human rights violations in Eastern Visayas.
“Their case shows the widespread practice of political persecution through ‘lawfare,’ a stark feature of the Marcos administration’s human rights record,” Karapatan said.
‘No knowledge’
According to RSF, Cumpio “had no official knowledge of these murder charges until just a few months ago,” even though local courts issued warrants for her arrest on Sept. 7, 2020, and Aug. 6, 2021, for the deaths of the two soldiers.
Karapatan only found out about the additional charges after relatives of the two slain soldiers filed a complaint on the ambush with the Commission on Human Rights (CHR) in Region 8, its secretary general Cristina Palabay said.
RSF said it was “troubling” that the CHR had opened an investigation into the double murder case of the soldiers, calling it an “apparent deviation from its core mandate.” The government agency, however, had told RSF that its inquiry has since been closed “for lack of sufficient evidence.”
The CHR has yet to respond to the Inquirer’s request for comment.
‘No material evidence’
RSF said there was “no material evidence” supporting Cumpio’s presence at the scene of ambush, pointing out that the military charges were based only on testimonies of “former communist rebels.”
The group noted that an alleged survivor of the ambush—an Army auxiliary—claimed that he “managed to crawl close to the shooting” and identify five of the attackers, including Cumpio. He alleged that he “immediately recognized” her as he knew her “personally” for her role in recruiting members for the New People’s Army.
The only other known witness in the case—another paramilitary soldier and purported survivor—did not identify Cumpio as among the attackers in his sworn statement, according to RSF.
“At the time, Frenchie was already a well-known journalist in the region. Had she been identified as linked to such activities, she would likely have already been arrested,” it said.
