COMMENTARY: A Preliminary Sampling of What is Not Red-Tagging (Last of 8 parts)

Fast-forward to the present.  Three weeks after the release of Deduro in 2024, came this Inquirer news item “ACT slams distribution of ‘Red-tagging’ leaflets”:

The Alliance of Concerned Teachers (ACT) has said it plans to make full use of the recent Supreme Court decision declaring Red-tagging as a threat to one’s life by citing it in a complaint it will file with the Commission on Human Rights (CHR).

ACT Chair Vladimer Quetua said the group was still gathering information about last month’s distribution by the military and Department of Education (DepEd) personnel of leaflets referring to students who belong to youth groups as terrorists during a seminar at Taytay Senior High School in Rizal province.

For ACT Teachers party list Rep. France Castro, the incident was a “clear case of harassment and intimidation” and a “blatant disregard” of the recent Supreme Court ruling.

She said the leaflets were distributed by the Philippine Army’s 80th Infantry Battalion and DepEd Rizal. Using comic strips, it showed how students could avoid “recruiters of the CPP-NPA (Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army)” who may be spotted in rallies, “teaching us to be angry at the government.”

“After that Supreme Court decision, we anticipated that the government would finally, finally end this kind of practice, but they are still doing it, and it’s just disappointing,” Quetua added.

He said they would soon file a complaint with the CHR, adding that they would also check if the distribution of such leaflets were also happening elsewhere.

No group targeted

The National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-Elcac), however, denied the group’s accusation, saying “a careful perusal and review of the said pamphlets [would] easily prove that there [was] no ‘Red tagging’ in the said materials.”

It added that it did not target any organization, “it merely informed the students of the modus operandi of recruiters of the New People’s Army, which is factual and based on evidence.”

According to NTF-Elcac, the 80th Infantry Battalion held the seminar as part of a civic education program to raise awareness of national security threats and promote patriotism among the youth, in line with a memorandum of agreement between it and DepEd.

“[These] seminars provided factual information that allows the youth to make informed decisions affecting their lives. The seminars were conducted transparently with the consent and cooperation of the Division of Rizal and attendance was voluntary.[1]

Though appearing in an earlier news story pre-Deduro, a quoted statement of AFP Visayas Command (Viscom) commander Lt. Gen. Benedict Arevalo, might be relevant to the foregoing incident issue of alleged red-tagging by the 80^th IB: 

This is not red-tagging.  This is truth-tagging.  We wanted the people to know the truth about the CPP-NPA and its accomplices and allied organizations. They can sometimes pose as angels but behind the angelic smiles and alluring promises are the devils hiding their horns and tails.[2]  

“Truth-tagging,” i.e. telling the truth (about the other side and for that matter one’s own side) “so the people may know” and “that allows the youth to make informed decisions affecting their lives,” is fine, if indeed it is just that. But the angels-devils metaphor unfortunately brings images of Dan Brown’s novel Angels & Demons which connotes fiction rather than fact, aside from a demonize-the-enemy frame (done by both sides actually) that militates against humane treatment and reconciliation towards the other side.

So, was the above-said 80^th IB public information dissemination incident red-tagging or not?  Again, to us, it depends on the presence (thus red-tagging) or absence (thus not red-tagging) of one or more of these three crucial elements presented early on above: 

1. Most crucial, accompaniment by “threats to a person’s right to life, liberty or security,” including but not limited to “intimidation, harassment and surveillance”

• Malicious purpose or motive to “silence,” “discourage” or “delegitimize” the legitimate exercise of various constitutional freedoms, especially of political dissent, critical discourse and human rights advocacy

• Unfounded, “without showing any factual basis,” “not grounded in truth and facts”

Does the fact of the normal or usual legitimate arms-bearing by security forces — who disseminate public information “about the CPP-NPA and its accomplices and allied organizations” and “the modus operandi of recruiters of the New People’s Army, which is factual and based on evidence” — itself (the arms-bearing) constitute “the use of threats and intimidation”?  Deduro at p. 34 provides this guidance: “… Neither mere membership in a nongovernment organization nor inclusion in an order of battle of the military equates to actual threats. What constitutes threats should include the totality of every individual petitioner’s circumstance.” When Deduro at p. 24 “declare[d] that red-tagging, vilification, labelling, and guilt by association constitute threats to a person’s right to life, liberty or security,” it qualified this immediately with “under the second paragraph of section 1 of the Rules, which may justify the issuance of a writ of amparo.”  This second paragraph of section 1 of the Rule on the Writ of Amparo[3] reads:  “The writ shall cover extralegal killings and enforced disappearances or threats thereof.”  In other words, not just any threat but these very serious threats. 

Indeed, the totality of circumstances should be taken all together when there is a publicly-made connection, linking or association of aboveground open and legal organizations and individuals as cohorts or partisans of the CPP-NPA-NDF or its “front organizations,” in determining whether it is red-tagging or not.  It is important to get this right because life, liberty and reputation are at stake.  Deduro at p. 32 said “The Rule [on the Writ of Amparo] does not preclude the filing of separate criminal, civil, or administrative actions,” citing Sec. 23 thereof.  And indeed such actions have justifiably snowballed even pre-Deduro, and more so post-Deduro. Most notably, such administrative (Ombudsman), contempt (SC) and civil (RTC) cases have in fact been filed and decided against Dr. Lorraine Marie T. Badoy-Partosa.   

The suppression of red-tagging as a properly defined actionable wrong is meant to protect constitutional freedoms, rights and duties, especially as legitimately exercised by political activists, human rights defenders and critical journalists. At the same time, while various measures of push-back against red-tagging are warranted, caution should also be exercised that “the high feelings of the moment”[4] against red-tagging do not result in also a chilling effect on the same constitutional freedoms, rights and duties when it comes to legitimately addressing and discussing “other equally important public interests”[5] like the local communist armed conflict. Thus, all the foregoing preliminary samples of what is not (or may not be) red-tagging for a better sense of this “in the sober afterglow.”

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SOLIMAN M. SANTOS, JR. is a retired Judge of the RTC of Naga City, Camarines Sur, serving in the judiciary there from 2010 to 2022.  He has an A.B. in History cum laude from U.P. in 1975, a Bachelor of Laws from the University of Nueva Caceres (UNC) in Naga City in 1982, and a Master of Laws from the University of Melbourne in 2000.  He is a long-time human rights and international humanitarian lawyer; legislative consultant and legal scholar; peace advocate, researcher and writer; and author of a number of books, including on the Moro and Communist fronts of war and peace. Among his authored books are The Moro Islamic Challenge: Constitutional Rethinking for the Mindanao Peace Process (UP Press, 2001);  How do you solve a problem like the GRP-NDFP peace process? Part 2 (Sulong Peace, 2022); and his latest, Tigaon 1969: Untold Stories of the CPP-NPA, KM and SDK (Ateneo Press, 2023). He also has a trilogy of books on his court work and practice:  Justice of the Peace (2015), Drug Cases (2022), and Judicial Activist (2023), all published by Central Books, Inc., Quezon City.

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[1]  Dempsey Reyes and Frances Mangosing, “ACT slams distribution of ‘Red-tagging’ leaflets, Philippine Daily Inquirer, May 28, 2024, p. A3.

[2]  Quoted in Nestie Semilla, “Military warns NGOs against aiding Reds,” Philippine Daily Inquirer, October 2, 2023, pp. A4 & A7. 

[3]  A.M. No. 07-0-12-SC, as amended by Resolution of the SC En Banc on October 16, 2007, effective October 24, 2007.

[4]  Phrase adopted from these lines of Justice Frank Murphy’s Dissenting Opinion in Yamashita vs. Styer, 327 U.S. 1 (1946):  “The high feelings of the moment doubtless will be satisfied.  But in the sober afterglow will come the realization of the boundless and dangerous implications of the procedure sanctioned today.”

[5]  Badoy-Partosa at p. 17, citing Garcia, Jr. vs. Manrique, 697 Phil. 157, 169 (2012).