Palace out to crush Bayan Muna: Satur

BAYAN Muna party-list Rep. Satur Ocampo yesterday accused Malacañang, national security adviser Norberto Gonzales, the Department of Justice and the Armed Forces of merging forces to "pin (him) down and crush Bayan Muna" after an arrest warrant was issued against him in connection with his alleged supervision of a communist purge in Inopacan, Leyte in 1984.

"The false charges are an attack on the freedom of thought and the party-list system. Malacañang wants to control the party-list elections, and that includes ensuring that we lose, by hook or by crook. This is a serious assault on the right of the marginalized and underrepresented sectors to elect their representatives," he said.

Ocampo is seeking reelection as party-list representative for a third and last term this May.

He also called those responsible for issuing the arrest warrant against him a bunch of fools, pointing out that he was in jail when the alleged purge took place. "Talagang puro kapalpakan ang mga naghahabla sa akin. The people behind these cases, the powers-that-be in the intelligence community, are a bunch of fools. Sangkatutak na bobo," he said.

"I was arrested on Jan. 14, 1976 and was under military custody until May 5, 1985. This renders impossible the claim that I was in Leyte in 1984 to supervise the purported purge," he said.

He also denied going to Leyte in 1991, saying he was again arrested in 1989 and detained until 1992.

The murder case against Ocampo and 52 others — including Communist Party founder Jose Maria Sison, Luis Jalandoni and Benito and Wilma Tiamzon — was filed on Oct. 17, 2006 after a mass grave of allegedly disillusioned communists was discovered in Sitio Sapang Dako in Southern Leyte on Aug. 26, 2006.

Fifteen of the exhumed skeletal remains were identified.

Ocampo said he will not allow himself be arrested in a "Gestapo manner" like Anakpawis Rep. Crispin Beltran who was picked up and jailed after President Arroyo declared a state of national emergency in February 2006 in response to an alleged plot to oust her. "The government should not waste its resources in trying to arrest me. I will surface eventually and voluntarily," he said.

Ocampo’s lawyer Romeo Capulong said he will go to the Supreme Court for a review of the evidence and to block the enforcement of the arrest warrant. He listed seven reasons why the crimes attributed to Ocampo should have been dismissed, including the lapse of the prescription period and the fact that Ocampo is already charged with rebellion and all common crimes allegedly committed in the course of the rebellion are considered subsumed in the rebellion case.

PNP spokesman Chief Supt. Samuel Pagdilao urged Ocampo and his co-accused to surrender voluntarily since flight would indicate guilt and aggravate their case. He said Ocampo and his co-accused are assured of their day in court, "unlike their alleged victims who were summarily butchered without the benefit of a fair trial."