CBCP panel quits from NTF-ELCAC executive committee

A panel from the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) has already left the executive committee of the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC).

In a radio interview, CBCP Commission on Public Affairs executive secretary Father Jerome Secillano said they left the NTF-ELCAC executive committee to preserve their independence.

“'Yung ugnayan namin ay nandoon pa rin, pero 'yung execom kumbaga wala na kami (Our connection is still there, but in the execom, so to speak, we are not there anymore),” he said.

Being outside the executive committee, Secillano said the CBCP panel can always be 'somehow honest' with the NTF-ELCAC.

“We can always tell them the issues on the ground. We can always be somehow honest with them. At hindi kami iyong tipong nag-uusap-usap doon (And we ‘re not discussing) in a formal setting.

Sought for comment, NTF-ELCAC National Secretariat executive director Undersecretary Ernesto Torres Jr., said they just learned about the issue through the media.

"We have not received any official communication from CBCP to that effect," he said.

Earlier this month, CBCP reported a survey by Caritas Philippines showing that 90% of respondents are against the church joining the NTF-ELCAC.

The report said there was “fear” that the Church would be “cop-opted and used to legitimize” the task force’s alleged human rights violations.

Respondents said the Church will have a stronger voice in dialoguing with the government outside the NTF-ELCAC by working in solidarity with the poor and other human rights groups, according to the report.

In September, the NTF-ELCAC announced that the CBCP already has representatives in the government's anti-insurgency task force.

The CBCP clarified that only the Episcopal Commission on Public Affairs is engaged with the NTF-ELCAC and not the conference of Catholic leaders.

CBCP president Kalookan Bishop Pablo David said  the episcopal commission would engage with the NTF-ELCAC to address some of the Church’s concerns and to provide “moral-ethical approaches to dealing with the problem of insurgency.”

“It’s not exactly CBCP as a conference but the Episcopal Commission of Public Affairs that is there as a private sector representative,” David said.

“As such, this Commission has access to the NTF-ELCAC ExeCom and more opportunity to express the Church’s specific concerns, since its mandate is to act as a liaison of the CBCP to the public and private sectors and to advance some of the social concerns and issues of the Church,” he added.

Bayan secretary general Renato Reyes Jr. reminded the CBCP of the limits of any engagement with the NTF-ELCAC.

"While we believe that the CBCP has by and large stood for basic human rights especially against red-tagging and extrajudicial killings, joining the NTF ELCAC sends the wrong message to the public," Reyes said in a statement.

"The CBCP may be used to deodorize the counter-insurgency task force amid a long list of abuses and violations attributed to it," he added.—Joviland Rita/AOL, GMA Integrated News