The moment for communal action for truth, justice and hope

Rodolfo Noel I. Lozada, Jr.
February 7, 2008

In our statement launching a Year of Social Engagement on Ash Wednesday, we recalled our Lord’s dark night in the Garden of Gethsemane and His invitation for us to share in His agony, to keep watch, pray and act for our country in crisis. As the CBCP stressed in their pastoral letter of 27 January 2008, the darkness of the present situation is rooted in the subordination of the common good to private ends. During the past few days, nothing illustrates this darkness and the need for vigilance more than the ordeal suffered by Rodolfo Noel “Jun” Lozada and his family, and the underlying reasons for his personal struggles, fears and sufferings, as he has recounted before the Senate and mass media.

Jun Lozada was taken by armed strangers from the airport against his will, while his family anxiously waited for his arrival. He was driven for at least four hours all the way to Laguna and back, not knowing who he was with nor where they were going. He was told his personal text messages were being monitored. He also says he was made to write an antedated “request for security” while he feared for his life. And even as he was brought to see his family, he remained under the custody of the police with no freedom of movement. This was the “ugly side of the state” which he has seen before in the senseless death of his brother at the hands of the police. His experience only confirms the people’s fear and distrust of the instruments and agents of state security which have so many times been used to intimidate citizens, violate human rights and suppress the truth in order to protect narrow private interests.

Moreover, Cabinet officials, their subordinates and representatives collaborated in various degrees to keep him from testifying before the Senate -- from arranging an “official” conference trip on the date of the Senate hearing, to dictating a letter to excuse his absence, to preparing a false affidavit, to proposing a press conference denying his abduction and role in the NBN-ZTE deal. But why the need for all of these untruths? Jun Lozada admits that he had told senior government officials that he feared testifying in the Senate because what he knew and could say will implicate very powerful people. He says he was already receiving death threats, and one of these was from former Comelec Chair Benjamin Abalos who had demanded a $130 million commission from the project. Abalos had cursed and threatened to kill him when this kickback could not be guaranteed. According to him, Abalos had sought the help of First Gentleman Jose Miguel Arroyo to facilitate the deal, particularly to overturn prevailing government policy to undertake telecommunications projects only on a build-operate-and-transfer basis. What did the chief overseer of elections have to do with such a project, and what hold did he have on the First Gentleman and the President herself?

Equally significant is that amidst all this darkness and the personal terror he was experiencing, Jun Lozada, after much agonizing and prayer, decided to “choose the light.” He admitted that he was part of the “dysfunctional system” that he was now exposing and condemning. He had already internalized its norms and was only trying to “moderate the greed” of those with “good political sponsors.” But he also knew when to draw the line and say “enough” even in such a corrupt environment. He was scandalized and personally embarrassed by the stark contrast between the pure generosity of the indigenous people he was working with in the uplands, who refused to profit from guava fruits to reserve food for the birds, and the naked greed of the corrupt politicians cum businessmen in Manila who were not satisfied with kickbacks in the billions of pesos. Jun Lozada’s decisive choice for truth and justice is a living example of the kind of conversion the bishops have called for -- toward a social conscience that would promote the common good. He believes that what he is doing is only being faithful to his father who had asked him and his siblings to give back to the country what they have been blessed with as a family. In the face of continuing threats to his life and all the malicious attempts to destroy his credibility, what Jun Lozada has done is nothing less than heroic.

Our bishops have renewed their call for us to come together as faith communities to “pray together, reason together, decide together, act together.” They have called us to communal action for truth and justice. What does this challenge mean?

1) We affirm and commend Jun Lozada for his courage and self-sacrifice to speak the truth. We call on our communities to create various venues for demonstrating the public’s defense of truth, in the face of concerted attempts to muddle it by discrediting Jun Lozada. We ask individuals and organizations in our networks to provide him with all the necessary legal, financial, institutional and morale support. We ask our school and religious communities to provide sanctuaries for the physical and spiritual defense of other would-be whistle blowers. We also endorse the “sanctuary fund” that has been set up by the AMRSP.

2) We call on others who are witnesses to abuse of power and corruption in government to follow the example of Jun Lozada in overcoming their fears to come out and stand for the truth. We strongly support the continuing search for truth and in particular, demand the lifting of EO 464 which is still invoked by officials of the Executive Department to prevent the Senate from conducting full investigations despite a Supreme Court decision.

3) We have a special responsibility as Catholic educational and religious institutions to set up centers for deepening awareness, reflection and formation toward sociopolitical engagement. We need to help our communities understand issues surrounding Jun Lozada’s testimonies, not as discrete and isolated cases, but as examples of often interwoven problems pertaining to human rights violations, abuse of power, massive corruption, social injustice and the undermining of institutions like the military, legal and electoral system for private ends. These questions, even as they demand pressing answers, often also call for long-term structural reform.

4) In light of the testimonies of Jun Lozada, we support various efforts to hold accountable all those who are culpable of serious crimes, including kidnapping and serious illegal detention, coercion, illegal wiretapping, bribery, graft and corruption. Even as we recognize how much our political and judicial institutions have been weakened and compromised by powerful interests, we call for solutions that would channel the people’s outrage and desire for truth and justice toward avenues that are non-violent and directed at strengthening the constitutional system and building trust in democratic institutions.

Together with the bishops, we are deeply concerned that perhaps the most serious crisis facing our country today, especially among our youth, is one of hopelessness – of distrust, disempowerment and disengagement. That is why we see the personal witnessing of Jun Lozada as such a precious gift of hope. And as Benedict XVI has stressed, hope is essentially for others; hope is intertwined with both faith and transformation. Jun Lozada’s example challenges us to look into ourselves and see our own personal and institutional accountability for the immense problems of poverty, corruption and violence in our midst.

Like him, we are often part of the problems we condemn and seek to solve. We are a deeply wounded people in need of healing and conversion. We often fail to respond and commit ourselves to change. But like Jun Lozada, we can also be moved to choose the light of truth and justice. Through our coming together in action as a community of faith and hope in God’s power and grace, death and evil shall be overcome!

See, I am doing something new! Now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? In the desert, I make a way; in the wasteland, rivers.
(Isaiah 43: 18-19)

The Association of Major Religious Superiors of the Philippines (AMRSP), the Inter-diocesan Catechetical Ministry (ICM), the Manila Archdiocesan and Parochial Schools Association (MAPSA), the Catholic Educational Association of the Philippines (CEAP), Simbahang Lingkod ng Bayan (SLB) the Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting (PPCRV), and the Archdiocese of Manila Presbyteral Council.

 Read also: SLB's statement on the ongoing Senate probe of the NBN-ZTE deal