In late 2019, a group of Belgian documentary filmmakers travelled to the Philippines to interview climate activists. Cristina Palabay, known as «Tinay», was one of them. She is the general secretary of the Philippine human rights organisation Karapatan and a partner of Viva Salud.
Speaking out critically about President Rodrigo Duterte’s policies is having increasingly serious consequences. There have been countless campaigns of harassment, threats, arrests and even extrajudicial killings. Tinay, too, has received death threats on several occasions because of her activism. She speaks about this in this video.
Working for Karapatan means frequently receiving threats because of the work I do. But fear will not silence me.
Tinay began campaigning for human rights and women’s rights whilst she was still a student. She has been leading KARAPATAN since 2012. She has taken part in countless emergency responses, fact-finding missions and humanitarian missions to document and investigate human rights violations. As part of her fight for justice, she also organises protests and supports victims of human rights violations and their families in bringing their cases to court.
Tinay has received international recognition for her work. As such, she is regularly invited by organisations such as the United Nations Human Rights Council and advocacy groups within the European Parliament. In 2019, she received an award from the Women Have Wings Foundation for her courage and perseverance in the struggle for social justice in the Philippines.
Under the guise of the «war on drugs» – and, since March 2020, also the «war on coronavirus» – the Duterte government has been increasingly hindering the work of human rights defenders and social movements. On 3 July, the President signed an anti-terrorism law which allows any form of criticism of his policies to be treated as terrorism. This law thus enshrines in Philippine legislation a widespread practice: the criminalisation of activism.
The consequences of this law were soon felt. On 17 August 2020, Zara Alvarez, a health and human rights campaigner with KARAPATAN, was brutally murdered because of her social activism. Like many other human rights defenders in the Philippines, her name had been included on a list of alleged terrorists. However, human rights defenders and the social movements in which they are active are not taking this lying down and feel emboldened by international solidarity.
This testimonial is part of the Sangterra project, an initiative by La boîte à images asbl in partnership with the Cara de Mono association.
Direction & video footage: Jean-Noël Lansival / Photos & interview: Christophe Smets / Assistant director, editing, subtitling: Frédéricq Bianchet.
