Press Release
March 29, 2007

PIA: "URBAN POOR COMMUNITIES NEED SERVICES
NOT MILITARIZATION"

"The hostage-taker, Jun Ducat and his accomplice should be made to face justice for risking the lives of the innocent children and teachers they held for ten tense hours yesterday."

"Ordinary citizens can readily identify with Mr. Ducat's sentiments on poverty, corruption in government, and the need to provide free education to poor children. But all his noble intentions cannot be justified by the violent method he chose to air his grievances."

"There are other legitimate ways of fighting for these basic rights. But taking children hostage is not one of them."

"As a mother, I share the dreams and aspirations of all parents that their children gain access to good health care and education. For that reason, I fought for the inclusion of a provision in the Expanded Value Added Tax (E-VAT) Law that would set aside a portion for health services and health insurance." (The executive's compliance with the provision is another issue, however.)

"The administration should consider yesterday's hostage incident a serious wake-up call. The marginalized sectors of our society shouldn't be deprived of legitimate avenues to ventilate their concerns. Be it through the media, public meetings and consultations, the parliament of the streets or Congress itself, through sectoral or party-list representation. The government should respect freedom of speech and assembly at all times.

"Our urban poor communities badly need social services from the government like education, health, and basic utilities like clean water and cheap electricity. They don't need intimidation and militarization."

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