Sunday, October 08, 2006 Aglipayan priest gets death threat
CAGAYAN DE ORO - The police have yet to arrest the suspects in the slaying of Bishop Alberto Ramento in Tarlac City and yet another Aglipayan clergyman has received a death threat, a religious group said Saturday.
The Promotion of Church People's Response (PCPR) said Fr. Antonio Ablon, also an Iglesia Filipina Independiente (IFI) priest based in Cagayan de Oro, received the death threat through a text message last October 6 at 4:45 p.m.
The PCPR is an ecumenical political organization of church people -- bishops, priests, religious sisters, pastors, deacons and deaconess, seminarians, religious and lay workers in the church and church-based and church-related institutions, programs and services.
The threat reads, "Fr. Ablon, patay gani ang supreme bishop ikaw pa kaha i sample ka namo dinhi sa CDO (Fr. Ablon, the supreme bishop was even killed how much more if we will make you the sample here in Cagayan de Oro)."
The group said the message, which came from cell phone number 09203546270, "is unmistakably a clear warning that Ablon could be the next victim of extrajudicial killing."
"We strongly suspect that the source of this message could only be the military agents who are dutiful in their mission to intimidate, suppress and brutally silence the voices of dissent that have exposed the fraud, corruption and human rights abuses of the Arroyo administration," PCPR said in a statement.
"We denounce this latest harassment against (Fr.) Ablon. This is a serious threat that further confirms the extent of mission orders against government critics," the group added.
The group said by killing an activist bishop and 22 other priests, pastors and lay church members, the record of human rights violations of the Arroyo government "is becoming more unparalleled in brutality."
Ramento was found dead at second level of the convent with his cellular phone, jewelry and cash missing. The church's collection was also reportedly missing.
Like Ramento, Ablon is also an outspoken critic of the Arroyo government. Ablon now joins the list of other activist priests and pastors who have been receiving death threats.
Ablon is a PCPR national council member and secretary general of the human rights group Karapatan in the region. (MSN/Sunnex)
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