“We do not know where to stand or how to feel, whether we could still hope or just move on.”
CAGAYAN DE ORO — Two years full of sorrow.
Marklen, son of disappeared Mindanao-based labor union organizer William Lariosa, stressed this out as they remain clueless of his father’s whereabouts since his abduction in Bukidnon on April 10, 2024.
He continuously calls for the surfacing of Lariosa, who was allegedly captured by elements of the Philippine Army. Marklen pointed out that his father’s disappearance is not just a personal grief, but it constitutes human rights violations.
“Two years of hope that one day we could see him and be together again,” he said in the vernacular during a protest in Davao City on Thursday, April 9.
Lariosa, a labor union organizer of Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU) Southern Mindanao, was last seen in Barangay Butong, Quezon town. He reportedly sought refuge in Bukidnon, one of the provinces in the neighboring region of Northern Mindanao, after his family received threats and harassment.
Read:Groups press gov’t to probe surveillance, harassment of Southern Mindanao organizers
According to eyewitnesses, alleged elements of the Army’s 48th Infantry Battalion forcibly arrested Lariosa. He is one the 16 victims of alleged enforced disappearances documented by the human rights alliance Karapatanunder the Ferdinand Marcos Jr. administration.
Read:Eyewitnesses say military involved in abducting labor organizer
But the fact-finding team organized by KMU in 2024 was told by the said Army unit that the labor organizer was not under its custody.
The Lariosa family filed petitions for legal remedies, but these were all denied at the Court of Appeals due to insufficiency.
To intensify the campaign, the family and various progressive groups established the Surface William Lariosa Network last year during the first year of the labor organizer’s disappearance.
During the launch, Lariosa’s daughter, Yasmin, lamented the red-tagging of those who have helped push the interest of the Filipino people. She said the search continues, as accepting what happened to his father equates to normalizing the injustice in the country.
“We do not know where to stand or how to feel, whether we could still hope or just move on,” she said in the vernacular. “If he is still alive to this day, he is suffering too much.”
During the April 9 protest, the Southern Mindanao chapters of Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan), Gabriela, and Anakbayan vowed to continue calls to surface the disappeared labor union organizer.
“The enforced disappearance of Lariosa shows proof of the deteriorating conditions of workers and the freedom of association in the Philippines,” Rauf Sisay of Bayan Southern Mindanao said in the vernacular.
The support from these progressive groups, Marklen said, empowered the Lariosa family to continue. (AMU, RVO)
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