Archbishop of Manila, Luis Antonio Tagle (right), delivers a message to the participants of the ‘procession’ in Luneta park, metro Manila, Philippines. — Reuters photo
MANILA: Thousands of Catholic faithful gathered in the Philippine capital on Saturday for a “show of force” in the biggest rally yet to stop extrajudicial killings in President Rodrigo Duterte’s drug war.
More than 6,000 people have died since Duterte took office seven months ago and ordered an unprecedented crime war that has drawn global criticism for alleged human rights abuses, but is popular with many in the mainly Catholic country.
Members of one of the nation’s oldest and most powerful institutions chanted prayers and sang hymns as they marched to condemn a “spreading culture of violence”.
“We have to stand up. Somehow this is already a show of force by the faithful that they don’t like these extrajudicial killings,” Manila bishop Broderick Pabillo told AFP before addressing the crowd.
“I am alarmed and angry at what’s happening because this is something that is regressive. It does not show our humanity.”
Duterte, 71, has attacked the Church as being “full of shit” and “the most hypocritical institution” for speaking out against a campaign that he says would save generations of Filipinos from the drug menace.
About eight in 10 Filipinos are Catholic, making the former Spanish colony of more than 100 million people Asia’s bastion of Christianity.
The Church helped lead the revolution that toppled dictator Ferdinand Marcos in 1986 and a 2001 uprising against then-president Joseph Estrada that saw him ousted over corruption charges.
It had initially declined to voice opposition publicly to Duterte’s drug war but, as the death toll of mostly poor people mounted, it began late last year to call for the killings to end. Saturday’s event, called the “Walk for Life”, gathered 20,000 people, according to the organisers. Manila police estimated the crowd at 10,000.
The rally also opposed Duterte’s push to restore the death penalty, his top legislative priority as part of his crime war. — AFP