Treason is one thing. Forcing the fishermen to tow the line of the traitors is another.
Yesterday, we were treated to the spectacle of Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel Piñol coming down hard on Barangay San Roque, San Jose, Occidental Mindoro, with what appeared to be a PNP invasion force. Piñol ordered the police to surround the fishermen and forced them to sing the government tune in the Recto Bank ramming incident.
Not only helpless abandonment, but the shock of blatant betrayal, was etched on the faces of the Gem-Vir crew as they were lined up like criminals by Sec. Piñol in a press conference that revealed more in what it showed than in what was said.
Halatang pinwersa at diniktahan ang mga mangingisda na sumakay na lamang sa linya ng gobyerno.
The Chinese puppets of the Duterte government have become the puppeteers to their own countrymen, and so on down the line, in what has become the fate of our country as a province of China under the new Makapili traitors of our time.
Ganito na kagarapal ang pagtataksil ng mga opisyales ng gobyerno. Naiwan ang mga mangingisda na malunod sa gitna ng karagatan pagkatapos palubugin ang kanilang bangka, muli silang iniwang nalulunod sa kataksilan ng sarili nilang gobyerno.
The Gem-Vir fishermen were abandoned the first time by the Chinese who rammed their boat. More than being abandoned the second time around by their own government, they were actually thrown overboard and fed to the sharks. After barely surviving the first, it is doubtful if the fishermen can still survive the second.
Masakit iwan na palutang-lutang sa gitna ng dagat ng mga banyagang mapagsamsam. Pero higit na kalunus-lunos na ipatapon sa dagat ng sariling gobyerno na kumampi pa sa banyaga.
Sa mga mangigisda ng Gem-Vir, nakakasiguro kayo, pinagkanulo man kayo ng mga pinuno ng ating bansa, hinding-hindi kayo iiwan ng inyong mga kababayan. Kasama ninyo ang buong sambayanang Pilipino sa laban na ito.
No amount of excuses, charades, denials, and lies by Duterte, Pinol, Cusi, Panelo, or Locsin will alter the inevitability of a nation and a people united against traitors and their foreign master.
(Access the handwritten copy of Dispatch from Crame No. 539, here: https://issuu.com/senatorleil…/…/dispatch_from_crame_no._539)