Tyranny and the Baguio POSD (Justice for Oscar Caranto)

It is a common sight around the market area and the rest of the Central Business District: ambulant vendors being chased by either the police or members of the Public Order and Safety Department (POSD) of the City Government of Baguio. Often, the vendors are old women who have mastered the art of sensing the presence of “authorities” from some meters away, giving them a few seconds’ head start to pack up their wares and make a run for it before they lose all their merchandise, and with it, a few meals for their family.

The late Cecil Afable once said during a rally: “We call them squatters because we failed to provide them homes.” And we call them illegal vendors because the benefits of our city’s so-called development, progress failed to reach one Oscar Caranto, a so-called illegal vendor who passed away on July 4, 2014 allegedly due to the beating he received from elements of the POSD.

I am for a peaceful, orderly, clean Baguio, but not at the expense of a life of a father who’s just desperately trying to make ends meet for his family. Who really wants to make a living that way, anyway? Imagine having to start your day preparing your merchandise all the time hoping that today, the “authorities” wouldn’t be around, or if they are that you would be able to run away from them fast enough. Nobody wants that kind of life.

Given the chance, nobody would want to be called an illegal vendor, or for that matter, a squatter. Given the chance, everyone would embrace a dignified, secure, peaceful, happy life – Caranto would have jumped at the opportunity to become a legitimate vendor, just as any squatter would to legitimately have the right to the land their home sits on. There is no dignity in being an illegal vendor, no security, it’s dangerous and it’s sad.

So how do all the taxes that the huge businesses pay that our local government have allowed to sprout all over this city at the expense of its natural environment, beauty, heritage trickle down to the likes of Caranto, if at all? 

And while Caranto paid with his life, others get away with it – how come supposed "legal vendors" selling illegal wares such as pirated DVDs and second-hand mobile phones that came from questionable sources can peacefully, orderly go ahead with their trade un-harassed? The law must apply to all...

And I wonder, too, what kind of instruction, direction these men of the POSD receive from their superiors that make them believe that violence can result in public order and safety.  

Caranto’s was a very, very wrongful death. City Hall’s got blood on its hands – the blood of a hapless, desperate, disenfranchised, deprived citizen. More light will be shed on this very unfortunate, tragic incident in the coming days – I already anticipate a self-defense alibi, but taking the life of someone who’s  just trying to make a living, or stay alive at all, is criminal. Way more criminal than what the elements of the POSD would say Caranto was committing. And even if he reacted quite violently to their efforts to confiscate his merchandise, that is justified – a hungry man is an angry man, as Marley sang – they were taking away the only means he knew to feed his family, his only means to stay alive.

The curse of the Filipino – given the slightest hint of power over his fellowmen and he abuses it. The ghost of hundreds of years of colonization and having those colonial masters as role models that really messed up our concept of being in power continues to haunt us.

That’s the point those POSD men missed – they didn’t have the power, instead, they had the responsibility to keep the community orderly and safe. Just like our congressman doesn't have the power to do as he pleases with the environment, like cutting down more than 700 trees for his own personal benefit, instead, he has the responsibility to ensure that the welfare and rights of the people he represents are defended and forwarded, including their right to a healthy environment.

And now that he's gone, Oscar Caranto and the loved ones he left behind have one right that demands to be respected, defended, forwarded: Justice!  

Photo lifted from the Facebook wall of Ivy Buenaobra