The Council for People’s Development and Governance stands in solidarity with Lumad indigenous people’s rights advocate Niezel Velasco as they face trial on trumped-up charges of estafa and unjust vexation.
Niezel Velasco, along with Manobo woman Julieta Gomez were previously acquitted on April 2025– four years after being arrested and detained on trumped up charge of illegal possession of firearms and explosives in 2021.
The charges on Velasco are part of the continuing state attacks against indigenous rights defenders–using judicial harassment and prosecution to prolong detention and deter people’s attention from the struggles of the Lumad indigenous peoples asserting their rights–maligning and unjustly prosecuting advocates to stifle dissent.
On June 24, Velasco is set to face a hearing on a fabricated estafa case including unjust vexation before the Quezon City Metropolitan Trial Court (QC MeTC).
Other human rights defenders (HRDs), development workers, as well as civil society organizations (CSOs) face increasing attacks through red-tagging, surveillance and freezing of assets.
As civic spaces are constricted, people’s right to development, to enjoy their economic, social and cultural rights as well as civil and political rights are repressed. The government must stop these attacks on HRDs and IP rights defenders, CSOs and non-government organizations (NGOs) whose advocacies and services are far-reaching in the communities they cannot reach.
We urge everyone to take a stand for just peace, an end to state attacks and impunity.
