Priest dedicates Magsaysay award to drug war victims

MANILA, Philippines — A Catholic priest dedicated his Ramon Magsaysay Award to the victims of detained former president Rodrigo Duterte’s bloody war on drugs.

The award, regarded as Asia’s highest honor, cited Fr. Flaviano Villanueva for his “transformative compassion” and for restoring dignity to the marginalized through concrete acts of mercy.

In his acceptance speech at the awards ceremony at the historic Metropolitan Theater in Manila on Friday, Villanueva added that the recognition was “never about me,” but about “the many lives and hands that gave it meaning” – the homeless, the grieving mothers, and volunteers who serve despite exhaustion and fear.

“When injustice persists, silence wounds the soul. To stop the bleeding, we need to start the healing and to start the healing, we must continue asking the difficult questions,” he said.

Villanueva reiterated Kalookan Bishop Pablo Virgilio Cardinal David’s call for President Marcos to establish a truth commission to investigate the extrajudicial killings (EJKs) related to the brutal anti-drugs campaign.

“How many were truly killed? Who were the perpetrators?” Villanueva asked. “How were they killed? Who will continue to begin these studies, this research, this investigation? That is why I strongly propose and support the creation of the EJK truth commission.”

After showing a list of the victims of extrajudicial killings, he said, “The names that I dedicate this award to are names that will never appear in the plaques, but they did appear in the news. But in appearing in the news, they appeared judged, maltreated, and even branded as people who fought back, even if it were lies.”

The board of trustees recognized the missionary priest for providing “dignified care and service” to the marginalized when he founded the Arnold Janssen Kalinga Foundation in 2015, which provides meals, hygiene services and psychosocial care to Manila’s street dwellers.

In 2016, at the height of the drug war killings, Villanueva launched Project Paghilom to provide widows and orphans of victims with grief counseling, legal aid, livelihood training and educational support, and opened a sanctuary for victims called Dambana ng Paghilom, located inside the La Loma Catholic Cemetery in Caloocan, where the cremated remains of 111 victims of extrajudicial killings are laid to rest.

Villanueva described the honor as “not a medal to display, but a mission to renew,” saying mercy must continue to “wash the tired feet of our nation” until dignity is restored to the forgotten and oppressed.

“Hope is what the poor have taught me. They have shown me that dignity can rise even from the streets, that kindness is stronger than cruelty and that love when lived is the only revolution that lasts,” he added.

Villanueva, a member of the Society of the Divine Word, earned the prestigious Ramon Magsaysay Award – Asia’s equivalent of the Nobel Peace Prize – alongside Maldivian environmentalist Shaahina Ali and the Indian organization Foundation to Educate Girls Globally, also known as Educate Girls.