Witness under protection raped

December last year, 29-year-old Evangeline Salmorin y Oraza and her husband and daughter were placed under the Witness Protection Program (WPP) of the Department of Justice (DOJ) after witnessing her father’s murder over a land dispute and being abducted and threatened by armed men from pursuing her father’s case.

Three months later, on April 2, 2002, at 2 p.m., Evangeline was allegedly punched in the stomach and raped by her security escort, Security Officer Gerry Lintan in his room. Two days later, Lintan allegedly tried to rape her again, but failed because Evangeline fought back with a knife.

That night, Lintan allegedly called Evangeline through the cellphone of Policewoman Jusan de Dios and threatened that he would kill her and her family if she told anyone about the rape.

Five days later, Evangeline reported the incident to Security Officer Romy Reyes who in turn reported her case to WPP Director Leo Dacera III. That same day, Dacera allegedly made little of Evangeline’s complaint by trying to make her admit that she and Lintan were having an "affair" and that their spouses could sue them for adultery.

That same day, Evangeline was allegedly compelled to leave the WPP because Dacera failed to act on her complaint, and the next day, April 9, she filed a rape case with the Commission on Human Rights.

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There are two violations of the law committed in this rape complaint. The first has to do with the violation of Section 8a of RA 6981, which provides such a witness as Evangeline the right and benefit "to have a secure housing facility until (s)he has testified or until the threat, intimidation, or harassment disappears or is reduced to a manageable or tolerable level."

The next violation is of Article 335 of RA8353 or the Anti-Rape Law of 1997, which considers as an aggravating circumstance in a rape case the commission of the crime by any member of the Armed Forces of the Philippines or para-military units of the PNP or any law enforcement agency or penal institution. This law goes on to say that the offender took advantage of his position to facilitate the commission of a crime.

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In support of Evangeline’s complaints, last April 29, House Resolution 532 was filed in Congress, directing the House Committee on Justice, Women and Good Government to conduct an investigation in aid of legislation into the rape case filed by Evangeline against Lintan. The resolution also asks for a probe into the "apparent failure" of WPP Director Dacera. Dacera, says the resolution, has to explain why he reassigned Lintan to the Cordillera without proper investigation, an act showing "an apparent complicity of (WPP) officials in the abuses committed by its security officers, and further shows a system of incompetence and insensitivity that must not be tolerated."

The resolution is authored by Bayan Muna Party List Rep. Liza Maza, and Reps. Nerissa Soon-Ruiz, Uliran Joaquin, Josefina Joson, Herminia Ramiro, Roman Antonino, Crispin Beltran and Satur Ocampo.

Maza expressed relief over the National Bureau of Investigation’s recommendation to arrest and file rape and attempted rape charges against Lintan. She said, "Abuses committed against women, especially in government custody should never be tolerated."

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The Iran Embassy’s cultural affairs office invited media persons the other night to a viewing of Journey to Kandahar, a documentary-type film judged by Time Magazine as Best of Cinema for 2001.

The film was made before the September 11 attack on the World Trade Center by Mohsen Makhmalbaf. It is the true story of Nafas (played by Niloufar Pazira), a reporter who was born in Afghanistan, but fled to Canada with her family when she was a child. Her sister, who had lost her legs to a land mine, was accidentally left behind.

Nafas receives a letter from her sister saying she has decided to commit suicide, compelling Nafas to travel to Afghanistan to save her. She joins a caravan of refugees who, strangely, are returning to the war-torn nation. She never reaches Kandahar nor her sister, but she sees the disturbing "toll the Taliban regime had taken upon its people."

The film is a moving depiction of the anguish brought upon the Afghanistans. Women with ailments are shown being examined by a male doctor behind a partition through whose small opening they can show their mouths and eyes, and the doctor questions them through children accompanying them. There is a long, surrealistic scene of one-legged men scrambling to retrieve prosthesis (plastic legs) being dropped in parachutes from a plane.

Moshen Makhmalbaf was born in Teheran in 1951, but left school at the age of 15 to form a group of religious activists opposed to the regime of Shah Rheza Pahlavi. At 17 he was imprisoned and was spared from execution only because he was a minor. After his release he decided to go into politics by artistic activities. Since then he has written 28 short stories, three novels, ten plays, two books of essays and 28 scripts before his debut as a film director in 1982. He directed famous films such as The Peddler, The Cyclists, and Once Upon a Time Cinema.