September 24 | Statement | Migrante BC
MIGRANTE BC FIRMLY CONDEMNS THE VIOLENT POLICE CRACKDOWN OF ANTI-CORRUPTION PROTESTS IN THE PHILIPPINES
September 21st saw the mass mobilization of hundreds of thousands of Filipino people of all ages and sectors in Luneta, EDSA, and other parts of the country to protest against widespread state corruption that has seen over PHP 1 trillion of flood control project funds in the pockets of the most wealthy elites. Solidarity rallies and actions have sparked across the globe from Canada to Aotearoa in response, identifying President Marcos Jr.’s regime as the chief executive of corruption—plundering from the hard-earned labour of the Filipino people in the homeland and the overseas remittances abroad to advance exploitative projects backed by American imperialists.
The statements from Malacañang brand protesters at Mendiola and Ayala as ‘criminals’, yet the actions of the police and the state show who the true criminals are. During Sunday’s actions, over 216 protestors and bystanders were detained, with reports of tear gassing, water cannons, and clear police brutality as youth were thrown and violently beaten on the street. From these 216, at least 90 were minors, the majority not even able to contact their family or access a lawyer.
This shows the continuation of state fascism as corrupt governance scrambles to suppress and divide a mass movement that threatens their power over the Filipino people. As an extension of Marcos Jr.’s regime, the Philippine National Police acting chief Jose Melencio Nartarez Jr. has given contradictory information, saying that law enforcers were the ones who were attacked and have disrespected “the rule of law”.
But what is the true state of the “rule of law” when the Filipino people are drowned in the rivers of debt mandated by the state? What is the “rule of law” when the Filipino people are violently expelled from their homelands and murdered, neglected, and plundered by the supposed institution meant to protect them?
Let us be reminded that the boiling rage of the urban poor, youth and students, the workers, peasants, fisher folk, and all the Filipino people in the diaspora that we are seeing right now is a legitimate and just reaction to the impoverished conditions that are systemically thrust upon them by the Marcos Jr. US-puppet regime, as well as all presidents before him.
With overseas remittances hitting a record seven month high of $3.18 B in July of 2025, Filipino migrant workers abroad continue to toil under precarious living and working conditions in Canada to send money to their struggling families back home, only for it to end up in the gluttonous mouths of Marcos and his cronies. The sacrifices of OFWs are undermined by the very officials who call them the ‘bagong-bayani’.
As overseas Filipinos we must continue the revolutionary spirit of our kababayan who have so valiantly risen up against the state to condemn the corrupt system under Marcos Jr.!
Hold Marcos Jr. accountable and release all those detained! Flood the streets with protest!
The only viable solution to the end of corruption is through the will of the people’s struggle towards genuine national democracy.
MIGRANTE NG BAYAN, TULOY TULOY ANG LABAN!
IKULONG NA YAN, MGA KURAKOT!