Bishop slams attack on priest in Aurora

A Catholic priest on Saturday escaped unhurt after armed men strafed a parish house in Casiguran, Aurora.

Fr. Jose Francisco Talaban, 43, parish priest of Nuestra Señora de la Salvacion in Barangay Bianoan, Casiguran, said he was sleeping when the group fired at the parish house at about 2:20 a.m.

He said he was about two meters away from where the bullets left marks.

Investigators recovered an empty shell from an M-16 rifle, three empty shells from an M-14 rifle and shrapnel from a grenade, said Senior Supt. Romulo Esteban, Aurora police chief.

Bishop Rolando Tria Tirona, head of the Prelature of Infanta that covers Aurora, condemned the attack and said it would not frighten the Catholic Church in defending the rights of the poor and exposing irregularities in that province.

“Father Joefran is a good shepherd and pastor. He acted on the cries for help of oppressed people in his parish. This violence is unacceptable,” Tirona said by phone on Saturday.

A resident saw a van near the area during the incident, Talaban said. The van had no license plate and its windows were tinted, he said.

The suspects left plastic laminated pamphlets warning Talaban to pack and leave because of the disunity he was supposedly sowing in Casiguran. The pamphlets were supposedly issued by the “Aniban ng Ayaw sa Komunista,” an anticommunist group.

Tirona, in a statement to be read in churches in the diocese today, called the perpetrators “coward and without conscience.”

“The allegations against Father Joefran are all lies and made by people who are panicking because the truth of their foolishness and deception on poor people are being revealed to all,” he said.

“The Church cannot be stopped from taking side with the oppressed and those being robbed of their land,” he added. “Justice and punishment of the Lord [will come] and the Lord is not blind to what has happened.”

Tirona said he suspected that the incident was related to Talaban’s assistance to groups opposing the establishment of an economic zone in the province.

“Definitely, 100 percent, this [incident] has something to do with the help Father Joefran is giving to those affected by the Aseza [Aurora Special Economic Zone Authority],” Tirona said.

The attack, he said, happened as Talaban and the prelature elevated the issue to advocacy groups based in the University of the Philippines and Ateneo de Manila University when the affected residents decided to oppose the conversion and expansion of Aseza into the Aurora Pacific Economic Zone (Apeco).

Aurora Rep. Juan Edgardo Angara, one of the proponents of the project, did not reply when sought for comments on Saturday.

Tirona said Angara had called him to say that the “Apeco issue might be used to sow intrigues.”

Talaban linked the incident to his advocacy against the project and logging and mining activities in Casiguran.

“[People behind this] have resources to use like cars, hired goons,” he said.

SIC: INQ