Amador Cadano, father of detained Guiller Cadano, said pain as well as a bit of anger brought about by the incident remain in his heart. “Bakit ganun? Ano ba ‘yung kasalanan ng dalawang bata para i-detain sila ng ganito katagal?”
Cadano said before the caravan moved from here to San Jose City Sunday morning.
The other detained youth is Gerald Salonga. The two identified themselves as community organizers of Kabataan Partylist group and Anakbayan at the time of their arrest by combined military and police forces in Barangay R.T. Padilla, Carranglan, Nueva Ecija on Aug.9, 2014.
Cadano was then 22 years old and Salonga ,24 were graduates of business management and psychology, respectively, from UP Diliman Extension Program at Clark Freeport, Pampanga.
The duo were reportedly watching television in a house at the said village when law enforcers swamped the area apparently to serve warrant of arrest against a certain Ely Taray alias Omeng who supposedly eluded arrest.
Taray was subject of standing arrest warrants for frustrated murder in 2006 and murder in 2008, according to government security agencies. The suspects denied knowing Taray and claimed to be organizing farmers who are allegedly facing displacement by the planned Dalton Pass Eastern Alignment Project, a road project to be undertaken under the so-called public- private partnership with Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).
But according to the Army’s 7th Infantry Division, Cadano and Salonga were guides of Platoon Nueva Ecija- Nueva Vizcaya-Eastern Pangasinan of the New People’s Army (NPA). Operatives said they recovered two 9mm pistols, bullets, two hand grenades and subversive documents from Cadano and Salonga.
“Ang totoo po niyan, siyempre malungkot, masama ang loob, medyo galit,” Cadano said.
But Cadano said they have learned to forgive the people behind the arrest of his son and his companion.
“Pero hindi kami makakalimot,” he added.
Cadano finds the progress of cases filed against his son “too slow.”
