“Serving the people is not a crime,” said human rights activist Felipe “Ipe” Gelle during a press conference on July 1, 2025, as he recounted his six-day detention on alleged terrorism financing charges.
Peasants’ rights advocate Felipe Gelle
Gelle said he voluntarily surrendered on June 24, 2025, after raising funds for his bail, amounting to P1 million for five counts under Section 8 of the Terrorism Financing Prevention and Suppression Act of 2012 (Republic Act No. 10168). Despite posting bail, he was reportedly detained after being arrested by operatives of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group in Barangay Villamonte, Bacolod City. Gelle was released on bail on June 30, 2025.
Gelle is a staff member of the Paghida-et sa Kauswagan Development Group (PDG), heads the Human Rights Advocates in Negros (HRAN), and serves as a National Council member of the human rights alliance Karapatan.
PDG is a development organization in Southern Negros that champions agrarian reform, sustainable agriculture, and the rights of small farmers and fisherfolk.
Gelle recounted that he and four other PDG colleagues are facing charges based on what he called recycled accusations. The cases were filed in court as early as December 3, 2024, he said.
Gelle questioned the basis of the charges, saying they rest merely on the claims of a lone witness, allegedly an enlisted member of the Philippine Army assigned in Isabela. He noted that identical charges against his colleagues had already been quashed by the Iloilo Regional Trial Court, citing the unconstitutionality of the provision used in the cases.
Gelle denied the accusations, saying that “we are just doing our jobs – helping the farmers and fishermen in Negros Occidental to have decent livelihoods to improve their lives and nothing else”.
Development worker Jasmin Jerusalem
Jasmin “Minet” Jerusalem, executive director of the Leyte Center for Development Incorporated (LCDE), also pleaded not guilty on July 14, 2025 before the Regional Trial Court in Tacloban City to three counts of alleged financing terrorism.
Jerusalem has led the LCDE since the 1980s, overseeing its efforts to deliver emergency relief, food, and health services to communities affected by disasters in Leyte and Samar. Since its founding in 1988, the organization reports having served over 900,000 individuals. Jerusalem has received many national and international awards for her humanitarian efforts. She was a 2021 recipient of the UN Women in Disaster Risk Reduction Leadership Award for Asia Pacific, among others.
The CIDG accuses Jerusalem of channeling resources to members of the armed communist insurgency group New People’s Army (NPA). As a result of the renewed charges, LCDe’s bank accounts and assets have been frozen, forcing the organization to temporarily halt its humanitarian and development programs in underserved communities lacking sufficient government support.
The Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) ordered the freezing of LCDE’s operational funds, along with the personal bank accounts of Jerusalem, her staff, her son, and their local suppliers. The freeze took effect on April 30, 2024, and has since disrupted the organization’s humanitarian work, Jerusalem said.
The case against LCDE was dismissed for lack of evidence on December 19, 2024, but has been revived following the court’s approval of the CIDG’s appeal.
Journalist Frenchie Mae Cumpio
Meanwhile, a new investigation by Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has exposed serious flaws and fabrications in the criminal case against Philippine journalist Frenchie Mae Cumpio, who has spent over five years in pre-trial detention in Tacloban City on charges widely seen as politically motivated.
Cumpio, 26, is on trial for illegal possession of firearms and financing terrorism – charges RSF says rely on planted evidence, dubious witnesses, and manipulated testimony.
The prosecution’s two key witnesses – both tied to the military – have reportedly made inconsistent or clearly false statements. One claimed to have met Cumpio regularly starting in 2008, when she would have been just nine years old. Both witnesses have appeared in other cases used to target activists, and one had 17 criminal charges dropped after cooperating with authorities.
A previously dormant case has recently emerged, accusing her of involvement in a 2019 ambush that killed two soldiers – charges RSF also deems implausible and fabricated. The murder case, which accuses Cumpio of double murder and attempted murder, was filed before her 2020 arrest, but she was unaware of it until recently.
Cumpio’s case, according to RSF, exemplifies the so called “red-tagging” practice of falsely portraying civil society actors as members of the Communist Party of the Philippines and its armed wing, the NPA – groups designated as terrorist organizations in 2017 – to discredit and target them.
Photo © Karapatan