The heads of Catholic religious congregations in the Philippines reminded voters to elect candidates who stand for truth and those who defend life in the coming national elections in May.
“Let us choose those who will defend life,” said the Conference of Major Superiors in the Philippines (CMSP) in a statement released this week as the country marks the 36th anniversary of the 1986 people power revolution that ended the 20-year rule of Ferdinand Marcos.
“In the face of unbridled killings and the continued decline in the overall quality of life in our country, let us choose leaders who will truly promote fullness of life,” said the religious leaders.
“Let us choose those who value the truth,” they added, saying that the widespread disinformation and fake news “poison the mind of our fellow Filipinos on social media.”
“Let us choose the candidates who respect our ability to decide based on truth, and who give us the power to do so,” read the CMSP statement.
“Let us reject candidates who continue to exploit us through lies in order to get our votes,” it added.
The organization urged voters not to support those “who continue to trample history… including those committed under the Marcos dictatorship.”
They said the purveyors of lies are also “those who employ trolls in order to confuse the citizenry” and those who continue to red-tag critics of the government.
The religious leaders urged voters to thumb down politicians “who were proven to have abused their power and authority, and have unjustly enriched themselves in office.”
They urged the public to scrutinize the candidates “through the lens of the Gospel” and reject candidates who have vested interests, those who support extrajudicial killings and those who desire all-out-war instead of pursuing peace talks with the rebel groups.
“Given all that is happening in our society today, we all have a collective and moral obligation to help one another in improving the conditions in our nation, especially for the poor,” said the religious leaders.
“Through the Gospel, may we discover that we have a Christian duty in this coming elections, and so, be able to break free from selfish reasons – be it political, familial, party, or regional – and to cast our votes according to what is right,” they said.
