The news from Toboso is not just another headline. Nineteen lives were lost in a single armed encounter, human beings, not statistics.
On one side were those identified as members of the New People’s Army. On the other, soldiers of the state. Both Filipino. Both sons of mothers who will now mourn.
We must begin not with analysis, but with honesty. Something in our society remains deeply broken, and it continues to produce death.
It is tempting to reduce this to a “security success” or a “counterinsurgency incident.” But such language hides more than it reveals. Armed conflict in Negros did not begin with guns. It began long before, in conditions that have shaped the lives of generations.
It began with landlessness in a land of vast haciendas, with entrenched poverty in communities surrounded by wealth, with cycles of exploitation in sugar, labor, and wages, and with a justice system many perceive as distant or inaccessible. These are not abstract ideas. They are lived realities in the fields, coastal barangays, and upland sitios.
When young people take up arms, or are drawn into movements, we must ask what conditions made that path seem meaningful, or even necessary.
The tragedy of Negros is that we have normalized a cycle where violence answers violence. Armed struggle emerges from real and long-standing injustices. Military response seeks to restore order. Communities are displaced. Grievances deepen. Another generation takes up arms. And the cycle continues.
This is not victory. This is collective failure.
And this is not the first time. Negros has seen killings that shocked the nation, only to fade without full accountability.
Human rights defender Zara Alvarez was shot dead in Bacolod City in 2020 after years of documenting alleged abuses on the island. In 2019, Bernardino Patigas, a human rights advocate, was also killed, raising concerns among rights groups about attacks targeting activists.
The 2018 Sagay massacre, in which nine sugarcane farmers were killed on a plantation, exposed the dangers faced by those asserting land rights. In 2022, peace consultant Ericson Acosta and his companion Joseph Jimenez were killed in Kabankalan City, with the military saying they died in an encounter, while human rights groups alleged they had been captured and summarily executed.
More recently, in 2023, the killing of members of the Fausto family in Negros Occidental drew renewed attention to violence affecting civilians, with rights groups linking it to broader patterns of abuse.
Across these cases, a pattern emerges. Human rights organizations have pointed to persistent impunity, with accountability often elusive. Victims are often labeled as communist rebels, a practice widely referred to as red-tagging, which critics say places individuals at risk. Many of those killed are farmers, labor organizers, or advocates involved in longstanding agrarian disputes.
Without truth and justice, each new encounter does not stand alone. It becomes part of an unbroken pattern.
What is perhaps more disturbing is not only the violence, but the silence around its root causes. We have grown accustomed to inequality that feels permanent, corruption that feels inevitable, policies that exclude the poor, and a development model that leaves many behind. These are tolerated evils. They no longer shock us, and because they are tolerated, they continue to produce violence.
For generations, societies have tried to justify violence under certain conditions. Today, the scale and persistence of suffering demand a more urgent question. What would it mean to build a just peace?
A just peace is not merely the absence of gunfire. It is the presence of justice in land, labor, and livelihood, participation in governance, truth-telling and accountability, the healing of historical wounds, and the restoration of human dignity. It demands more courage than war, because it requires transformation, not domination.
The encounter in Toboso must not end in a body count. It must become a wake-up call. The conversation must return to root causes, not focus solely on armed actors. Peace processes must be inclusive, not reduced to military solutions. Rural development must be just and participatory. Communities caught in the crossfire must be protected. And accountability must be pursued, both for past and present abuses, so that justice is not delayed or denied.
Negros has long been portrayed through the lens of violence, unrest, and conflict. But this cannot be its only story. The people of Negros are not defined by gunfire. They are defined by their struggle for dignity, their resilience, and their longing for a just and lasting peace.
To change the future, we must also change the narrative, from one of recurring violence to one grounded in justice, peace, and shared humanity.
Negros is fertile land. It was never meant to grow graves.
If we listen carefully, the blood spilled on its soil cries out not for revenge, but for justice.
Unless we heed that cry, we will read this same headline again, and again, and again.
+Bishop Gerardo A. Alminaza
Diocese of San Carlos
President, Caritas Philippines
