On 2 December 2020, Amanda Echanis, a Filipina writer, poet and activist, was arrested at her home alongside her month-old baby and charged with illegal possession of firearms, ammunition and explosives, non-bailable offences. Echanis vehemently denies the allegation and has accused the authorities of planting evidence. According to Echanis’s legal representative, the police did not present a warrant until five hours after searches had commenced, violating due process. The police’s widespread misuse of warrants to detain activists and those critical of the government prompted the Philippines Supreme Court to pass a resolution in 2021 requiring officers to wear body cameras when serving warrants.

Echanis has been detained for over three and a half years. Hearings have repeatedly been postponed, denying her the opportunity to prove her innocence in court. The types of allegations made against Echanis are routinely levelled against those who have been ‘red-tagged’ – accused by the authorities of having links to communist insurgency groups. PEN, Amnesty International and other human rights groups have called on the government to end the practice of ‘red-tagging’, which has seen a rise in human rights violations, including harassment, intimidation and arbitrary arrest, against political activists.

In 1990, Echanis’s father, Randall Echanis, an activist for rural workers’ rights, was arrested on similar charges to those Amanda now faces. At the time, Amanda stayed at the custodial detention centre with her parents (less than two years old, she was considered the country’s youngest political prisoner). The case against Randall was dismissed in 1992. In August 2020, he and a neighbour were murdered at his home in Quezon City. The case remains unsolved and no one has been brought to justice for the crime. 

A creative-writing graduate of the Philippines High School for the Arts, Amanda Echanis published her first book in 2006. Entitled Tatlong Paslit na Alaala (‘Three Childhood Memories’), it is a collection of stage plays about the struggles that children from different socio-economic backgrounds endure. In 2014, she produced a screenplay, Nanay Mamen, which depicts the life of the celebrated anti-poverty activist Carmen ‘Nanay Mamen’ Deunida. 

In 2023, Echanis published a collection of poetry and essays from prison entitled Binhi ng Paglaya (‘Seeds of Liberation’). In the same year, she was awarded a Southeast Asian Translation Mentorship. 

In recent years other Filipino writers, journalists and activists have been detained for political reasons and faced false accusations. The poet, musician and activist Ericson Acosta was arrested in 2011 for illegal possession of explosives. He remained in prison until January 2013, when the Department of Justice dismissed the case, admitting that the allegations against him were groundless. Acosta was killed by the Philippine army in November 2022. Questions remain over the military’s claim that he died in a shootout.

In October 2019, police raids in Negros Occidental province and Metro Manila resulted in the arrest and detention of dozens of activists over allegations of illegal possession of firearms and explosives. These included Reina Mae Nasino, an organiser for Kadamay, a group campaigning for the urban poor, whose three-month-old baby died after being separated from her in custody on the instructions of a Manila court.

Since her arrest, Echanis has continued to write behind bars. The following is a poem she wrote in English in December 2020 called ‘Secret Lullabies’:

Hush, my baby,
stay calm, stay strong,
freedom is but a few dreams away.
So sleep, sleep, sleep,
and in your sleep,
we will sing loudly
the secret songs, secret lullabies
that I whisper, that I hum to you,
always.
Say hello to the mountains and fields,
we will never forget;
surely, their love for you is boundless,
endless and pure,
even though they are far away;
distance is but a few dreams away.
So sleep, sleep, sleep,
hush, my baby, stay calm, stay strong,
we will overcome
for we are free in spirit;
freedom is but a few dreams away
and in our freedom we will sing
the secret songs, secret lullabies.
They will be sung loudly
ever so proudly for everyone to hear,
awakening sleeping hearts and minds,
always. 

Readers might like to send appeals calling for the release of Amanda Echanis, urging the government of the Philippines to investigate the circumstances of her arrest, including allegations that evidence used against her was planted, and calling on the authorities to end the practice of ‘red-tagging’, which has had a terrible toll on writers, journalists and activists. Appeals to be addressed to:

Ferdinand Marcos Jr, President of the Philippines
Email: pace@op.gov.ph
Jesus Crispin Remulla, Secretary of Justice
Department of Justice
Email: osec@doj.gov.ph

His Excellency Teodoro L Locsin Jr
Embassy of the Republic of the Philippines
6–11 Suffolk Street, London SW1Y 4HG
Fax: 020 7930 9787 Email: embassy@philemb.co.uk