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Anakpawis Party-list Rep. Crispin Beltran died Tuesday, when he fell
from the roof of his house in Bulacan province and sustained severe
head injuries.
He was pronounced dead at 11:48 a.m. after
doctors at the Far Eastern University Hospital in Quezon City failed
to revive him. His remains were brought later to the Cathedral of
the Philippine Independent Church along Taft Avenue in Manila.
Malacañang, which had once charged Beltran with
rebellion, mourned his death. “We mourn the untimely demise of one
of the most respected labor leaders in the country, Rep. Crispin
Beltran,” Deputy Palace Spokesman Anthony Golez said in a
statement.
Golez said the 75-year-old “Ka Bel,” as the
lawmaker was popularly known, was a respected member of the House of
Representatives, where he represented the interests of the working
class.
Normally, government’s message about Beltran
was acrimonious. Just a week ago, the Arroyo government filed a new
set of charges against Beltran and three other left-wing party-list
representatives, implicating them in killings allegedly done by the
underground communist movement.
In 2007, a court eventually threw out the
rebellion charge against Beltran, but not before he was forced to be
in “hospital arrest” in 2006 at the Philippine Heart Center to
recuperate from a weakened heart.
Condolences pour in
Bayan Muna Party-list Rep. Satur Ocampo said,
“Ka Bel’s death wish is to die in action fighting for our cause.
He said he is already old, and he wanted his death [to be] a
meaningful one.”
“I know that Ka Bel is not happy the way he
died, because he always claimed he wanted to die [in a] way [that]
everybody will remember his contribution to the nation as an
activist,” Ocampo added.
Sen. Francis Pangilinan said the lawmaker’s
death is a “tremendous loss, not only for the Beltran family and
friends, but for Philippine democracy.”
Sen. Richard Gordon, for his part, said, “He
[Beltran] was a man of great conviction whose work as a labor leader
had been seen and felt in the long years spent fighting for the
welfare and interests of every Filipino working man [and] made known
a view that needed to be heard and represented.”
Makati City Mayor Jejomar Binay, who had once
been a labor lawyer, described Beltran as “the working class,
[and] when he speaks of labor issues, he speaks not only from his
head but from his heart and soul.”
Gabriela Women’s Party officials said, “We
have lost a most formidable ally of workers, peasants and the urban
poor,” saying Beltran “has lived a worthy life in defense of the
rights of workers and the toiling masses.”
Unfinished business
Beltran was to file a bill Tuesday calling for
the repeal of the value-added tax on power. Family members said that
on the day he died, he was preparing to go to Congress but decided
to finish some chores first.
Beltran was the sectoral representative of
Anakpawis, which roughly translates to “toiling masses,” in the
Thirteenth and Fourteenth Congresses. He previously represented
another party-list group, Bayan Muna, from 1998 to 2004.
He was consistently the poorest legislator. In
his latest statement of assets and liabilities, he reported to own
P110,000 worth of assets, had liabilities of P60,000, and a net
worth of P50,000.
True to his working-class interests, he sat in
the committees on agrarian reform, labor and employment, cultural
minorities, rural development, housing and urban development, and
human rights, people participation and rural development, among
others.
He was also in the committees on appropriations,
aquaculture and fisheries resources, civil service and professional
regulation, cooperatives development and energy, foreign affairs,
government enterprises and privatization, government reorganization,
and others.
He had filed bills providing for genuine
agrarian reform, across the board increases in wages and salaries,
revision of tax laws, and repeal of the Human Security Act and of
the Electric Power Industry Reform Act.
Married to Rosario Soto Beltran, he was born on
January 7, 1933, in Bacacay, Albay. He did not finish his
engineering courses in the Philippine School of Arts and Trade and
the Far Eastern University.
Since the early 1980s, he has served as chairman
of the militant labor federation, Kilusang Mayo Uno (May 1
Movement), which had spearheaded several labor strikes.
-- Angelo S. Samonte, Jomar Canlas and Sammy Martin
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