We join KADAMAY in strongly condemning the brutal and heinous killing of its national secretary general Carlito “Karletz” Badion Jr. We hold the fascist Duterte regime and the mercenary AFP-PNP highly accountable for this latest activist killing, now numbering to several hundreds,” according to KMP chairperson Danilo Ramos.   

According to reports from urban poor group Kalipunan ng Damayang Mahihirap (KADAMAY), unidentified armed assailants abducted Badion last May 26. He was reportedly tortured in a nearby coastal area in Barangay Guintigui-an, Ormoc City in Leyte province. Badion’s lifeless body was found two days later, near a highway in Ormoc City on May 28, 5:30 pm. His remains were reportedly burned. Before his death, Badion received death threats and was subjected to constant red-tagging. He was relocated in Leyte where was organizing urban poor communities.  

Badion was the long-time secretary-general of KADAMAY. He was among the many firebrand urban poor mass leaders who emerged during the Estrada administration after the July 2000 Payatas Tragedy in Quezon City that killed and buried hundreds in the dumpsite landslide. Over the decades, he joined and led most of Kadamay and the urban poor sector’s anti-demolition campaigns, campaign for livelihood, campaign for affordable mass housing, protests against price hikes and other anti-poor policies and programs of the government. 

In mid-2000s, Badion was with Kadamay in condemning the Northrail-Southrail Linkage Project that was part of the PNR modernization of the then Gloria Macapagal Arroyo admin. The said project displaced tens of thousands of urban poor living along the tracks stretching from Caloocan to Laguna.

For several electoral campaigns, Badion was also among those who actively supported Anakpawis Partylist, the partylist organization representing the urban and rural poor sectors — farmers, workers, vendors, fisherfolks, and rural women. 

In August 2012, Badion and Kadamay were the first to protest the Aquino government’s substandard mass housing projects after the massive flooding in Kasiglahan Village in Montalban, Rizal. More than 2,000 relocatees lost their homes and belongings in that year’s monsoon flooding.

Despite persistent attacks on the urban poor by the Duterte government in the Oplan Tokhang killings that targeted suspected drug personalities in urban poor communities, Badion stood ground as he led the urban poor and other sectors in exposing and protesting against Duterte’s anti-poor drug war. Badion was a genuine mass leader of the urban poor sector. Despite many hardships and challenges, he remained steadfast and determined in upholding the rights and welfare of the masses.

In March 2017, some 6,000 homeless urban poor won shelter after the successful Kadamay-led Occupy Bulacan which occupied idle government housing sites in Pandi, Bulacan. Since then, Kadamay became a persistent target of red-tagging and vilification by state forces, particularly the vile NTF-ELCAC led by General Antonio Parlade. 

“Badion or Ka Karletz, represented the voice of the urban poor and the downtrodden. He fiercely faced Mayors and leaders of local government units and the National Housing Authority in many dialogues and protests, he faced police officers and demolition units in numerous community barricades as the urban poor staunchly defended their houses and livelihood. He was a fearless leader of the urban poor and toiling masses. It is for this reason that cowardly state mercenaries desperately silenced him,” Ramos said.   

“We are enraged with this heinous act perpetrated by the Duterte regime which is now laying the foundation of a full-blown Martial Law through the railroading of the Anti-Terror Bills,” Ramos concluded. ###