ILOILO City – Drivers and commuters staged a protest likening relentless fuel price increases and alleged government inaction to the suffering of Christ at Calvary, dramatizing what they described as the “kalbaryo” now endured daily by ordinary Filipinos.
Under the theme “Kalbaryo sang Pumuluyo,” protesters converged at gasoline stations of Petron, Caltex, and Shell in Jaro district, using Holy Week imagery to drive home their message.
A jeepney driver carried a black wooden cross while being symbolically whipped by individuals portraying President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. and United States President Donald Trump — an act organizers said mirrors the burden placed on the public by rising oil prices.
Participants wore black paper chains and recited the “Seven Last Words”, drawing parallels between Christ’s agony and the worsening socioeconomic strain faced by drivers, commuters, and low-income households.
The Holy Tuesday March 31 protest also blamed the surge in oil prices to global tensions, particularly the ongoing United States- Israel conflict with Iran, which demonstrators said threatens oil supply and further drives up fuel costs.
The protest culminated at Jaro Plaza, where cause-oriented group Bagong Alyasang Makabayan (BAYAN-Panay) Elmer Forro reiterated calls for urgent government intervention, including scrapping fuel taxes and the Oil Deregulation Law.
“BAYAN-Panay stands in full solidarity with the people. At a time when workers, drivers, farmers, fisherfolk, and ordinary consumers have been crushed by relentless price increases for more than three weeks, the Ferdinand Marcos Jr. regime shamelessly insists that ‘everything is normal’ and that ‘there is no crisis.’ Nothing could be further from the truth,” Forro said.
“There is a crisis — and it is a crisis created and sustained by the government’s own anti-people policies. The situation has been further aggravated by US aggression against Iran, which has heightened global oil instability and placed Filipino workers, especially overseas Filipino workers in the Middle East, in danger and uncertainty,” he insisted.
Forro also criticized the government’s declaration of a national energy emergency under Executive Order No. 110.
“The regime’s declaration of a ‘national energy emergency’ only exposes its failure to confront the roots of the problem. Instead of dismantling decades of oil deregulation and corporate control, the government is scrambling to manage a crisis it refuses to solve. This so-called emergency is not for the people, it is for the protection of big oil and profit,” he said.
He further alleged excessive pricing and corporate profiteering in the oil industry.
“While authorities claim supply is stable and will last until the end of April, fuel prices have skyrocketed without restraint. This is nothing less than brazen profiteering — reaching more than 120% in overpricing, at the direct expense of the Filipino people,” Forro said.
The group pushed for immediate measures, including fuel price controls, rollback of prices to P 55 per liter, removal of excise tax and VAT on petroleum products, and the scrapping of the Oil Deregulation Law.
“The crisis we face is not inevitable, it is political. And it demands a political response,” Forro said.
He warned that protests would intensify if the government fails to act.
“In response, we, the people, will exercise our legitimate rights. The people’s strike is a just and necessary action against a regime that refuses to listen,” he added./PN
