Slain IFI bishop laid to rest today

Aglipayan Bishop Alberto Ramento will be laid to rest today, 10 days after he was killed by alleged robbers inside his room at the Aglipayan Cathedral in Tarlac City.

The Iglesia Filipina Independiente (IFI) said Ramento’s remains will be cremated after a solemn requiem at 8 a.m. at the Aglipayan national cathedral in Manila.

Aglipayan leaders vowed to pursue justice for the slain 69-year-old bishop as they continued to reject police claims that the case was a mere robbery with homicide.

Police have arrested four suspects, but the followers of Ramento, who headed the IFI’s supreme council of bishops, and militant groups believe that he was a victim of a "political killing" because of his human rights activism.

In a condemnation rally at Liwasang Bonifacio in Manila yesterday, Aglipayan clerics as well as Ramento’s relatives and sympathizers insisted that the case did not end with the arrest of his alleged killers.

Organizers of the protest march, attended by over 1,000 members of the Aglipayan Church and civic and militant groups, said they wanted to show the government that they reject the police findings.

IFI Supreme Bishop Godofredo David said they would continue to believe that Ramento’s killing had something to do with his stance against the Arroyo administration unless a more credible investigation shows otherwise.

"We still view with skepticism the findings of the Philippine National Police that the killing of Bishop Ramento was a mere case of robbery with homicide. We conducted our own investigation and evidence showed that the killers’ motive was not only to rob," David said.

Bishop Ephraim Fajutagana, IFI general secretary, said he finds the police findings "very suspicious and hasty."

"It seems that the police are trying to protect the powerful people behind Bishop Ramento’s murder," he said.

An autopsy report showed that Ramento sustained "multiple stab wounds in the chest and back, resulting in the perforation of the heart and lungs and external hemorrhage."

The IFI tapped legal and medical experts for an independent investigation and found that Ramento was killed " in a very quick way" while he was asleep.

There were reportedly no defensive wounds or signs of struggle found in the body of the bishop, prompting the private investigators to believe the killing was intentional.