Philippines: fighting slum evictions with feces?
Residents in the Philippines hurl stones at policemen and members of a demolition team tasked with dismantling informal settlers’ homes at Paranaque City, south of Manila, on April 23, 2012.
On multiple occasions this year in the Philippines, construction crews and cops have faced off with irate slum residents defying eviction orders with stones and molotov cocktails.
Just this week, according to the Manila-based Inquirer, a slum being cleared for an industrial project turned into a battleground. An account in another Manila paper, the Examiner, reported one fatality and dozens of injuries in clashes that pit authorities with tear gas against locals with rocks and bottles.
How can locals fight back without sparking violent clashes?
One community leader interviewed by the ABS-CBN news outlet has a solution: when cops arrive later this month to his Parañaque City slum, slated for eviction, locals will be told to ditch the stones and instead fling "bags full of human waste, mud and chili-infused water."
Perhaps that will tone down the potential clash and prevent scenes such as this one, captured in January by the Philippines-based Tudla Productions film consortium in a San Juan slum being cleared for a new government center.