Fr. Flaviano “Flavie” Villanueva turned his Ramon Magsaysay Award into a rallying cry for truth and justice on Friday, dedicating the honor to the victims of the country’s bloody war on drugs.
In his acceptance speech, he said the recognition was “never about me,” but about “the many lives and hands that gave it meaning” — the homeless, the grieving mothers, and volunteers who serve despite exhaustion and fear.
“When injustice persists, silence wounds the soul,” Villanueva said. “To stop the bleeding, we need to start the healing — and to start the healing, we must continue asking the difficult questions.”
A Society of the Divine Word missionary known for helping victims’ families and the homeless, urged President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to establish an “EJK Truth Commission” to investigate thousands of drug war killings.
READ: Cardinal David urges Marcos to form ‘truth’ body on drug war killings
“How many were truly killed? Who were the perpetrators?” he asked, citing their study showing around 322 men in uniform and at least a thousand civilians possibly involved in the killings.
At one point, Villanueva held up a list of victims of extrajudicial killings — names, he said, that “will never appear on plaques but once appeared in the news, judged, maltreated, and even branded as those who fought back, even if [they] were lies.”
The priest founded the Arnold Janssen Kalinga Center, which provides meals, hygiene services, and psychosocial care to Manila’s street dwellers.
In 2016, at the height of the drug war killings, he launched Project Paghilom to provide widows and orphans of victims with grief counseling, legal aid, livelihood training, and educational support.
He described the honor as “not a medal to display, but a mission to renew,” saying mercy must continue to “wash the tired feet of our nation” until dignity is restored to the forgotten and oppressed.
“Hope is what the poor have taught me,” he said. “They have shown me that dignity can rise even from the streets, that kindness is stronger than cruelty, and that love — when lived — is the only revolution that lasts.”
The Ramon Magsaysay Award, regarded as Asia’s highest honor, cited Villanueva for his “transformative compassion” and for restoring dignity to the marginalized through concrete acts of mercy.
Villanueva is one of this year’s three awardees, along with marine conservationist Shaahina Ali of the Maldives and India’s Educate Girls, a nonprofit promoting education in rural communities.
