Defending Paradise: Heroes Talk About their Battle to Save Palawan
Palawan appears to be an idyllic tropical island. Its powder-white beaches and lush forests have made it one of Asia’s hottest new tourist destinations. But for a tiny network of environmental crusaders trying to protect its spectacular natural resources, it is more akin to a battlefield.
Delikado is a documentary that follows Bobby, Tata, and Nieves, three magnetic leaders of this network, as they risk their lives in David versus Goliath-style struggles to try and stop politicians and businessmen from destroying the Philippines’ “last ecological frontier”.
Nieves Rosento on the campaign trail in the May 2019 elections
It is a timely film emblematic of the struggles globally for land defenders as they are being killed in record numbers trying to save natural resources from being plundered by corporations and governments. As the world faces its sixth-mass extinction and the climate emergency worsens, Delikado offers a story of courage and resilience to inspire others into action.
It is also a unique expose of former president Rodrigo Duterte’s war on drugs in the Philippines, which claimed thousands of lives and which the International Criminal Court of Justice has said may amount to a crime against humanity. Delikado shows the drug war was used as a tool for politicians to control the levers of economic and political power.
Tata Balladares and other PNNI para-enforcers walk through a patch of destroyed mangrove forest
Delikado offers a story of courage and resilience to inspire others into action.
For eight years now, environmental organization Global Witness has named the Philippines one of the deadliest places in Asia for environmental defenders.
Forest rangers and anti-logging advocates have been murdered, hacked to death, and threatened. There were 29 documented killings of people who were protecting their lands and ecosystems in 2021 alone. And yet, for lawyer Robert “Bobby” Chan, the task of preserving Palawan's natural resources falls to no one but themselves.
"I have friends who died doing this. Sometimes when I hear the critics say we should not do it because people get killed. I know. That is a good argument ... There is a spirit that tells me we have to do it because nobody else will," Chan says in the trailer of Delikado, an enviro-thriller documentary directed by journalist Karl Malakunas.
The Palawan NGO Network Inc. (PNNI) executive director sits at the veranda of the organization's office, an ordinary building, save for a tree installation made of chainsaws that he and his team have confiscated from illegal loggers.
Tata Balladares rests on a fallen tree while searching for illegal loggers in forests of southern Palawan, Rizal, Palawan
Environment crusaders like Chan have dedicated their lives to protecting Palawan from mining, illegal fishing, illegal logging, and agribusiness.
In the 96-minute documentary, Malakunas follows Chan, former El Nido Mayor Nieves Rosento, and land defender Efren “Tata” Balladares in their fight against environmental ruin. What's at stake in their crusade are their homes; the Palawan rainforests—which are one of the oldest and most diverse in Asia; and the centuries-old customs and traditions of its indigenous peoples.
Delikado premiered at Hot Docs Canadian International Film Festival in April this year and has since reaped recognition from all over the globe. It won the Sustainable Future Award and Audience Award: Best Documentary #2 at the Sydney Film Festival; Special Jury Prize: Best Documentary Feature at Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival; and Special Mention: Best International Feature at Doc Edge, New Zealand. The film was also featured at Sheffield Docfest, Human Rights Watch Film Festival, and MountainFilm.
On August 13, at 3:30 p.m., audiences will get the chance to watch the gripping documentary at the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP) Main Theater (Tanghalang Nicanor Abelardo) for its Philippine premiere.
