SEVEN teachers and students who were arrested in Cebu in February have been released from detention after the Davao del Norte provincial prosecutor dropped the complaints filed against them.

Grade 10 students Moddie Mansimuy-at and Esmelito Oribawan, Grade 12 student Jomar Benag, volunteer teachers Chad Booc and Roshelle Porcadilla, and datus Benito Bay-ao and Segundo Melong were arrested when the Cebu City police raided the retreat house of the University of San Carlos-Talamban Campus on February 15.

They were released Friday evening.

The Office of the Provincial Prosecutor of Davao Del Norte dismissed the criminal charges filed against the seven for insufficiency of evidence and lack of probable cause.

The National Union of Peoples’ Lawyer-Cebu City chapter welcomed the dismissal.

“The indigenous peoples and their leaders have been victims of state terrorism because of their long history of struggle against the exploitation of their ancestral lands,” King Perez of NUPL-Cebu said.

“The raid of the bakwit school in USC Talamban Campus was intended to instill fear and thwart resistance by the Filipinos who have grown frustrated and restless with the administration’s anti-poor and anti-people policies,” Perez added.