The cost of human rights

The war on human rights has come to a head, with Sept. 12, 2017 being a date to remember. It was the day the House of Representatives voted, 119 to 32, in favor of slashing the Commission on Human Rights’ 2018 budget to a mere P1,000.

Rep. Rodante Marcoleta of SAGIP Partylist made the first move when he questioned why the Commission of Human Rights (CHR) hadn’t yet brought to justice those responsible for the slain SAF 44 in the 2015 Mamasapano clash. He was answered by the sponsor of the CHR bill, Cebu Representative Raul Del Mar, who clarified that the CHR could only examine in as far as the human rights aspect of the case was concern, and anything else was in the hands of investigative bodies. (According to a Supreme Court decision in 1991, 204 SCRA 483 or Cariño vs. CHR, the Supreme Court clearly states, “…it was not meant by the fundamental law to be another court or quasi-judicial agency in this country, or duplicate much less take over the functions of the latter. The most that may be conceded to the Commission in the way of adjudicative power is that it may investigate, i.e., receive evidence and make findings of fact as regards claimed human rights violations involving civil and political rights. But fact finding is not adjudication, and cannot be likened to the judicial function of a court of justice…” This means that the Commission cannot, after gathering evidence, institute any legal course of action or carry out a sentence. Its core function is as a means to check and balance, to ensure that justice is being served, rather than to exact justice itself.)

Then the most bizarre line of questioning, as documented by ABS-CBN News, occurs:

MARCOLETA: Does President Duterte have human rights?

DEL MAR: Everyone (does), Your Honor.

MARCOLETA: Does CHR think that the human rights of President Duterte were violated by New York Times?

DEL MAR: No, your honor… The journalist who wrote the editorial (has) freedom of expression, and secondly, public officials are held to abide by the standards set in our Constitution on human rights.

MARCOLETA: CHR was not concerned at all when the NY Times asked for world condemnation of the President?

DEL MAR: The CHR is there doing its job and cannot respond to each and every statement that is made. This is fundamental if we respect everybody’s right, human rights, the more we defend the President’s human rights.

Even stranger is that after this bizarre line of questioning as to whether it is the CHR’s responsibility to shield the ego of a nation’s leader, Marcoleta actually stumbles upon a valid point. He asks Del Mar which law actually created the CHR, and Del Mar responds that it was created by the Constitution and that its implementing legislation is Executive Order (EO) 163. This is contested by Marcoleta, and that’s where things gets sticky, because he’s not entirely wrong.

The Problem With The CHR

Article XIII of the 1987 Constitution states the mechanics of creating a Commission on Human Rights and clearly defines its powers. A portion of it, under section 17, states the following: “The term of office and other qualifications and disabilities of the Members of the Commission shall be provided by law. Until this Commission is constituted, the existing Presdential Committee on Human Rights shall continue to exercise its present functions and powers.” EO 163, signed by then President Corazon Aquino on May 5, 1987, was meant to function as the law providing the term of office, after it had abolished the Presidential Committee on Human Rights altogether. However, any executive order signed by then President Aquino only had the force of law up until Feb. 2, 1987, when the 1987 Constitution was promulgated. This makes the creation of CHR technically incomplete, being that while the Constitutional mandate is clear, the law that details the terms of those who serve within the Commission is nowhere to be found.

All this means is that gaping holes in the creation of the Commission on Human Rights do exist, and if legality was the concern of the current administration, it should’ve taken its case to the Supreme Court. Yet even as we speak, members of the Senate have already committed to fighting for the CHR’s original P678 million allocation, and it seems that the budget slash is one that won’t really see the light of day. What the act of reducing the CHR budget, especially with Marcoleta’s raising of the New York Times “issue” (quotation marks extremely necessary), leads us to assume is that this had little to do with the validity of the Commission itself. It wasn’t so much a vote as it was a statement and a message.

A Bullying Stance

The Commission on Human Rights, under various leaderships, has aggressively pursued its mandate. Senator Leila De Lima, who stood at its helm in 2009, investigated the alleged involvement of then Mayor Rodrigo Duterte in the Davao Death Squad. Current chairman Chito Gascon, according to President Duterte himself, earned the ire of the House of Representatives by actively investigating drug-related killings (what some people might call “actually doing his job”) and that is supposedly what triggered the budget slash. But as previously mentioned, this isn’t a commission that has much in the way of follow-through, as it is consistently at the mercy of other authorities.

This is further emphasized in a profile published by Esquire Philippines, where Gascon’s operations are characterized as such: “Its investigators look into state violations of human rights, but they can only provide recommendations to relevant authorities. It is up to a prosecutor to file a criminal case, and it is up to the police and the army to initiate internal administrative proceedings. They may choose to ignore the CHR, and they do so regularly, especially these days. ‘The anecdotal evidence,’ Gascon explains, ‘suggests that only 30 percent of our recommendations are ever considered.’ That’s if they can even investigate. With a staff of barely 600, Gascon must look into the over 3,500 deaths associated with Duterte’s war on drugs. As of late October, the CHR had initiated only 251 fact-finding inquiries, which were in various degrees of progress.” The CHR, already limited in its capacity, can and has been repeatedly ignored by institutions enabled to carry out any measure of justice. Yet it is consistently villified by the current administration, with the Speaker of the House himself repeatedly calling the commission ineffective and saying that if CHR wants its budget restored, Gascon must first step down. Frankly speaking, inefficiency is a post by which much Philippine governance is measured, so what is it about Gascon that sets him apart?

Feel The Fear

To pin down one commission in the middle of the playground and take its lunch money when all it can do is make recommendations that may never bear fruit. says more about the ones slashing its budget than the commission in question. Duterte supporters often say to those who’ve opposed tokhang that you have nothing to fear if you have nothing to hide. Likewise, you don’t shut someone down in such a bullying manner if they’re sincerely ineffective. You don’t send the mob or set fire to someone who looked too closely if there’s nothing there to see. That majority in the House of Representatives wasn’t really trying to convey a complete disregard for human rights altogether; they’ve already done that in other ways, several times over. What they were trying to do in this particular instance was theatrically convey a message: that they could strong-arm their way for results that favor their agenda, and that they could make good on longstanding threats. Gascon is where he is, reviled as he is, because he hit a nerve.

It is easy to be frightened by current events, and rightfully so. Václav Havel in The Power of the Powerless describes a system increasingly familiar to our own: “The post-totalitarian system touches people at every step, but it does so with its ideological gloves on. This is why life in the system is so thoroughly permeated with hypocrisy and lies: government by bureaucracy is called popular government; the working class is enslaved in the name of the working class; the complete degradation of the individual is presented as his or her ultimate liberation; depriving people of information is called making it available; the use of power to manipulate is called the public control of power, and the arbitrary abuse of power is called observing the legal code; the repression of culture is called its development; the expansion of imperial influence is presented as support for the oppressed; the lack of free expression becomes the highest form of freedom; farcical elections become the highest form of democracy; banning independent thought becomes the most scientific of world views; military occupation becomes fraternal assistance. Because the regime is captive to its own lies, it must falsify everything. It falsifies the past. It falsifies the present, and it falsifies the future. It falsifies statistics. It pretends not to possess an omnipotent and unprincipled police apparatus. It pretends to respect human rights. It pretends to persecute no one. It pretends to fear nothing. It pretends to pretend nothing.” 

Bullies display strength because they are vulnerable, and it’s clear that they are afraid — much more than we are of the blood in our streets and authorities we can’t trust. Their strength is in pretense, and it is fragile to any manner of prodding. They are afraid of what we might find if we look too close, what movement we may spark if we speak too loudly, what truth may surface if we keep asking questions. A thousand pesos wasn’t just a message, it was the exposition of an underbelly.