President Estrada heeded calls by the Catholic Church yesterday to suspend judicial executions until January next year, saving 18 convicts from death this year.
The President said spiritual adviser Bishop Teodoro Bacani had personally requested him to implement the moratorium.
"Because of the request of Bishop Bacani, I will implement a moratorium until January next year. It didn't matter that the presidential conscience committee had been divided on the issue. It is the sole prerogative of the President to implement a moratorium or not," Mr. Estrada said during an informal press conference at Malacañang.
Cotabato Archbishop Orlando Quevedo, president of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines (CBCP), lauded the President's moratorium order.
"His decision comes from a compassionate heart. It gives breathing space for the many prisoners languishing on death row, in keeping with the religious spirit of the Great Jubilee," Quevedo said in a statement.
Church leaders earlier appealed to Mr. Estrada to impose the 2000 moratorium out of respect for the lubilaeum - the 2,000th anniversary of the birth of Jesus Christ.
The President clarified that the deferment of executions does not mean there will be a commutation of sentences.
"It is only a suspension of the executions. There will be no general commutation," he pointed out.
Earlier, however, Executive Secretary Ronaldo Zamora pointed out that calls by the Church to suspend judicial executions this year could face legal obstacles.
Zamora, who heads the presidential committee that reviews death sentences, explained that a moratorium would effectively commute the death sentences of at least 18 convicts scheduled to be executed this year to life in prison because authorities would not be able to execute them within a prescribed six-month period.
Under the death penalty law, an execution should be carried out not earlier than one year and not later than 18 months after a death sentence has been declared final by the Supreme Court (SC).
Five people had been lined up for execution in the next two months. The first would have been child rapist Victor Esteban, who had been scheduled to die on March 29.
The country has executed seven men by lethal injection since the death penalty was reimposed in 1994 in response to widespread crime.
Since then, more than 1,000 people have been sentenced to death and at least 80 death sentences have been upheld by the SC.
The President has said he wants the executions to serve as a warning to would-be criminals, especially potential rapists and drug traffickers.
Opponents, however, say there has been no convincing proof anywhere in the world that capital punishment effectively deters crime. -- With wire reports