Human rights group hits national ID system

MANILA, Philippines - Human rights group Karapatan yesterday said the twin proposals from Congress to introduce a national identification system and to register phone SIM cards are bound to result in the curtailment of the right to privacy, free speech and civil and political rights.

“Such measures will aggravate the already bleak human rights situation in the country where human rights defenders and political dissenters are subjects of surveillance, threats, illegal arrests and detention, enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings,” said Karapatan secretary-general Cristina Palabay.

“The twin proposals seem to have been conspicuously timed when the Aquino administration and the Armed Forces of the Philippines have announced the intensification of their counter-insurgency program Oplan Bayanihan,” she added.

Albay Rep. Al Francis Bichara filed House Bill 11 proposing a national identification system for all Filipino citizens here and abroad to facilitate and streamline government transactions.

Senators Teofisto Guingona III, Tito Sotto and Bam Aquino are also pushing for the mandatory registration of all phone SIM cards to prevent criminal activities such as the recent bombing in Cagayan de Oro City.

But Karapatan noted “the proposals with such lame and unfounded bases open the floodgates for the wholesale violation of the people’s civil and political rights.”

“A more productive response to the need for an efficient system of delivering government service to the people is through the prioritization and allocation of necessary funds for social services instead of giving a lion’s share of public funds to the defense sector. ”