Guevarra sees no link between Duterte and high number of lawyers killed since 2016
MANILA, Philippines — Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra distanced President Rodrigo Duterte from the high number of lawyers killed so far during his presidency, despite independent tallies showing a huge difference in the the number of killings since 2016 compared to previous administrations.
In a Palace briefing on Monday, Guevarra said he knows that lawyers are aware of the dangers that come with their profession. “I am not in the position to say that there is link to whoever is the president to the number of killed lawyers or prosecutors or judges,” he said partly in Filipino.
“It’s difficult for me to relate the number of deaths and make a comparison, depending on who is the president of the Philippines. The president himself is a lawyer, do you think he will have a policy that… will be something that will put his fellow members in the legal profession in personal jeopardy or something to that effect? I don’t think so,” Guevarra added.
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But Duterte in 2016, months into his presidency, warned lawyers representing drug suspects over reports that some of their clients went back into the drug trade after having cases dismissed. "I will include them," he said, referring to the bloody "war on drugs."
An intelligence unit of the Calbayog City police last week also asked a local court to provide a list of lawyers representing supposed members of "communist terrorist groups", a government term for activist groups. The request was withdrawn after public clamor and national police leadership has distanced itself from the incident.
An Inquirer report suggests, however, that the request made to the Calbayog City court is not an isolated incident.
The Free Legal Assistance Group, in a tally made public Monday, said there have been 61 lawyers killed during the Duterte administration against 28 killed since 1972.
A separate list culled from Supreme Court and Department of Justice figures showed 49 killings from the dictatorship of Ferdinand Marcos to the Benigno Aquino III administration.
The number is still higher than the murders recorded in the five years of the Duterte administration.
Lawyers' groups have been putting pressure on government agencies, especially the Judiciary, to address the continuing attacks on members of the legal profession. The Supreme Court has been silent on the issue, but ordered an inventory on pending court cases amid “growing concern.”
Noted rights lawyer Evalyn Ursua earlier said they would also want to hear Duterte categorically call for an end to attacks on their profession. Ursua said they are also pinning their hopes on the SC to urge the executive, its co-equal branch, to address the attacks.
Government action late?
To date, the SC led in conducting meetings with lawyers’ groups and concerned government agencies in January. The high court and the Department of Justice have respectively ordered the creation of an inventory of cases related to violence against lawyers.
When the meetings were called in January, more than 50 lawyers had already been killed since 2016. Since these gatherings, another lawyer was violently attacked in Iloilo and survived an assassination attempt.
Asked why these dialogues were conducted only in January, Guevarra replied: “Better late than never.”
READ: With more than 50 lawyers killed since 2016, legal institutions meet on security issues
He said such issues have always been discussed, although informally, and when a member of the legal profession is attacked, investigations are done.
Guevarra said the dialogues earlier this year were brought about by “recent spate of killings,” but he asserted that there is “something being done about it.”
“Can we say that the dialogues were belated? No. You don’t know what will happen in the future. All of these are happening every day, we don’t know," he said.
"So right now, we do what needs to be done to minimize incidents like this, not only [members of] legal profession are becoming victims. There are many others, ordinary people and other professionals and so forth and so on."
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