It was a phenomenal and stimulating experience. The talks were very informative and the interactions among the participants were just inspiring and heartening. It was indeed a meeting at the mount aintop where the fresh wind of sincerity and openness was blowing all around while erstwhile protagonists came face to face in the spirit of amity and goodwill. I thought that the friendly one-on-one dialogues between the rabid activists and the dedicated military officers during session breaks were the defining moments of that “National Consultative Summit on Extrajudicial Killings and Enforced Disappearances” last July 16-17, 2007 at Manila Hotel. It fits the description of another summit, the biblical “holy mountain filled with the knowledge of the Lord” where there is “no harm or ruin’ and where “the wolf shall be a guest of the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid. The calf and the young lion shall browse together with a little child to guide them. The cow and the bear shall be neighbors, together their young shall rest. The lion shall eat hay like the ox. The baby shall play by the cobra’s den and the child lay his head on the adder’s lair” (Isaiah 11, 1-9).
According to one of the participants who reported for his workshop group, the “convening capacity” of the Supreme Court indeed provided a “safe space” for all the parties to meet and engage in a frank and free exchange of their deepest feelings and difficult situations. There was empathy on both sides as the usual suspect which is the military, and the commonly perceived victims who are the left-leaning activists and dissenters advocating radical changes in the socio-economic and political system, were able to place themselves into the “shoes” of each other.
The military men were able to point out that it was never their intention to harm or kill or violate the human rights of their fellow Filipinos. But in fulfilling their role as protector of the people and the State, they are fighting an almost “invisible” enemy who are not bound by the rules which they in turn are required to observe. Hence in some extreme cases where it becomes a matter of self defense and defense of the State, they are only forced to engage the “enemies” through the same “dirty” methods used against them. The irony is that the same methods which they are only forced to use under extremely exceptional circumstances are now more commonly attributed to them than to the “enemies of the State”. Hence it becomes easy for the other side to commit these extrajudicial killings (EJK) and enforced disappearances (ED) and pin the blame on them. Indeed the enemy even uses military uniforms to perpetrate their illegal acts and carry out their unlawful activities.
The “victims” or their families, relatives and friends on the other hand pointed out that they are indiscriminately and invariably labeled as “enemies of the state” when most of them are merely individuals or groups who openly defend the civil, political, social, economic and cultural rights of the people. Others are staunch political activists and dissenters defending human rights and preventing a repeat of the repressions during the martial law regime. While still many others are only intimidated into giving aid and comfort to perceived enemies of the state precisely because of lack of adequate protection from the State itself. While there are no concrete evidence implicating the military to these killings and disappearances, there are enough circumstances all pointing to their culpability. Besides, the employment by their perceived enemies of dirty tactics without any rules does not justify them to engage in the same methods especially because they have all the powers and resources of the State that enable them to act within the rule of law. Two wrongs do not a right make.
The beauty of the two-day conference also lies on the composition of the participants and its methodology that enables the participants to get a view of the problems not only on the ground but also from the top; to see the forest from among the trees; to sift the facts from purely unfounded claims and allegations.
The workshop participants came from both the government and non-government sectors that presented real and concrete problems and came up with feasible and effective solutions. More specifically they are representatives from the AFP/PNP/NBI, the Prosecution service, Judges from specially designated court on EJK and ED, Associate Justice of the CA, members of Congress, Cabinet secretaries, Integrated Bar, CHR, academe, religious sector, civil society (representing victims’ families), media and even sociologists. These participants were broken into 12 groups chaired by a Justice of the Supreme Court.
This summit that provided a view from the top thus enabled the participants to come up with concrete and doable proposals addressed to the Legislative, Executive and Judicial Department. More significant of these proposals are: (1) for the legislative to enact a law defining and classifying extrajudicial killings and enforced disappearances as special crimes with separate and specific and more severe punishments; (2) for the executive to upgrade the scientific and investigative techniques of the police, to expand the power of the public prosecutor in preliminary investigations of EJK and ED so as to include the power to conduct ocular inspection of safehouses and possible places of detention and examination of documents towards a certain speedy and swift prosecution and punishment, to strengthen the witness protection program, to provide ample protection and financial assistance to victims so that they will not be forced to “settle” their complaints; (3) for the judiciary to revise the rules concerning the writ of habeas corpus by allowing search and ocular inspection of the possible places where the victims are being hidden and detained, to allow would be victims to apply for protection orders from the courts through what is known as writ of amparo, to apply the doctrine of command responsibility at least to commanders of the military in the area where the EJK or ED occurred, and to exclude from the rule on presumption of regularity in the performance of official duties, cases against state agents involved in EJK or ED.
The Filipino people is truly grateful to SC Chief Justice Reynato Puno and Associate Justices Leonardo Quisumbing, Consuelo Ynares-Santiago, Angelina Sandoval-Gutierrez, Antonio Carpio, Alicia Austria Martinez, Renato Corona, Conchita Carpio-Morales, Adolfo Azcuna, Dante Tinga, Minita Chico-Nazario, Cancio Garcia, Presbyterio Velasco Jr. and Antonio Nachura, for this unprecedented and landmark summit conference.
E-mail us at jcson@pldtdsl.net