More good tidings from the SC in the new year

With the year 2022 about to end, another bright prospect for enhancing the protection of our basic rights comes to us courtesy of the Supreme Court.

The fresh piece of good news was delivered by Chief Justice Alexander Gesmundo, who announced that the high tribunal has begun to draft the rules of procedure on how the Philippine courts will handle cases in relation to the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA) of 2020.

This law took effect on July 18, 2020 after being signed by then president Rodrigo Duterte. It had been approved by Congress following contentious discussions in both the House and the Senate.

ATA’s constitutionality was then questioned in 37 petitions by various concerned groups. Voting 9-6 on the consolidated petitions, the SC struck down two provisions of the law but upheld it as constitutional on Dec. 9, 2021 (the eve of International Human Rights Day).

But, Gesmundo explained, rendering the decision was not enough: “We went a step further to ensure the implementation of the antiterrorism law is properly done when it reaches the judicial process.”

His statement addresses a major criticism: that the Anti-Terrorism Council (ATC, the law’s implementing body) is an “administrative body that performs a judicial function,” with a senior magistrate describing as “very dangerous” the ATC’s authority to prolong up to 24 days the detention of individuals arrested without a court-issued warrant.

“We want to make sure,” the Chief Justice affirmed, “that there are specific rules governing the antiterrorism cases so that the rights of the people are respected, the right of the state is also equally protected.” Drawing up these rules will be the task of an ad hoc committee that has been created by the court.

Moreover, Gesmundo is hopeful that, by the first quarter of 2023, the public and “other stakeholders” (vis-à-vis the ATA) may be consulted on the ad hoc committee’s proposed rules of procedures. This is a democratic process that seems to be increasingly mentioned in the workings of the presently-constituted Court. We note that the chief magistrate said recently in a holiday message that Christmas serves as “a reminder of [the Judiciary’s] role as guardian of the people’s rights.”

The ad hoc committee is chaired by retired Chief Justice Reynato S. Puno, whose opinion as amicus curia (friend of the court) was heard by the SC during its deliberations on the 37 consolidated petitions. It was Puno who advised the SC, in May 2021, not to dismiss all the 37 petitions on the ground that the petitioners lacked legal standing (as urged by retired Justice Francis Jardeleza, the other amicus curia). The tribunal must resolve the petitions on their merits, he said, backing up the petitioners’ legal standing as they all challenged the ATA “because on its face, it infringes freedom of speech due to its vagueness and overbreadth.”

“A law that is vague and overly broad is considered as an immense evil and destructive of fundamental rights in a democratic regime,” Puno stressed, and therefore it should be “struck down at the earliest opportunity by anyone in the body politic.”

There are other “areas of constitutional concerns” to be found in the ATA, he pointed out; these involve the designation of terrorists, proscription, the arrest and prolonged detention without judicial warrants (no remedies provided) and surveillance.

As chief justice in 2007, Puno initiated the holding of a national summit, billed as “A Conspiracy of Hope,” on the alarming incidence of extrajudicial killings and enforced disappearances under the Gloria Arroyo administration.

Following that broad public consultation, the Puno court initiated the issuance of the writs of amparo (providing judicial protection to victims of enforced disappearances and their families, and to those whose life or liberty and security are under threat from state security forces) and habeas data (enabling those red-tagged, vilified and threatened by state security forces to demand and cause the removal of derogatory or contrived information against them from the files of intelligence agencies).

These SC issuances have since supplemented the writ of habeas corpus, long in effect and resorted to by aggrieved parties in the country, but generally found to have been an insufficient protection. In addition, the Puno Court also issued a writ of kalikasan, providing protection and relief against national disasters or the threat of disasters caused by human activities like mining.

As discussed in this space on Dec. 10, Senior Associate Justice Marvic Leonen, chairperson of the SC’s committee on human rights, had then announced he would very soon ask the court en banc to approve his proposed writ of kalayaan. This writ aims to assist various individuals and communities and call for action to resolve the bad conditions in the country’s jails and detention centers.

Justice Leonen also said then that the SC human rights committee would review the above-cited writs – their contents, impacts and operations, in order to make them more effective. During that review, the SC would consult the basic sectors of society, the government and its uniformed services.

Meantime, the Supreme Court en banc has issued a ruling affirming that it is “a constitutionally declared policy of the State” to protect the “rights of indigenous cultural communities to their ancestral lands to ensure their economic, social and cultural well-being.”

The ruling, promulgated on June 21 but made public only on Dec. 22, terminated a 2015 arbitral ruling which exempted the Lepanto Consolidated Mining Company from securing the free, prior and informed consent (FPIC, as provided by law) of ancestral domain dwellers in Benguet’s Mankayan town where the firm has mined gold and copper over many years. The exemption was granted to Lepanto Mining when it applied seven years ago for a 25-year renewal of its mineral production sharing agreement, which the Kankanaey community had strongly opposed.

As they say, hope springs eternal... May our hearts find reason to be truly glad this new year!

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