The House of Representatives on Tuesday postponed deliberations on the Palace-backed death penalty on a question of quorum raised by Buhay party-list Rep. Lito Atienza, a staunch anti-death penalty proponent.
But even as the House decided to reset the deliberations on the proposed bill, left-leaning lawmakers belonging to the Makabayan bloc said it would reject the proposed measure, saying its enactment will only empower police and military officials to commit human rights violations.
Atienza had insisted that there were only 162 House members present during the proposed debate, contrary to the claim of Deputy Majority Leader and Marikina Rep. Miro Quimbo, who said that there were 224 members present.
Quimbo said the number was enough to proceed with the sponsorship speech to House Bill 4727 by Oriental Mindoro Rep. Reynaldo Umali, chairman of the House committee on justice.
Quimbo said the result of the roll call was accurate, but Atienza rejected his claim, prompting the suspension of the session,
The House instead reset the deliberations for today, Wednesday.
Atienza has found an ally in the Makabayan Bloc, which opposes the passage of House Bill 4727 which seeks to restore death penalty. The measure is among the priority legislation of the Duterte administration.
“We are against this measure because it is anti-poor; an historic tool for suppressing political dissent; prone to abuse by corrupt police, military, and other state agents; and ultimately, an ineffective deterrent against criminality, rooted in mass poverty and an unjust social system,” the group led by Bayan Muna Rep. Carlos Zarate said.
Zarate said the revival of capital punishment “is a guillotine poised over the necks of the poor.”
“The poor, oppressed, and the marginalized, who cannot afford adequate legal representation, will inevitably populate death row, rather than the plunderers and human rights violators with deep pockets and a phalanx of lawyers at their disposal,” Zarate said.
He added that the death penalty is prone to abuse by corrupt police, military, and other state agents.
“We have seen corrupt members of the Philippine National Police performed acts of extortion, kidnapping, extrajudicial killings, and other crimes, especially against the poor, in the name of this administration’s so-called war on drugs,” Zarate said.
The group stressed the broadened definition of heinous crimes in HB 4727 provides yet more opportunities for extortion, planting of evidence, filing of trumped-up cases, and the like.
The death penalty bill, principally authored by Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez, proposes to impose death penalty on more than than 20 heinous offenses, such as rape with homicide, kidnapping for ransom, and arson with death.
Alvarez earlier stressed the need for Congress “to reinvigorate the war against criminality by reviving a proven deterrent coupled by its consistent, persistent and determined implementation, and this need is as compelling and critical as any.”
But the Makabayan Bloc pointed out that the restoration of capital punishment is not an effective deterrent against criminality.
“The deterrent effect of the death penalty has been repeatedly debunked by studies made worldwide,” the group said.
In the Philippines, they said, even with the reinstatement of the death penalty in December 1993, the crime rate increased.
In 1999, the year that Leo Echegaray was executed, the national crime volume, instead of abating, increased by 15.3 percent or a total of 82,538 (from 71,527 crimes in the previous year), the group added, quoting the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism.
“Reimposition of the death penalty, combined with the move to lower criminal liability; the rampage of killings of thousands of suspected drug offenders from among the poor; and the continuing offensive military operations by state security forces are alarming signs of rising state fascism in defense of an inequitable and unjust social order which the people must vigorously oppose,” the Makabayan Bloc stressed.
President Rodrigo Duterte has said he would want the capital punishment by hanging reimposed. Duterte also vowed to carry out at least 50 executions a month to serve as a strong deterrent against criminality.
Republic Act 7659 or the Death Penalty Law was abolished in 1986 during the term of former President Corazon Aquino. It was restored by former President Fidel V. Ramos in 1993, and was suspended again in 2006 by then president and now Pampanga Rep. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.